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Taxation, Warfare, and the Early Fourteenth Century 'Crisis' in the North: Cumberland Lay Subsidies, 1332-1348 Author(s): Chris Briggs Source: The Economic History Review, New Series, Vol. 58, No. 4 (Nov., 2005), pp. 639-672Published by: on behalf of the Wiley Economic History SocietyStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3698794Accessed: 07-07-2015 12:16 UTC

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Economic History Review, LVIII, 4 (2005), pp. 639-672

Taxation, warfare, and the early fourteenth century 'crisis' in the north: Cumberland lay subsidies,

1332-13481 By CHRIS BRIGGS

The causes and symptoms of England's economic problems in the first half of the fourteenth century were unusually varied and complex. It is generally agreed that in the three or four decades preceding the Black Death of 1348-9, roughly two centuries of demographic and economic growth came to an end. Yet in seeking to chart trends before the plague more closely, and to identify their key determinants, commentators have found it much harder to reach consensus. The effects of population pres- sure, 'feudal' social relations, and environmental disaster have been among the issues given greatest emphasis.2 War, however, stands out as a root cause of many features of the 'crisis' of this period. Although in the later 1330s and 1340s in particular the wider repercussions of war in Scotland and France were profound, most English localities felt them only indirectly through heavy taxation and the disruption of overseas trade. By contrast, in the northern counties of Cumberland, Westmorland, Northumberland, Durham, and, on occasion, Lancashire and Yorkshire, Anglo-Scottish warfare was also experienced at first hand as a direct 'shock' to the economy.

Clearly, the killing, destruction, and plunder involved in the characteristic cross-border raiding of this conflict had the potential to act as prime mover in economic dislocation across a large area of the kingdom. In the older historiography of the fourteenth century borders, warfare did indeed tend to feature as the cardinal fact in the fortunes of the region, its effects seen as both geographically widespread and uniform over time.3 More recently, however, work by Lomas and McNamee, building on an approach pio- neered by Kershaw, has used the available local series of estate accounts to undertake increasingly sophisticated explorations of the consequences of

' Research for this article was funded by Trinity College, Cambridge, and the British Academy. I thank Adam Green for his expert help, and Mark Bailey, John Hatcher, Leigh Shaw-Taylor, Paul Warde, and anonymous referees for comments on earlier drafts. I am grateful to Philip Stickler, of the Cartographic Unit, Department of Geography, University of Cambridge, for drawing the maps. The author bears sole responsibility for any errors.

2 Campbell, ed., Before the Black Death; Hatcher and Bailey, Modelling the middle ages. 3 For example, Bouch, Prelates and people, pp. 63-8; VCH Cumberland, II, pp. 254-68; Miller, War in

the north.

? Economic History Society 2005. Published by Blackwell Publishing, 9600 Garsington Road, Oxford OX4 2DQ, UK and 350 Main Street, Malden, MA 02148, USA.


640 CHRIS BRIGGS

border warfare.4 This work reaches revisionist conclusions, emphasizing the narrowness of the active war zone, and the importance of developments unconnected with warfare. In particular, it makes efforts to disentangle the impact of the agrarian crisis of 1315-22 from the results of contemporary Scottish depredations. It also seeks to distinguish the long- and short-term effects of raiding, pointing to the speedy recovery achieved in many places.

The estate accounts detailing changes in rents and tithes used by Lomas and McNamee to argue for the complexities of the border situation are thinly scattered, however, and relate almost exclusively to Durham Priory lands located in northeastern England. Like their predecessors, therefore, recent historians of border warfare have been obliged to rely most heavily on the records of English central government. Perhaps because of their more even geographical coverage, the central records continue to form the major part of the foundation for explorations of the relationship between warfare and economic catastrophe in the region.

In particular, the crown's practice of allowing the northern counties exemptions and concessions with respect to lay taxation because of Scottish attacks remains a very widely cited indicator of the areas affected by war and the seriousness of its impact. It is true that in his account of raids between 1306 and 1328, McNamee was largely able to sideline taxation evidence in favour of estate documentation that permits the effects of war to be examined under the microscope.Yet for periods and parts of the north where such local estate evidence is unavailable, some reliance on evidence of success or failure in paying tax is inevitable when the economic impact of warfare is under consideration. It is not surprising, for example, that taxation material figures so prominently in Summerson's account of Carlisle and the western part of the border region in the 1330s and 1340s.5 Yet in view of the weight that has traditionally (and understandably) been placed on the taxation evidence, it is striking that there has not been more critical research specifically focused on the negotiations and processes involved in levying subsidies in the north in the reigns of the three Edwards. A short paper published almost a century ago by the author of the classic work on the medieval lay subsidies remains the most substantial treatment of the subject.6 Most historians have been content to use taxation data after noting simply that claims of inability to contribute to royal levies are likely to be exaggerated, but without probing further into the taxation process itself.

This study carries out such an investigation into the process of taxing the north as part of a consideration of an unusually rich series of Cumberland

4 McNamee, Wars of the Bruces, pp. 72-165; Lomas, North-East England, pp. 54-74; Lomas, 'Impact of border warfare'; Kershaw, Bolton Priory; Kershaw, 'A note'; see also Tuck, 'War and society'.

5 Summerson, Medieval Carlisle, I, pp. 263-95; for taxation evidence on the impact of later fourteenth century warfare, see Macdonald, Border bloodshed, pp. 95, 114-15, 142; Winchester, Landscape, pp. 44-7, and Kershaw, 'A note', use taxation evidence in addition to estate records to assess the impact of warfare; Campbell, 'North-South dichotomies', pp. 157, 161, largely attributes the decline between 1334 and 1524-5 in the northern counties' share of national taxable wealth to the ongoing effects of warfare.

6 Willard, 'Scotch raids'. ? Economic History Society 2005


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taxation records surviving for the period 1332-48, material which at first glance appears to hold out the prospect of providing valuable insights into the economic impact of warfare. The article asks how far the pattern of exemptions secured and payments made by the county and its communities at this time can be regarded as a faithful reflection of the destruction of movable property by raiding parties.7

In assessing the Cumberland taxation evidence, it is necessary to take account of the arguments of the 'revisionists' referred to above, which stress that levels of taxable wealth were determined not only by the direct effects of war but also by its indirect consequences, such as depopulation stimu- lated by fear of attack, and by other economic difficulties shared with the rest of England. Population and economic resources are naturally of great importance in determining taxation revenue, and in spite of the difficulties they pose, it is clearly appropriate to turn to taxation sources when attempting to gauge changes in a region affected by war, especially when little other evidence is available. However, taxation was also an invariably contentious political issue in late medieval England, and this was perhaps especially true in the fourteenth century border counties. As Macdonald has argued, an important aspect of the 'alienation' that has been seen as characteristic of fourteenth century border society was resentment of interference by central government in the region. One focus of this hostility to central authority lay in concerns about the legitimacy of taxing a war zone while failing to provide adequately for the defence of the kingdom. When evaluating the process of taxation in Cumberland and the records it generated, therefore, it is also necessary to consider the role of local attitudes to the fiscal claims of a distant government.8

I The county of Cumberland was among the most heavily affected by Scottish incursions in the first half of the fourteenth century. The series of major raids launched by King Robert I, especially during his ascendancy after the battle of Bannockburn (1314), resulted in the complete exemption of the county from each of the six lay subsidies levied from 1313 to 1327.9 The decision to exempt Cumberland and other counties from taxation in this period is traditionally seen as recognition of their impoverishment following Scottish attacks.1" During that phase of the war, which was

7 This article is restricted to lay subsidies (taxes on movables). Lay taxes in kind, and clerical taxes, are ignored.

8 For resentment of failure to defend the north during Edward II's reign, see McNamee, 'Robert Bruce', p. 83, and McNamee, Wars of the Bruces, p. 123; for 'alienation' and taxation in the later fourteenth century, Macdonald, Border bloodshed, pp. 196-241.

9 Willard, Parliamentary taxes, pp. 122-5; Jenks, 'Lay subsidies', pp. 31-9; for the impact of Robert's campaigns, see McNamee, Wars of the Bruces, and Scammell, 'Robert I'.

"0 For example, Willard, 'Scotch raids', pp. 238-9; Willard, 'Taxes upon movables', p. 318; Miller, War in the north, p. 6; Hadwin, 'Lay subsidies', p. 208, n. 50. ? Economic History Society 2005


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brought to a close by the Treaty of Edinburgh-Northampton (1328), the last raid to affect Cumberland occurred in 1327." This article focuses on the period between the recommencement of Anglo-Scottish hostilities in 1332 and the battle of Neville's Cross of October 1346. Raiding was less intense in these years than it had been under Edward II, and the government sought to draw Cumberland and the other northern counties back into the lay taxation system. This policy generated a series of different strategies designed to cope with the problem of taxing movables in a county where crops, livestock, and other goods were periodically removed or destroyed by invaders. As a result of this experimentation, taxation documentation survives from this period in relative abundance, providing an opportunity to study changing wealth levels across an entire county.

Table 1 shows the taxation assessment payable by Cumberland to lay subsidies between 1332 and 1340, the year in which the third instalment of the triennial subsidy of 1337 was collected. (In this article the three years of the 1337 subsidy are referred to as 1337 (1), 1337 (2), and 1337 (3), and the first and second years of the biennial subsidies of 1344 and 1346 are referred to as 1344 (1), 1344 (2), 1346 (1), and 1346 (2).) Table 1 also shows the contributions of each of the county's nine taxation divisions (wards and liberties) towards the total assessments. The 'county rolls' that give the assessments are discussed fully in section II below. However, the assessments represent only what the government hoped to collect in each tax, not the actual sums raised.12 To obtain figures on yield it is necessary to consult the enrolled lay subsidy accounts, which detail the net sums received from the Cumberland chief taxers and collectors after due allow- ances had been made to them for their expenses and for other purposes.13 Figures from the enrolled accounts are also included in table 1. As table 1 shows, 1332 was the only year showing any significant debt of uncollected tax outstanding at the point when the taxers and collectors presented their final account before the exchequer.14

Clearly, however, the taxation revenue produced by Cumberland declined substantially in this period, as the yield from 1337 (3) represented only 45 per cent of that of 1336, which was the maximum in these years. If one adopts the view that developments in taxation of the border counties are first and foremost a reflection of the direct impact of war, then table 1 is likely to be interpreted as evidence of the ongoing effects of raids severe enough to be capable of reducing the county's taxable wealth by more than half in around four years. Certainly Willard, the only historian to date to consider the drop in Cumberland's tax assessment in the later 1330s, viewed the evidence solely in terms of the destruction of property through war. This

" McNamee, Wars of the Bruces, pp. 112, 241. 12 Ormrod, 'Crown and the English economy', pp. 151-2. 13 National Archives (hereafter NA), E 359/14, mm. 19d, 21d, 22d, 24, 26d, 29d-30, 32, 33, 34d, 36d. 14 Taxers' debts outstanding at the time of the enrolled account were transferred to the pipe roll; no

attempt has been made to follow up debts in that source. ? Economic History Society 2005


i t. F;? Table 1. Cumberland lay subsidy assessments and yields, 1332-1340

1336 1336 1332 (W'minster grant) (Nott'ham grant) 1337 (1) 1337 (2) 1337 (3) Taxation divisions

(wards and liberties) ? s d C s d s s d C s d E s d s d Leath w 98 14 13/4 100 1 53/4 100 1 53/4 75 0 11/4 53 9 0 47 3 4 Cumberland w 85 13 2'/2 85 13 23/4 85 13 23/4 44 3 53/4 32 5 23/4 27 7 11/4 Eskdale w 54 5 21/2 54 12 01/4 54 12 01/4 32 11 33/4 e20 19 31/2 19 8 11 Allerdale w 120 5 101/2 120 5 101/2 120 5 10'/2 79 11 81/4 58 12 01/2 50 2 1 Cockermouth L 20 7 63/4 20 7 63/4 20 7 63/4 20 0 0 20 0 0 15 16 0 Egremont L 39 10 11'/4 39 10 111/4 39 10 111/4 39 10 111/4 35 1 13/4 32 0 0 L of prior of Carlisle 6 18 23/4 7 11 63/4 7 11 63/4 6 3 01/4 4 3 5 3 19 11 L of bishop of Carlisle "35 5 53/4 48 12 1'/2 48 12 1'/2 d31 11 41/4 25 7 2 f20 19 1 Penrith L 77 13 91/4 77 13 91/4 77 13 91/4 42 1 2'/2 36 2 4 32 8 0

Total assessment 538 14 5 554 8 63/4 554 8 63/4 370 13 13/4 285 19 71/2 249 4 51/4 Yield ('in the treasury') 500 0 0 555 0 0 527 3 2 360 13 2 275 19 8 239 4 5'/2 Taxers' expenses 13 6 8 10 0 0 10 0 0 10 0 0 10 0 0 10 0 0 Debt outstanding b26 0 13 - - - 0 13 71/4 Excess payment - - C11 4 91/4 - - 0 0 01/4 0 0 01'/2 0 0 /4

Notes: a assessment for Caldecotes illegible in E 179/90/2, 1336 figure used to reach total for liberty. b includes 13s. 4d. owing from taxation of chief taxers' goods. c carried forward to the account for 1336 Nottingham subsidy; includes 13s. 4d. credited to the taxers because the hospital of St Nicholas, Carlisle was excused part of its payment. d no data for liberty in E 179/90/6, but a combined figure for all taxation units taxed at a tenth can be derived from E 359/14 m. 26d, which allows an estimate for Linstock (the only unit in the liberty taxed at a fifteenth). e data in E 179/90/7 incomplete, ward assessment estimated as the difference between total of other divisions and county total. fdata in E 179/90/ 22 incomplete, liberty assessment estimated as the difference between total of other divisions and county total. Sources: 1332: NA, E 179/90/2 (Steel, ed., Cumberland lay subsidy); 1336: E 179/90/3 and E 179/90/4 (Glasscock, Lay subsidy of 1334); 1337 (1): E 179/90/6; 1337 (2): E 179/90/7; 1337 (3): E 179/90/10 and E 179/90/22; NA, E 359/14 mm. 19d, 21d, 22d, 24, 26d, 29d-30.

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644 CHRIS BRIGGS

approach was in tune with the historiography of the border economy current at the time."

In what follows, the relationship between cross-border conflict and the ability to pay tax is subjected to closer scrutiny. This is done, first, by establishing the sequence of events in the re-incorporation of Cumberland into the lay taxation system between 1332 and 1346 (section II). Then, in sections III to V, attention is focused on the records of the triennial subsidy of 1337. In section III, consideration is given to the 'fit' between, on one hand, the changing taxation yields of different parts of the county over the three years of the subsidy, and, on the other, what is known of the timing of Scottish raids and the areas they affected. Section IV analyses the char- acter and patterns of the tax charges imposed on the county's taxation units (the taxpaying settlements within each taxation division), and in section V, attention is given to the patterns of tax charges on individual taxpayers. Section VI concentrates on the taxation evidence for raids in 1345 and 1346.

II Prior to 1334, the system used to tax the movable property of English laypeople involved the valuation of livestock, grain, and other movable goods by local men (subtaxers) working under the direction of chief taxers appointed for each county. The tax charge paid by each household head represented a specified fraction of that person's total wealth valuation; the proportion taken as tax changed from one subsidy to the next. From 1294, rural areas were commonly taxed at a different rate from urban areas and ancient demesne.16 In most subsidies, exemption was permitted for those with goods below a minimum threshold, and certain basic items necessary for livelihood were formally excluded from the valuations.

In carrying out their work, the subtaxers produced 'local rolls' listing and valuing the movable property from which individuals' tax charges were derived, and from these the chief taxers drew up 'county rolls' in which the names of taxpayers, their valuations, and charges were summarized. As research by the many historians of these valuable records demonstrates, there was considerable local variation in the conscientiousness with which the subtaxers worked. By permitting undervaluation, conventional valuation, and ignoring sections of the taxpaying population, the subtaxers, to differing degrees, created a body of evidence whose reliability and usefulness continues to be debated." The subtaxers' work also gave rise to contemporary charges of corruption, and it was largely as a result of these that in

"5 Willard, 'Scotch raids', pp. 241-2 (Willard did not compare assessment and yield). 16 All the Cumberland subsidies discussed here were fifteenths and tenths. Fifteen taxation units (all

within the liberty of the bishop of Carlisle and Penrith liberty) were taxed at a tenth, out of a county total of around 180 units.

17 Stanley, 'Tax returns'; Franklin, 'Gloucestershire's medieval taxpayers'; Cromarty and Cromarty, eds., Wealth of Shrewsbury, pp. 20-27, Crowley, ed., Wiltshire tax list, pp. xvi-xviii.

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1334 a crucial change took place in the administration of the lay subsidies.' Rather than overseeing the usual process of assessment, the chief taxers appointed to collect the fifteenth and tenth of 1334 were instructed to collect the same sums from each taxation unit as had been levied in 1332. The sums collected in 1334 became fixed quotas paid thereafter by every taxation unit towards each new grant of subsidy. The task of determining the individual taxpayer contributions came to be settled within the communities themselves, and, as a consequence, very few tax lists providing per- sonal names and individual payments survive after 1334.

However, not all places paid exactly the same amounts towards each grant of a fifteenth and tenth after 1334 as they had in that year, and reductions and remissions were granted from time to time in response to economic hardships.'9 In the period following the adoption of the quota system special arrangements were made regarding the lay subsidy contributions of Cumberland in response to reports of the damaging effects of cross-border raids.

As already noted, Cumberland contributed nothing to the subsidies levied from 1313 to 1327. In 1332, however, Cumberland was successfully taxed on the same basis as other counties. A detailed county roll survives, giving taxpayers' names, overall valuations of their goods and tax charges.20

However, Cumberland was exempted from the fifteenth and tenth granted in September 1334, and although initially chief taxers were appointed for the county, their names were later removed from the patent rolls.21 It is not entirely clear why it was decided that Cumberland was not required to make a payment in 1334. No evidence survives of a major raid deep into Cumberland in the years 1332-4, and it seems unlikely that the attack of March 1333 affected more than a relatively small portion of the county, or that substantial recovery from this raid had not taken place by the time parliament granted the subsidy around 18 months later (for evidence of all known raids 1332-46, see table 2). Although the reason for this suspension of payments is uncertain, it seems most likely that in 1334 a policy of total exemption for Cumberland was employed in a situation where at most only part of the county was incapable of making a contribution because of depredations. This policy was a continuation of the practice current under Edward II, whereby the government's response to reports of war damage was the simple solution of exemption of the entire county from taxation, the difference being of course that the sufferings of the county as a result of raids were clearly much greater in the earlier period than was the case in 1332-4.

18 Willard, Parliamentary taxes, pp. 11-13; Glasscock, Lay subsidy of 1334, pp. xv-xvii. 19 Jurkowski, Smith, and Crook, Lay taxes, p. xxxiv. 20 NA, E 179/90/2, printed but omitting all fractions of a penny and the individual tax charges in

Steel, ed., Cumberland lay subsidy; for a discussion of this roll, see Fraser, 'Cumberland and Westmorland lay subsidies'.

21 Cal. Pat. Rolls, 1334-8, pp. 38-40. C Economic History Society 2005


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Table 2. Scottish raids affecting Cumberland, 1332-46 Date Area affected, duration

1 1333 March 23 Gilsland (Eskdale ward) via Carlisle; returning following day 2 1337 August Arthuret (Eskdale ward) and eastwards, burning 'about twenty

villages, taking prisoners and an immense number of cattle'; three days. Met with resistance from men-at-arms

3 1337 mid-October Rose via Carlisle, then Allerdale and Copeland (see text); three days 4 1338 Allerdale, Cumberland, and Eskdale wards, plus Carlisle city with its

parishes of St Mary and St Cuthbert 5 1340 Cumberland and Eskdale wards, plus Carlisle city with its parishes of

St Mary and St Cuthbert 6 1345 October-November Gilsland and Penrith with adjoining villages via Carlisle; inquisition

suggests two separate raids, the second lasting six days 7 1346 Easter Carlisle 8 1346 July 24 Cumberland, the 'hills of Derwent and the moor of Alston' 9 1346 October 7 Liddel and Lanercost Priory (Eskdale ward); inquisition says four

days

Notes: for wards and liberties, see map 1. Sources: Maxwell, ed., Lanercost, pp. 277 (1), 305 (2), 307-8 (3), 325-6 (6), 326 (8), 330-2 (9); NA, E 179/90/9 (4 and 5); Cal. Inqu. Miscellaneous, II p. 515 (6, 8 and 9); Nicholson, Scotland, p. 145 (7). See also Rogers, War cruel and sharp, pp. 61-2 (1); Summerson, Medieval Carlisle, I, pp. 267-8 (4 and 5), 272-3 (6), 278 (7) (suggests a small-scale strike only), 278-9 (8); Hewitt, Organisation, pp. 126-9 (6); Winchester, Landscape, pp. 45-6 (6 and 8); Rogers, 'Scottish invasion', p. 56 (9). All figures in parentheses refer to number of raid in table 2.

The treatment of Cumberland in relation to the next two grants of a fifteenth and tenth, those made at Westminster in March 1336 and at Nottingham in September 1336, shows a switching between several different strategies for coping with the problem of war damage. Following the first grant of this year, a separate commission and form of taxation was issued to the chief taxers of Cumberland, Northumberland, and Westmorland, which was different from the instructions to other counties. The special form directed subtaxers to be selected from the towns (the taxation units) to assess and levy the tax, while the chief taxers would check their work and cause rolls of taxation (that is, county rolls) to be made based on the subtaxers' local rolls.22 This, in other words, was the general form of taxation in use throughout the country from 1297 to 1332, until it was abandoned in 1334 with the change to a quota system. The issuing of separate instructions for Cumberland, Northumberland, and Westmorland may in part have been a result of their exemption from the 1334 tax, which meant that in 1336 no rolls were available to their chief taxers showing quotas under the previous grant.

However, these special instructions were quickly overturned by an order simply to levy the first subsidy of 1336 on the basis of the 1332 returns, and the sums paid towards the subsidies of 1332 and 1336 were largely identical.23 Like their counterparts elsewhere, the chief taxers of

22 Cal. Fine Rolls, 1327-37, p. 487 (24 May 1336). 23 Ibid., 1327-37, p. 502 (28 May 1336); NA, E 179/90/3 and E 179/90/4, used by Glasscock, Lay subsidy of 1334, pp. 36-41, give the sums paid towards the two 1336 subsidies.

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Cumberland in 1336 simply used the last available tax list to make the new assessments. The fact that the county assessment was approximately ?16 higher in 1336 than in 1332 is largely down to the re-introduction of the city of Carlisle, which was not taxed in the earlier year.24

Yet as well as issuing and subsequently withdrawing a special form of taxation, the government also contemplated permitting a temporary delay in Cumberland's payments in the summer of 1336. It is clear that the county was pressing at this time for a lightening of its lay subsidy burden. In response to a request of the people of Cumberland that the king consider the depres- sion of their state and the damage they had suffered by the frequent invasions of the Scots, in July 1336 a royal order was made to supersede the levying of the Westminster subsidy in Cumberland until Michaelmas next.25 It is not unreasonable to speculate that this was a compromise position, and that the county had been aiming for a complete exemption like that secured in 1334. However, the concession made in July was quickly revoked in August in an order stating that the taxation of the county should go ahead without delay.26 In spite of its claims of poverty, the county successfully contributed to the two subsidies of 1336, even yielding a small surplus over and above the assessment total towards the Westminster subsidy.

The triennial subsidy of 1337 marked a further shift in the approach to levying taxes on movables in Cumberland. In late 1337, after the grant of the triennial subsidy of that year, the county petitioned that a major incursion by the Scots meant it was unable to contribute as much as it might have done beforehand (for the raid, see table 2). In response to this, the county's chief taxers were ordered in March 1338 to carry out a reassessment under the special form of taxation abandoned in 1336, a process that was repeated for the remaining years of the 1337 subsidy.27 The second and third reassessments may have been necessary because of further raids in 1338 and 1340, although, as will be suggested below, there is doubt about the reliability of the evidence for those raids. The special treatment of Cumberland in the 1337 subsidy resulted in the survival of three detailed county rolls containing taxpayers' names and charges rather than simply the quotas from each taxation unit, a rarity after 1334.28 Instead of resorting to total exemption for the county in response to economic damage that may

24 NA, E 359/14, m. 19d. Summerson, Medieval Carlisle, I, pp. 265, 268 suggests the city of Carlisle was also pardoned from the 1336 Westminster subsidy, but the lack of any reference to this in the enrolled account, plus Carlisle's inclusion in E 179/90/3, indicates this was not the case.

25 Cal. Close Rolls, 1333-7, p. 692 (12 July 1336). 26 Ibid., 1333-7, pp. 604-5 (20 August 1336). 27 Commission of October 1337: Cal. Fine Rolls, 1337-47, pp. 50-2; instructions of 4 March 1338

requiring chief taxers to make fresh assessments in Cumberland according to the form of 1336: ibid., 1337-47, p. 69 and Willard, 'Scotch raids', pp. 241-2; similar instructions of 5 October 1338 and 20 October 1339 to reassess in 1337 (2) and 1337 (3): Cal. Fine Rolls, 1337-47, pp. 95, 148.

28NA, E 179/90/6, E 179/90/7 and E 179/90/22, relating to 1337 (1), 1337 (2) and 1337 (3) respectively. I am grateful to Robin Glasscock for drawing my attention to these documents. At least one membrane is missing from E 179/90/6; parts of E 179/90/22 are illegible. Assessments for Eskdale ward in 1337 (2) are located in E 179/90/22 m.5. C Economic History Society 2005


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have been geographically restricted, it appears that in the 1337 subsidy the aim of the crown was to secure a sum, albeit reduced, from the county. However, as sections IV and V argue, although this process of reassessment was probably intended to provide sensitivity to variations in damage caused by raids, it was as vulnerable to manipulation at the local level as the system abandoned for most of the country in 1334 had been.

Probably as a result of this, when the next lay subsidy was granted in 1344 the practice of issuing a separate form of taxation to Cumberland's chief taxers was abandoned. For the 1344 subsidy, the county was taxed in the same way as other counties, that is, on the basis of the last fifteenth and tenth granted.29 In 1344, Cumberland was assessed for the same sum as it had been in 1337 (3): ?249 4s. 5'/4d.30The sum collected towards the 1344 subsidy formed the county quota due thereafter whenever a fifteenth and tenth was granted.3' Cumberland had now fallen into line with most other counties by adopting fixed charges on the county as a whole and on each of its taxation units. From 1344, when a raid took place, inquisitions were appointed to establish which communities had been affected and could justifiably be excused payment. Petitions for relief were made by the county in response to the raids of October 1345, July 1346, and October 1346. Inquisitions were ordered to assess the damage from these attacks, resulting in numerous towns and villages gaining pardon from 1344 (2) and both years of the 1346 subsidy.32

Between 1332 and 1346, therefore, several different approaches were pursued in the drive to secure lay subsidy revenue from Cumberland. There were two distinct phases in this effort. In the first phase, lasting from 1332 to 1340 (the year in which the assessment and collection of 1337 (3) was completed), wholesale exemption followed by reassessment of the entire county was employed in order to allow for the consequences of war damage. By contrast, in the second phase (1344-8) a fixed county quota was accepted, and individual taxation units were exempted whenever damage from attacks was deemed to justify it. A brief discussion of these localized exemptions from a fixed tax quota, and their value as evidence for the direct economic impact of war, is reserved for section VI below.

At this stage, however, some verdict is required regarding the evolution of strategies for taxing the county between 1332 and 1340. Clearly, the obstacles encountered in re-introducing lay subsidies to Cumberland had a great deal to do with actual and threatened attacks and their economic repercussions. On the other hand, it is clear that few, if any, of the incursions of 1332-46 were on the same scale as those experienced during Edward II's reign. The period 1332-40 can also be seen as one in which the taxpayers of Cumberland sought to take advantage of the government's predicament

29 Cal. Fine Rolls, 1337-47, pp. 391-3. 30 Scribal changes to the heading of NA, E 179/90/10, the duplicate county roll for 1337 (3), show

that it was used to assess 1344 (1). Several membranes are missing from E 179/90/10. 31 Willard, 'Scotch raids', p. 242. 32 Section VI below.




as it tried to accommodate the twin aims of securing tax revenue from the county while making some allowance for the plight of a region situated in a war zone. It is clear the county achieved some notable victories towards this end. By 1344, Cumberland's tax burden under the fifteenths and tenths had become permanently set at less than half its 1336 level. Also, a complete exemption from taxation had been secured in 1334. The reduction in the county quota reflects, at least in part, the government's acceptance that it was more realistic to settle for a relatively small payment that could be reliably collected, rather than trying simultaneously to provide sensitivity to the effects of raids and to maximize revenue using repeated reassessment. The latter strategy had failed, because of the reluctance of local people to implement the reassessment properly in the 1337 subsidy, a development described in sections IV and V below. In 1334, the county was able to obtain a wholesale exemption of a type that had been routine in Edward II's reign, even though the raiding activity justifying it in 1334 was relatively small scale. In 1336, the crown came close to agreeing to a delay in payment; that the county's claims of poverty were overstated at this time is suggested by the successful collection of the two 1336 subsidies.

III The second stage in evaluating the effects of border warfare on contributions to lay taxation involves studying the payments made between 1332 and 1340 by different parts of the county alongside information about the timing and spatial extent of raiding activity. The aim is to establish whether or not there was a correlation between changes in an area's taxation contributions and the degree to which it suffered under attacks from the north. This question can only be addressed in a rough and ready fashion, because of a shortage of independent information about the reach, duration, and effects of raids. Nonetheless, the findings are revealing as they show that the 'fit' between a locality's success in paying tax and its experience of raiding was not always close. This suggests that the reasons behind Cumberland's dwindling importance as a source of lay subsidy revenue were complex, involving factors other than the destruction or removal of property through warfare.

The first incursion to be considered, and probably the most significant of the period 1332-40, is the attack of October 1337 that occurred soon after the granting of the triennial subsidy. One is forced to treat the Laner- cost chronicler's description of this raid as a reliable account against which to compare the taxation data.33 The raid lasted only three days, and pro- ceeded first due south and then southwest across the Solway plain. The raiders skirted the eastern side of Carlisle, and on the first day headed for the bishop of Carlisle's manor of Rose about ten miles south of the city; as the chronicler describes it, 'they destroyed that place, and everything else

33 Maxwell, ed., Lanercost, pp. 307-8. C Economic History Society 2005


650 CHRIS BRIGGS

o o* 0

* a o0 *Carlise 0

o

o o

Emo o

ooo oAera W ar 0 o 0 0 00 o o

0 A o

, Penn- i~U

CeCockerrmouth L b

S Keswick 0 o o a Xo O

0n

Approximate route of

xt0l

raid of October 1337

EgremontOO O Allerdale Ward M Cockermouth Liberty

O~CoO * Cumberland Ward

O O Egremont Liberty

O0 0 Eskdale Ward * Leath Ward

0 A Liberty of the Bishop of Carlisle O * Liberty of the Prior of Carlisle

A Liberty of Penrith

00 0 5 10 15 20

I I I IA km

Map 1. Cumberland lay subsidy taxation units and approximate route of raid of October 1337 Sources: NA, E 179/90/6; Glasscock, Lay subsidy; Maxwell, ed., Lanercost, pp. 307-8.

on their march, with fire'. On the next day, 'the Scots burnt the villages throughout Allerdale, and detached part of their force against Copeland to lift cattle'. On the third day, lords Percy and Neville and their retinues came to the relief of the district, and the Scots appear to have fled.34 The approximate route of the raid is suggested in map 1, along with the location of all identifiable taxation units in the nine taxation divisions.

34 The raiders' return route is unclear. ? Economic History Society 2005



Two further raids of this period must also be considered, the sole evidence for which lies in returns to a government inquisition of 1341. In this year, local jurors throughout England were charged with giving reasons for the unexpectedly low assessments towards an innovative tax in kind granted by parliament in 1340, under which taxpayers had to render the ninth part of their corn, wool, and sheep. The jurors' responses, known as the Nonarum Inquisitiones, constitute a valuable yet treacherous source for historians of the early fourteenth century crisis.35 Some of the Cumberland returns to the Nonarum Inquisitiones cite Scottish raids in 1338 and 1340 as an expla- nation for the low value of the ninth.36 One may be sceptical about any suggestion that these were serious long-range incursions, as major raids at this time would presumably also have attracted the attention of chroniclers, which does not seem to have been the case. However, although evidence of these raids is limited to the bare references in the Nonarum Inquisitiones, account must be taken of their possible impact on lay subsidy payments. The Nonarum Inquisitiones are based on ecclesiastical parishes, which were not always equivalent to the taxation units used for lay subsidies. Nonethe- less, inquisitions concerning eight groupings of ecclesiastical parishes are recorded in the Cumberland Nonarum Inquisitiones, and in most cases these are the same as the wards and liberties employed for lay taxation. The six largest groupings of ecclesiastical parishes are Cockermouth liberty, Egre- mont liberty, Cumberland ward, Allerdale ward, Eskdale ward, and Leath ward.37 The last of these incorporates those parishes falling within Penrith liberty for the lay subsidies. The other two groupings comprise, first, the parishes of Crosby and Stanwix, and second the 'Carlisle grouping' (the parishes of St Mary and St Cuthbert, plus the city of Carlisle itself). Attacks by the Scots are cited in the inquisitions for Allerdale ward (an attack in 1338 only), and those for Cumberland ward, Eskdale ward, and the Carlisle grouping (attacks in 1338 and 1340).38

If raiding was the prime factor impairing taxpaying ability, then the effects of the October 1337 raid ought to be clearly visible in the 1337 (1) assessments, made in spring and summer 1338. In particular, one would expect a relatively large fall in tax yield from the four divisions hardest hit as the raiding party approached Rose from Carlisle and then moved south and west towards Copeland. These were Cumberland ward and Allerdale ward, plus the liberties of the prior and bishop; most of the taxation units in the latter two divisions were in vulnerable positions around Carlisle and just to its south.39 One would also perhaps anticipate some loss in yield from

" Nonarum Inquisitiones prints many (but not all) returns; Livingstone, 'The Nonae'. 36NA, E 179/90/9; see Summerson, Medieval Carlisle, I, pp. 267-8; Winchester, Landscape,

pp. 45, 47; Livingstone, 'The Nonae', pp. 229-30, 345-54. 37 The inquisitions are endorsed 'Leath', 'Allerdale', and so on. 38 Table 2. The Carlisle grouping is ignored in this discussion because it is not obvious how closely it

corresponds to any single lay taxation division. The Crosby and Stanwix grouping also mentions Scottish depredations, but no date is given and the reference could be to much earlier raids.

39 The liberties of the prior and bishop each included one southern outlier (Little Salkeld and Ousby respectively). C Economic History Society 2005


652 CHRIS BRIGGS

Table 3. Cumberland lay subsidy assessment totals 1336-40 expressed as a percentage of total in previous subsidy

Taxation divisions Subsidy

(wards and liberties) 1336 1337 (1) 1337 (2) 1337 (3)

(1) (2) (3) (4) Leath w 101 75 71 88 Cumberland w 100 52 73 85 Eskdale w 101 60 64 93 Allerdale w 100 66 74 85 Cockermouth L 100 98 100 79 Egremont L 100 100 89 91 L of prior of Carlisle 110 81 68 96 L of bishop of Carlisle 138 65 80 83 Penrith L 100 54 86 90

County total 103 67 77 87

Sources: 1336: E 179/90/3 and E 179/90/4 (Glasscock, Lay subsidy of 1334); 1337 (1): E 179/90/6; 1337 (2): E 179/90/7; 1337 (3): E 179/90/10 and E 179/90/22; NA, E 359/14 mm. 19d, 21d, 22d, 24, 26d, 29d-30.

Egremont and Cockermouth liberties. These areas comprised Copeland, which marked the southernmost extent of the raid. By contrast, in eastern parts of the county, especially those furthest from the border in Leath ward and Penrith liberty, depletion of taxable wealth through attack ought to have been minimal, since as far as one can tell this raid affected at most the fringes of these areas.

Examination of the figures expressing the 1337 (1) payments from each taxation division as a percentage of the 1336 payments confirms some of these predictions but confounds others (table 3 column 2). Reductions in yields from Cumberland ward, Allerdale ward, and the liberty of the bishop were indeed among the most marked, falling to around half to around two- thirds of 1336 levels. Tax yield from the liberty of the prior also fell, albeit by a smaller margin. Egremont liberty and Cockermouth liberty-the Copeland taxation divisions-were able to maintain their contributions at the 1336 level or thereabouts. This perhaps indicates that the October 1337 raid had lost its impetus by the time it reached Copeland, allowing rapid recovery.

However, it is puzzling that areas in eastern Cumberland that do not appear to have been the main targets of this particular raid paid substantially less in 1337 (1) than in 1336. That Eskdale ward yielded only 60 per cent of its 1336 total is perhaps unsurprising, since this especially vulnerable border area of the county had been raided somewhat earlier in August 1337. It is also possible that the October 1337 raiders targeted some Eskdale ward taxation units as they approached Carlisle, although the Lanercost chronicle is not explicit about where the raiders entered the county. Yet further south, Leath ward also achieved only 75 per cent of its 1336 total, and Penrith liberty only 54 per cent. It is true that Penrith liberty included the outlying




Table 4. Penrith liberty lay subsidy assessments in 1337 (1) expressed as a percentage of 1336 assessments

Subsidy 1336 1337 (1)

1337 (1) Taxation units s d ? s d as % 1336 Penrith 39 16 31/2 20 5 9 51 Carlatton 1 5 2 1 1 0 83 Scotby 2 3 101/4 0 17 81/2 40 Carleton 1 8 71/4 1 16 9 128 Langwathby 15 1 41/2 5 0 0 33 Great Salkeld 6 0 01/2 5 0 0 83 Castle Sowerby 11 18 5'/4 8 0 0 67

Penrith L total 77 13 91/4 42 1 21/2 54

Sources: 1336, NA, E 179/90/3 and E 179/90/4 (Glasscock, Lay subsidy of 1334); 1337 (1), NA, E 179/90/6.

taxation unit of Scotby, positioned much closer to the raiders' path than the other units in the liberty, but although Scotby's contribution dropped sharply, it was not the only one in the liberty to do so. In Penrith itself, for instance, tax paid fell from just under ?40 in 1336 to just over ?20 in 1337 (1) (table 4).

Furthermore, a community's taxpaying capacity was not inevitably impaired, even when it lay close to the invaders' path. Map 2 shows in more detail the taxation units nearest the raiders' probable route from Carlisle to Rose and the start of their route onward into Allerdale. These, presumably, were the communities most at risk of attack during this incursion. Consequently, it is not surprising that most of them paid much less towards the subsidy in 1337 (1) than they did in 1336 (table 5).40 For example, Scotby and Raughton yielded only 40 per cent of their 1336 totals, and Carleton and East and West Curthwaite each paid just 50 per cent. However, four of the remaining taxation units closest to the raiders' probable route-Cumwhinton and Botcherby, Brisco, Wreay, and Sebergham-equalled or exceeded their 1336 contributions. The fact that some of the places most accessible to the October 1337 raiders were able to maintain their payments at the 1336 level is striking, given that many communities situated much further away from the route of this raid-in Leath ward, Penrith liberty, and the southern parts of Eskdale ward-failed to do so. It suggests that the explanations for the declining taxation yield in the latter areas are complex and do not simply reflect destruction wrought by the incursion.

Some of the surprising patterns in the 1337 (1) payments are more readily explicable in terms of the effects of Scottish depredations if one considers the possibility that they show the effects of not only the October 1337 raid

40 Table 5 excludes the taxation units of the liberty of the bishop, as data are missing. ? Economic History Society 2005


654 CHRIS BRIGGS

*Houghton

OLinstock

StanwixO

CARLISLE[] CaldecotesO OBotcherby BotchergScotby OScotby

Upperby@ Carleton

* Cumwinton OBrisco

O Dalston .Blackhall

Park OWreay East & West Curthwaite

Raughton

ROSE

Approximate route of 0 Langholm raid of October 1337

0 1 2 3 4 5 OSebergham km

Map 2. Approximate route of raid of October 1337 between Carlisle and Rose showing nearest taxation units Sources: NA, E 179/90/6; Glasscock, Lay subsidy of 1334; Maxwell, ed., Lanercost, pp. 307-8.

but also of the 1338 raid. It is not known when the 1338 attack cited in the Nonarum Inquisitiones occurred, but it is altogether possible that it preceded or was contemporary with the assessment of 1337 (1) during spring and summer 1338. The decrease in yield from Leath ward and Penrith liberty in 1337 (1) cannot be explained by reference to the 1338 raid, however, since no such Scottish attack on these areas was cited in the Nonarum Inquisitiones.




Table 5. Lay subsidy assessments in 1337 (1) expressed as a percentage of 1336 assessments: selected Cumberland taxation units

Subsidy

1336 1337 (1) 1337 (1)

Taxation units and divisions C s d C s d as % 1336

Houghton Eskdale w 0 11 51/2 0 6 81/2 59 Cumwhinton & Botcherby Cumberland w 0 14 71/2 0 14 71/2 100 Blackhall Park Cumberland w 2 16 71/2 1 13 4 59 E & W Curthwaite Cumberland w 1 4 6 0 12 3 50 Langholm Cumberland w 1 14 1/4 1 5 0 73 Raughton Cumberland w 3 15 8 1 10 0 40 Botchergate L Pr of Carlisle 2 3 21/2 1 10 0 69 Carleton L Pr of Carlisle 1 12 0 0 16 0 50 Brisco L Pr of Carlisle 1 4 111/2 1 5 0 100 Wreay L Pr of Carlisle 1 0 0 1 0 8 103 Sebergham L Pr of Carlisle 0 18 03/4 0 18 03/4 100 Scotby Penrith L 2 3 10'/2 0 17 8'/2 40

Note: for locations of all units, see map 2 Sources: 1336, NA, E 179/90/3 and E 179/90/4 (Glasscock, Lay subsidy of 1334); 1337 (1), NA, E 179/90/6.

The assessment towards 1337 (2) took place between October 1338 and January 1339.41 If any raid had a major impact on the capacity to contribute towards this subsidy it was probably that of 1338, since some recovery by this point from the raid of October 1337 might be expected among places not attacked subsequently. The returns for 1337 (2) must therefore be examined in the light of what little is known about the geographical impact of the 1338 raid. In many ways, the figures support the argument that Cumberland taxation evidence primarily shows the direct impact of war on taxable wealth. In particular, a drop in the 1337 (2) yield, when expressed as a percentage of the 1337 (1) yield, was evident in all of the areas for which reports of raids in 1338 were made in the Nonarum Inquisitiones: Cumberland, Eskdale, and Allerdale wards (table 3 column 3). No 1338 raid was cited for Cockermouth liberty in 1341, which tallies with the absence of any decline in yield there in 1337 (2).Yet other aspects of table 3 do not fit with what one would expect if taxation simply reflected war damage. In particular, the decline in yield from Leath ward between 1337 (1) and 1337 (2) was relatively large, but as already noted, the Nonarum Inquisitiones for that grouping of parishes make no mention of a raid in 1338.

Only three groupings of parishes were said to have suffered raids in 1340 (table 2). If these raids occurred very early that year, it is just possible that their effects are reflected in the assessments for 1337 (3), which were made between October 1339 and January 1340. However, as table 3 shows, decline in payments towards 1337 (3) was apparent in all taxation divisions,

41 The October commissions to assess 1337 (2) and 1337 (3) both state that the chief taxers' first payment was due on 2 February in the following year. ? Economic History Society 2005


656 CHRIS BRIGGS

indicating that the 1340 raids cited in the Nonarum Inquisitiones were not the sole reason for the falling tax yield.

Between 1337 and 1340 there was only a partial 'fit' between a locality's experience of raids and the pattern of its lay subsidy contributions. This, at least in part, is presumably because determinants of movable wealth levels other than raids are unlikely to have stayed constant in this period. The Cumberland Nonarum Inquisitiones returns cite three other main justifica- tions for the low yield to the ninth that could further explain the declining lay subsidy assessments. Perhaps most significantly, six of the inquisitions state that part of the reason for the low value of the ninth was that communities had to provide hobelars (mounted warriors) and archers at their own expense to serve in Scotland. This is a reminder that the direct impact of war in border localities was not confined to enemy incursions, but was also felt in the demand for personnel and supplies for English campaigns.42 The two other issues cited were sheep murrain, and the accumulated burden of taxation, which was clearly a major factor in these years in Cumberland as elsewhere.43 However, as the following section argues, Cumberland's contributions to the 1337 subsidy were shaped as much by the way the tax was assessed as they were by the quantity and value of the property on which it was based.

IV The pre-1334 lay subsidy returns have been used in historical enquiries ranging from the charting of national levels and distributions of wealth to the reconstruction of social and economic hierarchies within villages, yet in all cases investigators necessarily engage in a debate about the reliability of the returns which consists in essence of a consideration of the subtaxers and their techniques.44 Historians have tried to determine which goods the subtaxers assessed, and which they disregarded. They have looked at the undervaluation of taxable goods, and the practice of conventional valuation (setting all oxen at the same one or two prices). Consideration has also been given to evasion, and to the possibility that households at or near the minimum wealth level for tax liability were customarily ignored. Most important from the point of view of making comparisons across space has been the question of local variation in such practices.

Those most sceptical about the reliability of the lay subsidy returns have not only emphasized the prevalence of these short cuts in assessing wealth, but have also questioned whether proper assessments were carried out at all in some places. It has been suggested that the difficulties of

42 Edward III's major Scottish campaigns of this phase of the war were restricted to the years 1332-6: Nicholson, Edward III; on provisioning Carlisle's garrison, see Summerson, Medieval Carlisle, I, p. 275.

4 Maddicott, 'English peasantry'. 44 Hadwin, 'Lay subsidies'; Jenks, 'Lay subsidies'; Nightingale, 'Lay subsidies'; Stanley, 'Tax returns';

Cromarty and Cromarty, eds., Wealth of Shrewsbury; Franklin, 'Gloucestershire's medieval taxpayers'. ? Economic History Society 2005



calculation involved in summing the valuations of goods and then dividing the total to arrive at, say, a twelfth or fifteenth, combined with lack of cooperation from taxpayers, tempted some subtaxers instead to decide first upon an acceptable tax charge for the individual, and then to produce valuations of livestock and goods which added up to the appropriate total valuation.45 Such ideas are encouraged by study of the lists of tax charges on county rolls, which often bunch around convenient sums which can easily be multiplied by 15, or whatever the tax fraction may be, to give a valuation.46

Such discussions have concentrated on the tax charges on individuals, but it is also necessary to consider the overall sum paid by the taxation unit when investigating the possibility that the subtaxers first set charges and then arranged valuations accordingly. If the charge payable by a whole community was decided upon independently as the initial step, all the individual taxpayer assessments generated to fit that figure must have been more or less artificial. This would represent a high level of manipulation of the system of lay subsidy assessment. Accordingly, this section considers the charges and valuations on Cumberland taxation units in the 1337 subsidy.

How might one recognize a 'manipulated' taxation unit charge and valuation? In any assessment carried out according to the official instructions, the charge on the taxation unit represented one-fifteenth or one-tenth of the total valuation, which in turn was made up of all the combined individual valuations in the unit. If such meticulous assessment were carried out across taxation units, the lists of valuations and charges at taxation unit level would consist of a wide range of different sums, most ending in pence and fractions of pence. By contrast, 'manipulated' taxation unit charges would include, first, a large proportion of charges of a round shilling, since in producing an overall valuation such charges could be multiplied more quickly and easily by 15 or 10 than those ending in pence, halfpennies, or farthings. It might be even quicker and easier to concentrate on a relatively small set of convenient charges-multiples of round shillings-for which the corresponding valuations would not even have to be calculated, but could simply be remembered or read off a table.47

Table 6 shows the incidence of round shilling charges and convenient 'multiple' charges on Cumberland taxation units. The multiple charges used in the table are, first, the round figures of 5s. and 10s. plus multiples of 10s. up to 200s., and second, the common accounting unit of the mark sterling (13s. 4d.) and its divisions. These sums are arguably among the most obvious for subtaxers to select if they wished to simplify the taxation process by removing the need for painstaking assessment.

The findings presented in table 6 are striking. In the 1336 subsidies, which duplicated the 1332 quotas, evidence of manipulation is relatively

45 For a useful discussion, see Cromarty and Cromarty, eds., Wealth of Shrewsbury, pp. 20-2. 46 Willard, Parliamentary taxes, pp. 141-8. 47 For the idea that subtaxers may have used tables, see ibid., p. 148.



Table 6. Tax charges on taxation units, Cumberland and Wiltshire Cumberland subsidies

1336 1337 (1) 1337 (2) 1337 (3) Wilts 1332

Charge ends l/4d., 1/2d., 3/4d. 92 (51.1) 26 (16.7) 22 (12.5) 8 (4.5) 259 (50.5) Charge of round shilling 24 (13.3) 58 (37.2) 73 (41.5) 103 (57.9) 43 (8.4) 'Multiple' charges with corresponding valuations: 3s. 4d. (15" of ?2 1Os. Od., 10th of ?1 13s. 4d.) 0 (0.0) 2 (1.3) 1 (0.6) 2 (1.1) 1 (0.2) 6s. 8d. (15th of ?5 Os. Od., 10" tof ?3 6s. 8d.) 1 (0.6) 1 (0.6) 6 (3.4) 6 (3.4) 0 (0.0) 5s. Od. (15" of ?3 15s. Od., 10th of ?2 1Os. Od.) 0 (0.0) 1 (0.6) 4 (2.3) 6 (3.4) 1 (0.2) 1Os. Od. (15" of ?7 1Os. Od., 10 thof ?5 Os. Od.) 1 (0.6) 8 (5.1) 9 (5.1) 14 (7.9) 3 (0.6) 13s. 4d. (15" of ?10 Os. Od., 10" of ?6 13s. 4d.) 2 (1.1) 3 (1.9) 7 (4.0) 7 (3.9) 0 (0.0) 20s. Od. (15" of ?15 Os. Od., 10th of ?10 Os. Od.) 3 (1.7) 3 (1.9) 8 (4.5) 11 (6.2) 2 (0.4) 30s. Od. (15" of ?22 1Os. Od., 10th of ?15 Os. Od.) 4 (2.2) 6 (3.8) 6 (3.4) 10 (5.6) 0 (0.0) 40s. Od. (15th of ?30 Os. Od., 10' of ?20 Os. Od.) 0 (0.0) 3 (1.9) 8 (4.5) 8 (4.5) 1 (0.2) 60s. Od. (15"' of ?45 Os. Od., 10 h of ?30 Os. Od.) 0 (0.0) 1 (0.6) 2 (1.1) 6 (3.4) 1 (0.2) 80s. Od. (15h of ?60 Os. Od., 10h of ?40 Os. Od.) 0 (0.0) 5 (3.2) 2 (1.1) 2 (1.1) 0 (0.0) 1OOs. Od. (15" of ?75 Os. Od., 10h of ?50 Os. Od.) 1 (0.6) 2 (1.3) 1 (0.6) 1 (0.6) 0 (0.0) 120s. Od. (15" of ?90 Os. Od., 10" of ?60 Os. Od.) 0 (0.0) 1 (0.6) 0 (0.0) 0 (0.0) 0 (0.0) 140s. Od. (15" of ?105 Os. Od., 10th of ?70 Os. Od.) 0 (0.0) 1 (0.6) 0 (0.0) 0 (0.0) 0 (0.0) 160s. Od. (15" of ?120 Os Od., 10" of ?80 Os. Od.) 1 (0.6) 1 (0.6) 1 (0.6) 0 (0.0) 0 (0.0) 180s. Od. (15"thof ?135 Os. Od., 10h of ?90 Os. Od.) 1 (0.6) 0 (0.0) 0 (0.0) 0 (0.0) 0 (0.0) 200s. Od. (15" of ?150 Os. Od., 10" of ?100 Os. Od.) 0 (0.0) 0 (0.0) 1 (0.6) 0 (0.0) 0 (0.0) Total 'multiple' charges 14 (7.8) 38 (24.4) 56 (31.8) 73 (41.0) 9 (1.8) Total units 180 (100.0) 156 (100.0) 176 (100.0) 178 (100.0) 513 (100.0) Note: Figures in parentheses represent no. of taxation units in row as percentage of total units Sources: 1336: NA, E 179/90/3 and E 179/90/4 (Glasscock, Lay subsidy of 1334); 1337 (1): E 179/90/6; 1337 (2): E 179/90/7; 1337 (3): E 179/90/10, E 179/90/22 and E 179/90/12; Crowley, ed., Wiltshire tax list. VF

t-

0

00

C)

C, tkj



scarce. Only 13.3 per cent of tax charges were a round shilling, the remain- der ending in pence or fractions of pence. Also, only 7.8 per cent of charges were convenient 'multiples'. The three years of the 1337 subsidy, however, present a growing contrast to 1336. The percentages of round shilling and convenient 'multiple' tax charges increased, so that by 1337 (3) almost 58 per cent of the charges were round shillings, and 41 per cent of the total were drawn from a small group of 11 convenient charges. Of course, there was nothing to prevent a subtaxer who wished to proceed by first fixing the charge on the taxation unit from selecting a figure ending in pence or fractions of pence, rather than a convenient sum based on the round shilling. Manipulation could still have occurred, in other words, even if the taxation unit charges are diverse. However, it is difficult to claim that the substantial concentrations of rounded and convenient charges shown in table 6 are compatible with a meticulous valuation of goods, since that would have produced a much more diverse set of unit totals.

As already intimated, the 'bunching' of tax charges around a convenient figure has been noticed in returns from various parts of the country. The phenomenon is thought to be especially prominent in the last two subsidies before the 1334 shift to a quota system. Indeed, the practices it represents probably provoked some of the accusations of maladministration and corruption that preceded that policy change. In the 1337 subsidy the Cumberland subtaxers were of course supposedly following the assessment system abandoned in most counties in 1334. Some comparison is required in order to determine whether their propensity to select round and convenient tax charges was any greater than that evident elsewhere before 1334. For this reason, data from the Wiltshire county roll pertaining to the fifteenth and tenth of 1332 is included in table 6.48 Clearly, the incidence of round and convenient charges on the taxation unit was very much smaller in Wiltshire than in Cumberland.

The evidence presented in this section suggests that over the three years of the 1337 subsidy, there was a growing tendency for subtaxers to decide upon a charge for the community as a whole as the first step in levying the tax. The number of charges on the taxation unit that can reasonably be considered to have arisen from a genuine assessment of goods declined substantially by 1337 (3).There was nothing in particular about destruction of goods through warfare to give rise to these practices; meticulous assessment of despoiled property could still have been carried out throughout the county, had the will to do so been present. When manipulation of the taxation system reached the level it did in Cumberland at this time, the relationship between the valuations given in the rolls and the real value of property must be assumed to have been exceptionally loose.

Lastly, it is worth noting that there is also at least one instance of manipulation of the assessment procedure at the level of the taxation divi-

48 Crowley, ed., Wiltshire tax list. ? Economic History Society 2005


660 CHRIS BRIGGS

Table 7. Egremont liberty lay subsidy assessments in 1337 (1) expressed as a percentage of 1336 assessments

Subsidy 1336 1337 (1)

1337 (1) Taxation units ? s. d. 6 s. d. as % 1336

Birkby 1 10 0 1 7 0 90 Bolton 1 1 6 1 12 4 150 Bootle 1 8 83/4 1 17 8 131 Calder 0 18 41/4 0 11 8 64 Cleator 0 12 0 0 15 8 131 Distington 0 16 4 0 16 8 102 Drigg 1 6 11'/2 1 10 4 113 Egremont 7 10 43/4 7 6 0 97 Frizington 1 3 63/4 1 4 0 102 Gosforth 1 2 5 1 12 8 146 Haile"

-- --

0 13 0 Harrington 0 16 2 0 15 8 97 Kelton 1 5 0 1 7 0 108 Kirksanton 1 10 31/4 1 13 8 111 Lamplugh 1 11 01/4 1 5 8 83 Millom 1 16 41/4 1 10 4 83 Muncaster 1 0 91/4 1 4 4 117 Murton 1 15 53/4 2 6 4 131 Newton 0 15 3 0 16 0 105 Silecroft 1 6 81/4 1 2 8 85 Seaton 1 8 1 1 14 4 122 Santon 1 15 21/2 1 17 0 105 St Bees 3 13 71/4 2 7 11'/4 65 Wiltona 0 18 31/4 0 10 0 Workington 2 8 4'/2 1 13 0 68

Egremont L total b39 10 111/4 39 10 110/4 100

Notes: a Haile taxed with Wilton in 1336 and separately in 1337 (1). bTotal as given in roll; actual sum of taxation unit charges is ?39 10s. 91/2d. Sources: 1336: NA, E 179/90/3 and E 179/90/4 (Glasscock, Lay subsidy of 1334); 1337 (1): NA, E 179/90/6; Winchester, 'Medieval viii'.

sion. In Egremont liberty, the total assessments in 1336 and 1337 (1) were identical down to the last farthing (table 1). It is impossible that this could have arisen had the reassessment ordered in 1338 been faithfully carried out. Instead, the assessors apparently viewed the 1336 contribution as a quota that it was expedient to match but not to exceed in 1337 (1). The Egremont liberty taxation units and their contributions appear in table 7, which shows that nine units paid less in 1337 (1) than in 1336.49 The contributions of the remaining taxation units were increased just enough to allow the 'quota' to be reached. Yet it is unlikely that the local taxers acted arbitrarily in deciding which communities should pay less and which could pay more. Instead, the manipulation of taxation unit charges that took place

49 Excludes Wilton and Haile (see table 7, notes). ? Economic History Society 2005



was probably informed by economic conditions in the region. For example, the sheep murrain cited in the Egremont liberty Nonarum Inquisitiones returns presumably had a more detrimental impact on wealth levels in the pastoral uplands than in the coastal arable zone, and this may explain why five of the nine units with reduced contributions (Calder, St Bees, Lamplugh, Millom, and Birkby) contained substantial upland territory, while the units experiencing the greatest increase in their contributions (Bolton, Gosforth, Murton, Bootle, Cleator, and Seaton) were all predom- inantly lowland communities."s

V This section concentrates on the tax charges imposed upon individuals in Cumberland ward and Egremont liberty in the 1337 subsidy. These divisions are selected primarily because, unlike some others, they have few missing or illegible charges. These divisions were taxed entirely at a fifteenth. The minimum threshold of liability was 10Os. in goods, so the lowest possible individual tax charge was 8d."' In attempting to determine how each household's contribution was decided upon, it should be remembered that one is restricted to the bare lists of tax charges upon individuals in the county rolls, plus the individual valuations given for 1337 (1) only. No local rolls listing taxpayers' goods survive for Cumberland.

Examination of the individual tax charges reveals further signs of the absence of proper assessment. Tables 8 and 9 focus on the numbers of

Table 8. Taxpayers paying 10 common charges, Cumberland ward No. taxpayers

Tax charge 1337 (1) 1337 (2) 1337 (3) 12d. 74 (17.3) 55 (15.7) 40 (13.0) 16d. 37 (8.7) 4 (1.1) 6 (1.9) 20d. 11 (2.6) 4 (1.1) 1 (0.3) 24d. 69 (16.2) 9 (2.6) 11 (3.6) 28d. 2 (0.5) 2 (0.6) 4 (1.3) 32d. 32 (7.5) 3 (0.9) 0 (0.0) 36d. 18 (4.2) 0 (0.0) 2 (0.6) 40d. 25 (5.9) 3 (0.9) 4 (1.3) 44d. 0 (0.0) 3 (0.9) 1 (0.3) 48d. 26 (6.1) 0 (0.0) 3 (1.0) Total 294 (68.9) 83 (23.6) 72 (23.4) Total no. taxpayers 427a (100.0) 351 (100.0) 308 (100.0) Notes: Figures in parentheses represent no. of taxpayers in row as percentage of total taxpayers. a includes High Head taxation unit, taxed in Leath ward in 1337 (2) and thereafter. Sources: 1337 (1): NA, E 179/90/6; 1337 (2): E 179/90/7; 1337 (3): E 179/90/22 and E 179/90/10.

50o This assumes the St Bees taxation unit incorporated the upland Copeland forest. Winchester, 'Medieval vill', p. 63 attempts a mapping of the Egremont liberty units.

1 Cal. Fine Rolls, 1327-37, p. 487. ? Economic History Society 2005


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Table 9. Taxpayers paying 10 common charges, Egremont liberty No. taxpayers

Tax charge 1337 (1) 1337 (2) 1337 (3)

12d. 27 (9.0) 7 (3.1) 6 (2.9) 16d. 39 (13.0) 2 (0.9) 2 (1.0) 20d. 15 (5.0) 6 (2.6) 5 (2.4) 24d. 44 (14.7) 3 (1.3) 3 (1.5) 28d. 17 (5.7) 4 (1.8) 6 (2.9) 32d. 25 (8.3) 4 (1.8) 4 (1.9) 36d. 21 (7.0) 3 (1.3) 7 (3.4) 40d. 15 (5.0) 15 (6.6) 14 (6.8) 44d. 4 (1.3) 2 (0.9) 3 (1.5) 48d. 33 (11.0) 2 (0.9) 1 (0.5) Total 240 (80.0) 48 (21.1) 51 (24.8) Total no. taxpayers 300 (100.0) 227 (100.0) 206 (100.0)

Note: Figures in parentheses represent number of taxpayers in row as percentage of total taxpayers. Sources: 1337 (1): NA, E 179/90/6; 1337 (2): E 179/90/7; 1337 (3): E 179/90/22 and E 179/90/10.

people paying one of ten common charges, all of which are multiples of 4d. In 1337 (1) almost 70 per cent of the Cumberland ward charges and 80 per cent of those from Egremont liberty were drawn from this small group. It is hard to see how a genuine assessment of movable property could produce such bunching. One could perhaps argue that similar total valuations were all rounded off after division by 15 to give the same charge, so that, for example, valuations of 14s. 10d. and 15s. 2d. would both translate into tax charges of 12d.52 Yet the 1337 (1) county roll contradicts this suggestion, since where the charge is 12d. the valuation is invariably 15s., and so on. It is more likely that, in the absence of a proper assessment, the ten sums in tables 8 and 9 provided subtaxers with a scale of convenient charges to use to distinguish taxpayers crudely according to their wealth levels. Focusing on these ten charges also made it quicker and easier to calculate the individual valuations that the subtaxers were required to enter into their rolls.

Section IV argued that in the 1337 subsidy the Cumberland subtaxers often selected a rounded or convenient charge for the taxation unit as the starting point of the levy. The patterns shown in tables 8 and 9 must be considered in the light of this argument, since it implies that the subtaxers had to devise a strategy for setting the charges on individuals in the community so that they added up to the convenient vill totals.

To investigate this, closer examination was made of those units that had charges of either a round shilling, or one of the 16 convenient 'multiple' charges used in table 6. For 1337 (1), this showed that these units often featured a preponderance of individual charges that were easy to multiply (when there was more than one individual with the charge) and then to add

52 On this issue, see Willard, Parliamentary taxes, pp. 146-8. 0 Economic History Society 2005



up to produce the right taxation unit total without leaving odd pence over. For example, the total to be met at Kirkbampton (Cumberland ward) was 40s. (480d.). Accordingly, seven persons paid 12d., and there were further charges of 16d. (three), 20d. (one), 24d. (six), 32d. (three), 40d. (one) and 48d. (one).53 These, of course, are precisely those shown by tables 8 and 9 to have been so common in 1337 (1). The practice of dividing up taxation unit totals into individual charges by concentrating on those figures that were most straightforward to multiply and sum therefore probably accounts for much of the evidence of bunching of individual charges in 1337 (1).

However, in 1337 (2) and 1337 (3), by contrast with 1337 (1), the charges on taxpayers were markedly less concentrated around those ten charges that were most convenient to multiply and to sum (tables 8 and 9). That taxpayer charges became more diverse in 1337 (2) and 1337 (3) could be taken as evidence that in those years real assessments of individuals' goods were duly made. Such a suggestion is not wholly convincing, however, since it is incompatible with the evidence on taxation unit charges presented in section IV, which indicates that manipulation of the assessment was growing rather than declining in 1337 (2) and 1337 (3). Like their counterparts elsewhere in the county, in those years subtaxers in Cumberland ward and Egremont liberty displayed an increasing tendency to choose a rounded and convenient taxation unit charge as the first step in assessing the subsidy. In those two divisions, the percentages of round shilling charges and convenient 'multiple' charges at the taxation unit level were generally higher than the percentages for the whole county shown in table 6. Only in Egremont liberty in 1337 (3) were rounded and convenient taxation unit charges rare or absent, which perhaps suggests that in the third year of the subsidy a real assessment of movables was conducted in that taxation division.54 In general, though, the county rolls for Cumberland ward and Egremont liberty in 1337 (2) and 1337 (3) are notable for mixing rounded and convenient taxation unit charges with diverse individual charges. For instance, the total charge on Bowness on Solway (Cumberland ward) in 1337 (3) was 40s. In distributing this sum among the taxpayers, the Bow- ness subtaxers did not restrict themselves to the ten convenient charges shown in tables 8 and 9, but included five charges ending in a fraction of a penny and other 'awkward' sums such as 27d. and 31d. among the individual charges.55 Such evidence simply shows that the subtaxers varied the techniques they used to divide up predetermined taxation unit charges, perhaps even to make them seem more 'realistic'. It does not make it any

"3 NA, E 179/90/6, m. 15d. 4 The only other example of the incidence of round shilling and 'convenient' charges (shown in

table 6) in the two divisions being lower than in the county as a whole relates to 'convenient' charges in Cumberland ward in 1337 (2). 'Convenient' charges, Egremont liberty: 1337 (2), 33 per cent; 1337 (3), none. 'Convenient' charges, Cumberland ward: 1337 (2), 21 per cent; 1337 (3), 54 per cent. Round shilling charges, Egremont liberty: 1337 (2), 54 per cent; 1337 (3), 29 per cent. Round shilling charges, Cumberland ward: 1337 (2), 43 per cent; 1337 (3), 64 per cent.

55 NA, E 179/90/10, m. 4. ? Economic History Society 2005


664 CHRIS BRIGGS

more likely that the many convenient and rounded charges at taxation unit level are compatible with a generally meticulous assessment.

It may be asked how failure to carry out the 1337 subsidy reassessments according to the official instructions could happen, since it was the job of the county's two chief taxers to ensure the assessment and collection was undertaken correctly. Yet the chief taxers had good reason to condone local strategies for minimizing the impact of the lay subsidy.

Although at least two of the four persons appointed to oversee collection of the 1337 subsidy were experienced royal servants who presumably were trusted to uphold the interests of the crown, these chief taxers would not necessarily have viewed it as prudent to press the demands of royal taxation in Cumberland too hard.56 In the 1370s and 1380s, chief collectors of both lay and clerical subsidies in the northern counties claimed to have met with physical danger, which made it impossible to collect taxes from several areas." Although no evidence survives from the 1330s and 1340s of any similar threat to the safety of the chief taxers in Cumberland, the circum- stances which apparently gave rise to opposition to collectors later in the century-that is, heavy taxation combined with inadequate royal provision for border defence-were also present in the earlier period. The lay subsidies collected from shires north of the Trent between 1337 and 1349 were earmarked for the defence of the border, yet the actual and threatened raids affecting Cumberland in this period demonstrated to the local population that this money was not always being spent to good effect.58 Between 1332 and 1346, therefore, individuals and communities in Cumberland turned to the same strategies for self-defence as they had during the campaigns of Robert I. The first of these was the building of private fortifications. Royal licences to crenellate, which give some indication of growth in small-scale defences, continued to be granted in considerable numbers in the 1330s and 1340s.59 The second strategy for self-defence inherited from the earlier phase of the war was that of paying the Scots not to attack. This was resorted to again on at least one occasion between 1332 and 1346, when Cumberland purchased protection from the Scots during the invasion lead- ing to Neville's Cross.60 It is quite possible that the Cumberland chief taxers acquiesced in manipulation of the lay subsidy machinery not only because of fear for their own safety, but also because they sympathized with the view that as little wealth as possible should be allowed to leave the region and

56 Chief taxers: Clement de Skelton, 1337 (1); John de Hutton Roof, 1337 (2); Thomas de Skelton, 1337 (1), 1337 (2), 1337 (3); John de Orton, 1337 (3). For Clement de Skelton in royal service, see Fraser, 'Cumberland and Westmorland lay subsidies', pp. 131-2; for John de Orton, see Graham, 'Great Orton', pp. 41-2. Little evidence has been found to show Thomas de Skelton and John de Hutton Roof acting on royal commissions in this period.

7 Macdonald, Border bloodshed, pp. 210-11; Tuck, 'War and society', p. 47. 58 Harriss, King, parliament and public finance, pp. 348-52. 9 VCH Cumberland, II, p. 256, n. 2; for the numerous fortified sites dateable to the fourteenth century,

see Perriam and Robinson, Fortified buildings; for licences to crenellate in the earlier fourteenth century, McNamee, Wars of the Bruces, p. 250.

60 Rogers, 'Scottish invasion', p. 56. ? Economic History Society 2005



thereby compromise efforts at local self-defence. As landowners in the county they were naturally concerned with the protection of their own estates, and they perhaps knew from their families' experiences earlier in the century that expenditure on protection money and fortifications was a more reliable route to security than contribution to royal taxation.61

VI As section II showed, between 1344 and 1348 the royal government adopted a changed approach to making allowance for the effects of war damage on taxation revenue from Cumberland. Rather than resorting to the supersession of payments from the whole county, or repeated reassessment, the method now used was to investigate claims of impotence from individual taxation units, and to permit affected places exemption from contribution towards the fixed county quota. This section considers the use of the lists of exempted vills as evidence of the spatial extent and economic impact of raids.

In the past, these sources have typically been treated as reliable statements of the places affected by raids and the level of damage inflicted. The reputation of the raid of October 1345 as one of the most devastating attacks of the fourteenth century, for example, is wholly based on the list of places excused subsidy payment in the following spring.62Yet the process by which individual localities came to be exempted from this and later levies has never been closely investigated.

The chief taxers of Cumberland were due to hand over tax collected towards the second year of the biennial subsidy of 1344 in moieties, the first in November 1345 and the second in April 1346. But in October 1345, a Scottish army invaded the county. Sometime later that year or early in 1346, the king received a petition requesting pardon from payment towards 1344 (2) on the grounds that the raid had left people in many places possessing nothing with which to cultivate their lands or maintain themselves. In April 1346, Thomas de Lucy and John de Orton were ordered to take an inquisition on the matter, which led in May to an instruction to the chief taxers to exempt around 56 taxation units from the subsidy. These places were described as 'totally burned and destroyed'.63 Further taxation units-those comprising Penrith liberty-had already been excused payment in April because of burning by the Scots.64 As table 10 shows, the collection of 1344 (2) yielded only around ?125 of the county quota. The

61 The Skeltons were lords of Armathwaite and places elsewhere in the county: Parker, 'Inglewood'; John de Hutton Roof was perhaps the contemporary lord of the manor of Hutton Roof of this name: Nicholson and Burn, History, I, p. 249; John de Orton was lord of Great Orton: Graham, 'Great Orton'.

62Hewitt, Organisation, pp. 126-9; Summerson, Medieval Carlisle, I, pp. 272-3; Winchester, Landscape, p. 45.

63 Cal. Inqu. Miscellaneous, II, p. 496 (no. 1974, after March 1346); Cal. Close Rolls, 1346-9, pp. 30-1 (10 May 1346).

64 Cal. Close Rolls, 1346-9, pp. 22, 301. ? Economic History Society 2005


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Table 10. Yield of the 1344 and 1346 biennial lay subsidies from Cumberland

Subsidy 1344 (1) 1344 (2) 1346 (1) 1346 (2)

, s. d. ? s. d. ? s. d. C s. d. 1. Taxation quota 249 4 5'/4 249 4 51/4 249 4 5'/4 249 4 51/4

Yield: 2. i. 'in the treasury' 200 2 8 15 15 5 21 4 101/2 0 0 0 3. ii. paid to John de 110 0 0 100 0 0 130 12 1

Wodehousa 4. Sum in respect of which - - 91 14 11'/4 - - - 108 16 4

taxers discharged 5. Taxers' expenses 10 0 0 10 0 0 10 0 0 10 0 0 6. Debt outstanding 39 1 9'/4 21 14 1 117 19 63/4 - - 7. Excess payment --- ------ 0 3 113/4 8. Total assessment of 94 12 11/4 106 12 10'/2 106 12 101/2

exempted taxation units

Notes: a King's receiver of subsidies north of Trent. Sources: rows 1-7: NA, E 359/14 mm. 32, 33, 34d, 36d; row 8: NA, E 179/90/12, Cal. Close Rolls, 1346-9, pp. 30-1, 448-9.

taxers were discharged of their burden in respect of a further sum of just under ?92. Although the enrolled account does not explicitly state that this allowance was made because of Scottish depredations, it is clear the sum represents the combined total of quotas from the exempted taxation units, because adding up those quotas using the vill by vill assessment produces a very similar figure (table 10, row 8).

In 1346, there were two further Scottish attacks, in July and October. Again a petition for remission of subsidy payments was received, and again the claims of the county were investigated through a commission, appointed this time in January 1347. The commissioners apparently took into account the effects of all three raids of 1345-6, and their inquisition produced a list of around 86 taxation units to be exempted from the 1346 subsidy. The order to exempt these places stated that they were totally burned and destroyed by the Scots, and the men there plundered of their goods and chattels.65 It is fairly clear that these taxation units were excused from both years of the 1346 subsidy. It can be calculated that the quotas of all 86 places added together totalled just over ?106 (table 10). In the enrolled account for 1346 (1), the taxers were left in debt to the not dissimilar sum of just under ?118. This was probably the money not collected from the exempted vills. It appears to have been entered as a debt in this account because the taxers had not received the appropriate royal writ entitling them to make exemptions. In April 1348, however, the necessary order to supersede payment from the 86 taxation units was issued, and in the account for

65 Cal. Inqu. Miscellaneous, II, p. 515 (no. 2051, March 1347; the commissioners were Peter Tillioll, Clement de Skelton, and William de Langwathby); Cal. Close Rolls, 1346-9, pp. 448-9 (18 April 1348).




1346 (2) the taxers were accordingly discharged of their obligations in respect of ?108 16s. 4d.66

The fact that exemption of a large number of taxation units was secured in 1346 (2) as well as 1346 (1) represents a significant concession, since in spring 1348 it had been almost two years since the last raid to affect substantial areas of the county, that of July 1346. As already noted, Cumberland paid the Scots not to attack during the invasion of October 1346, which meant that that incursion was limited to the fringes of the county. Another noteworthy feature is that the 1348 order to supersede payments demanded that the inhabitants of the exempted taxation units should nonetheless answer for-that is, presumably, pay tax on-any goods and chattels that they had at other places in the county, and for property saved from destruction. As in the 1330s, the crown perhaps sensed at this time that Cumberland was overstating its difficulties, and that more taxation revenue could be squeezed from the county than its inhabitants cared to admit. As the enrolled accounts show, however, the chief taxers secured nothing from the 86 exempted vills.

Can one be certain that the raids affected all the exempted places to an equal degree, and does 'totally burned and destroyed' accurately reflect the severity of the raids? To answer this fully is impossible, as it would require independent local evidence for every excused place. The Lanercost chronicle provides a short description of the attack of October 1345, which allows comparison with the geographical distribution of the exempted vills. It states that the Scots burnt Gilsland and Penrith, with the adjoining villages, which certainly fits with the exemption of Penrith liberty in April 1346 and the large number of places in Eskdale ward, Leath ward, and eastern Cumberland ward excused from the subsidy in May. Yet given that the taxation inquisition evidence gives such a strong impression of the severity of this raid, it is surprising that Lanercost goes on to say that 'as [the Scots] suffered from hunger, they returned without any gain to themselves or m

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