A hearth tax was a property tax in certain countries during the medieval and early modern period, levied on each hearth or family unit. It was calculated based on the number of hearths, or fireplaces, within a municipal area.
Hearth tax was levied in the Byzantine Empire from the 9th century, France and England from the 14th century, and finally in England, Scotland and Ireland in the 17th century.
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In the Byzantine Empire a tax on hearths, known as kapnikon, was first explicitly mentioned for the reign of Nicephorus I (802–811), although its context implies that it was already then old and established and perhaps it should be taken back to the 7th century AD. Kapnikon was a tax levied on households without exceptions for the poor.[1]
The fogatge was a direct tax created during the reign of Peter III of Aragon.
It was passed by the Catalan General Courts so that the new tax would not only be levied on royal lands, but also on aristocratic and ecclesiastical dominions.
The way fogatges were levied and the census drafted depended on the Courts and very soon after it was assumed by the Generalitat.
In the 1340s especially, the King of France's personal expenditure on dowries, gratuities, the upkeep of the palace, his travels and his wardrobe, consumed the entirety of the royal income.[2] The fouage (Latin: focagium) was assessed on the basis of households and was usually paid by towns in a pre-arranged lump sum raised in any manner the locality chose to employ.[3] It existed in certain French provinces, and became widespread in the 14th century when the royal finances were unable to bear the rising costs of war and state agents. In particular, fouages were levied in 1342 and 1349.[4]
In England, hearth tax, also known as hearth money, chimney tax, or chimney money, was a tax imposed by Parliament in 1662,[5] to support the Royal Household of King Charles II. Following the Restoration of the monarchy in 1660, Parliament calculated that the Royal Household needed an annual income of £1,200,000.[5] The hearth tax was a supplemental tax to make up the shortfall. It was considered easier to establish the number of hearths than the number of heads,[5] hearths forming a more stationary measure than people. This form of taxation was new to England, but had precedents abroad.[5] It generated considerable debate, but was supported by the economist Sir William Petty.[5] The bill received Royal Assent on 19 May 1662,[5] with the first payment due on 29 September 1662, Michaelmas.
One shilling was liable to be paid for every firehearth or stove, in all dwellings, houses, edifices or lodgings,[5] and was payable at Michaelmas, 29 September and on Lady Day, 25 March. The tax thus amounted to two shillings per hearth or stove per year. The hearth tax was intended to be fair, in that it fell more heavily upon those with multiple or larger residences, but there were practical difficulties. The original bill did not distinguish between owners and occupiers and there were no exemptions.[5] The bill was subsequently amended so that the tax was paid by the occupying family or household.[5] Further amendments introduced a number of exemptions.[5]
| Exemptions from the Hearth Tax[5] |
|---|
| Not paying Poor or Church Rates |
| Inhabiting a house, tenement or land worth less than 20 shillings (£1) rent per annum |
| Assets worth less than £10 |
| Private ovens, furnaces, kilns and blowing houses |
| Hospitals and almshouses where revenue less than £100 per annum |
Revenue generated in the first year was less than expected, so from 1663, the names and number of hearths were required to be listed even if non-liable. This additional detail has made the hearth tax documents useful to modern historians and researchers.[5] From 1664, everybody with more than two hearths was liable, even if otherwise exempt, and there were clauses which reduced the scope for tax avoidance.[5]
What had started out as a simple idea, perceived to be fair, had become over-complicated and bureaucratic. It was administered by receivers known as "Chimney Men", aided by sub-collectors and petty constables.[5] Exemption certificates had to be signed by a minister, a churchwarden, or an overseer of the poor and two Justices of the Peace.[5] It was clearly not targeting the wealthier people with multiple or larger properties, as originally intended. Wealthy landowners and landlords, who could best afford the tax, were exempt as the tax was now being paid by their tenants. The landowners were often MPs or had links with the Royal Household and were seen as being in a good position to amend the original bill to their advantage. The hearth tax was therefore much resented by those upon whom it fell, typically the middle classes. The tax was also resented because it entailed inspection of every dwelling by the sub-collectors and petty constables, who had legal authority to enter every property and inspect the number of hearths.[5]
Some people stopped up their chimneys so that the tax was not due on them, but where this was discovered by the assessors the tax was doubled.[5] On 31 July 1684, a fire in Churchill, Oxfordshire, destroyed 20 houses and many other buildings, and killed four people. It was apparently caused by a baker who, to avoid chimney tax, had knocked through the wall from her oven to her neighbour's chimney.
Hearth tax was repealed by William and Mary in 1689,[5] at least in part as a bid for popularity after their accession to the throne as a result of the Revolution of 1688.
Unlike in England, which abolished the Hearth Tax in 1689, it continued in the Kingdom of Ireland till the early 19th century although it underwent major reform at end of the 18th century. It was levied half yearly by the Sheriff of each county on the basis of lists of the names of householders compiled by local Justices of the Peace. The list of the households required to pay the Hearth Tax became known as the Hearth Money Rolls, which were arranged by county, barony, parish, and townland. The tax was sometimes collected over an area known as a 'walk', which was based on both the town and a large rural area outside the town.
Several attempts were made in Parliament to abolish or at least limit the proportion of households obliged to pay the tax, which was widely regarded as “a shameful infliction upon the poor peasant, to whom even two or three shillings in the year for such a tax was a burden and a wrong”.[6] The chief proposers of a radical change were Thomas Conolly and John O'Neill. In 1788, for example, they argued that for a substantial portion of those having to pay the tax, the yearly cash demand was an unreasonable burden.[7][8] Henry Grattan developed the same point: "I am convinced, that the man who has but five pounds in the world, and pays thirty shillings for his house, ought not to pay hearth-money; the strongest argument for his relief is the bare statement of his condition….The wretchedness of their living, and the misery of their consumption, is the reason why they scarcely pay any tax but the hearth-money, and is likewise a reason why they should not even pay hearth-money.[8]
Major reform of the hearth tax was finally carried out in 1793 whereby one-hearth households with less than £10 in personal property, or with houses and land worth £5 or less, were henceforth deemed exempt from the tax. The measure was apparently a consequence of parliamentary pressure in the previous session; the modification of the window tax in Britain giving total relief to poorer householders had led to calls in the Irish Parliament for similar "liberality" in the light of Ireland's healthy finances. The Chancellor of the Exchequer ( William Pitt) had refused, but a parliamentary committee was established under the de facto chairmanship of Mr G.P. Bushe who successfully proposed that one-hearth householders should be divided into two groups: those above and those below £5 in annual valuation. Subsequently, in 1795, freedom from hearth tax was extended to all one-hearth householders, as the opposition had earlier demanded; at the same time the tax on multiple-hearth houses was raised.[7][9] The number of persons exempted from the hearth tax was estimated at between a million and a half to two million.[10]
The original Hearth Money Rolls are not extant. The records were housed in the Four Courts in Dublin, the repository for the Public Records Office, but During the Irish Civil War in 1922 the building was destroyed by fire, which also destroyed the Rolls (along with the Ireland census records for 1821, 1831, 1841, and 1851), but copies of some of the Rolls have survived.