f L2 per sack on wool on the
ground that it was really a tax on the landowners, who received a lower
price for their wool in consequence of the duty. Bargains between the
king and the merchants were forbidden, and this species of taxation was
brought under parliamentary control by statutes passed in 1362 and 1371.
Along with the special duties on wool there was an increase of the
imposts on wine and general goods. By agreement with the merchants a
charge of 2s. per tun on wine and 2-1/2% on goods was levied in 1347.
Between 1371 and 1376 these dues were established as parliamentary
grants under the names of "Tunnage" and "Poundage," leaving the older
dues intact.

One class or "estate" occupied a peculiar position. The clergy still
claimed the privilege of self-taxation, and therefore it was
convocation, not parliament, that voted the tenths imposed on clerical
property. In some instances much heavier charges (e.g. in 1296
one-third) were decreed by the king, but the taxation of the clergy
declined in productiveness during the 14th century. By the close of the
reign of Richard II. the results of the transition from feudalism to a
parliamentary constitution were practically complete. In respect to
finance the most important of these were: (1) The disappearance or
reduction to unimportance of the feudal dues. The fact that this change
occurred at, relatively speaking, so early a date is of special
significance for English development. (2) The royal demesne, though it
had not suffered the losses that the grants of later times inflicted on
it, had also lost some of its value as a source of revenue. (3) In
compensation the direct taxation of property had become a ready means of
supplying the growing requirements of the administration, and the mode
of levy had been reduced to a well-recognized form, unsatisfactory
experiments--such as the poll tax--being withdrawn. (4) The growth of
import and export duties through the "old" and "new" customs and the
subsidies furnished a large part of the requisite funds. In fact, in
the course of a little over three hundred years the constituent parts of
the public income had, without any violent change, been completely
altered in relative value and in organization.

The period of the Lancastrian kings, extending over two-thirds of the
15th century (1399-1471), is noticeable for various experiments in the
system of direct taxation. The standard tax--"the tenth and
fifteenth"--failed to su