Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Carucage/archive1


 * The following is an archived discussion of a featured article nomination. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.

The article was promoted by SandyGeorgia 22:53, 30 January 2010.

Carucage

 * Nominator(s): Ealdgyth - Talk 15:37, 11 January 2010 (UTC)

I am nominating this for featured article because after a very thorough copyedit by Malleus AND Parrot of Doom (I'm moving up in the world, two copyeditors!), plus a peer review and a GAN, I feel this is as ready as it gets. Instead of a bishop OR a horse OR a nobleman, you get a ... medieval tax. It was an experiment that didn't work out, only collected six times, but still an interesting little tidbit on the way to more "modern" systems of taxation. It wouldn't work any more, as we don't usually have the ox-teams this tax was based on! No, I don't know how it was pronounced, sorry! Ealdgyth - Talk 15:37, 11 January 2010 (UTC)


 * Comment. It seems very short, 9736 B or 1658 words readable prose size. Does this really cover the key sources? SlimVirgin  TALK  contribs 17:37, 11 January 2010 (UTC)
 * It was only collected six times. Google Scholar search for carucage+history+taxation, which includes quite a number of brief mentions. Before the Royal Historical Society shut down their free bibliographical database, I also consulted it for any sources I might be missing. The important sources are the Barrett articles, Harriss' work on finance, the Mitchell Taxation work, and Warren and Richardson/Sayres works on Government. I didn't consult Norgate's 1888 work on the tax, as it's quite frankly out of date. Ealdgyth - Talk 17:45, 11 January 2010 (UTC)


 * I wonder if it could be fleshed out some more, perhaps with a little background explanation of some of the terms and the context, because it's quite difficult to understand if you're not already familiar with the period. For example, "The last carucage was imposed in 1224, after which revenue was collected by levying taxes on moveable property instead of land." It's not clear what that means. And "Despite its intermittent use ... the main source of royal income during those years remained scutage, feudal dues, and royal rights such as justice." What are "royal rights such as justice"? It would be helpful if terms that people can't be expected to know could be expanded just a little as you tell the story. SlimVirgin  TALK  contribs 18:01, 11 January 2010 (UTC)


 * I can work on that in a little bit, but there is a limit to how much can be explained without getting into wild tangents. That's how this article started, I needed to explain 'carucage' for Hubert Walter, and it just kept... growing. Ealdgyth - Talk 18:04, 11 January 2010 (UTC)
 * Are there any other spots that you did not understand or felt needed explaining? Ealdgyth - Talk 18:06, 11 January 2010 (UTC)


 * It's hard to point to any other specific instances, because it's a feeling throughout that you're assuming a lot of background knowledge, or assuming that your reader will constantly have to click off the page. Second sentence, for example, "It was a replacement for the danegeld, last imposed in 1162, which had become difficult to collect." Why had it become difficult to collect? And last sentence of the first para introduces the idea of "moveable property," without saying what it means. Second para of lead&mdash;most tax came from royal and feudal rights, again without saying what those terms mean. Last sentence of lead: it was used in part to pay King Richard's ransom: what's that? And so on throughout the article. The narrative needs to be a story that the average intelligent reader can grasp without having to click off the page too often. If it's too awkward to expand on a term in the sentence it's first used, you could include a link to lower sections that expand the key terms, or the key parts of the context. SlimVirgin  TALK  contribs 18:19, 11 January 2010 (UTC)


 * Some comments have been moved to the talk page. See here.  SlimVirgin  TALK  contribs 22:26, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

Comment. I'd like to second the above remarks that there's not enough of the big picture here. In particular, the last paragraph of Legacy is mostly a paragraph about the background: some of it should be moved to Background and greatly expanded (in particular please expand "the main source of royal income during those years remained scutage, feudal dues such as feudal reliefs or feudal aids, and royal rights such as the profits from the justice system"), so that the reader knows how carucage fits into the bigger picture of medieval taxation. I don't know anything about medieval taxation, so I picked a source about carucage at random, read a tiny bit of it, and came up with the following questions that aren't clearly addressed by the article: The source I used to come up with these questions (and which answers some of them) is: Eubulides (talk) 21:59, 11 January 2010 (UTC)
 * Was carucage intended as general revenue, or was it raised for specific projects? If so, what were the projects, exactly?
 * Was carucage imposed as part of a consensual process between monarch and subjects, or was it arbitrarily imposed by the monarch without any formal or informal say by the subjects?
 * Approximately what percentage of the royal revenue during the period came from carucage, as opposed to other sources of revenue? Even if we don't know exact figures, order of magnitude would be quite helpful. Was it 50% 10%? 1%? 0.1%?
 * Was carucage considered a state tax, or a personal tax for the king's benefit only, or both?
 * How was carucage related to tallage, or to the military service that scutage was supposed to be a substitute for?
 * Were serfs subjects to carucage directly, or were they subject only indirectly via their lords? Did the lords pass on the carucage to their serfs?
 * Okay, there is no real division between revenue at the time. As explained, each carucage was usually raised for a specific purpose, but didn't go into a separate fund or anything. (And it's mentioned what project/task/etc. each individual carucage was raised for in the article) As it explains in the Under Henry III section, one time out of six, the consent of the council was gained for the collection, otherwise it was just imposed. We don't really know, as we don't have a total figure for all royal revenue, we have guesses, but not all royal income went into our records, so most historians don't speculate. We just don't know. Tallage as it's named was not really collected in England, but it's a tax on movable goods. Otherwise, how do you mean "related to scutage" ... they were two different types of revenue. Serfs by definition did not own land, so no, they were not subject to the tax. Quite likely they ended up paying, but we don't know whether that happened or not. I do not have access to that article (its not yet in the university i use's sub package) so if you could send a copy my way, that would be helpful. But some of this is somewhat anachronistic, there isn't a division between state/personal taxes at this time, quite honestly. Or at least most historians I've read don't consider it so. (Maybe this author is, but...I've never heard of either of these two authors, so I'd want to know more about the article before committing myself.) Ealdgyth - Talk 22:09, 11 January 2010 (UTC)
 * "there is no real division between revenue at the time" Yes, and this info should be in the article, since this context is not obvious to the non-expert. Similarly for several of the other points you make: they're good points, and should be in the article. Anyway, again, I'm no expert, but Barzel & Kizer 2002 (which unfortunately I lack the rights to pass along a copy of) does talk about tallage (and, for what it's worth, Tallage says that tallage was collected in England) so it appears that tallage should be looked into. Barzel & Kizer agrees that there aren't reliable figures, but says (p. 481) "In the 12th and early 13th centuries, revenues from crown lands and customary feudal prerogratives accounted for roughly 75–80% of rulers' expenses in both England and France (Mann 1986 [ISBN 052131349X]: 418; Baldwin 1986 [ISBN 0520073916]: 156). The other 20–25% came from various other forms of taxation, some semi-customary and some consensual (discussed below). The revenues served both the ruler's private expenditures and those of the state; the latter at the ruler's discretion." Not being an expert I'm not sure what I mean by scutage, other than from what I can tell it was a substitute for armed service, and the idea that taxes were essentially a way to finance wars (one way or another) is a point that needs to be made more clearly, if I'm understanding the situation correctly. It is surely obvious to an expert that serfs didn't pay carucage, but it wasn't obvious to this non-expert; I think it'd help to state in the article who paid it, and who didn't, as long as there are reliable sources to back this up of course. A typical reader who views this article will have the modern view of taxation (including national, regional, and local taxes), and I expect that such a reader will misunderstand many of the terms in this article by interpreting them in the modern way. Matters aren't helped when the lead says that carcucage was a "land tax" but the body says "collection of the carucage was actually a feudal aid, rather than a tax". In short, more context is needed for the non-expert, and an introductory section summarizing medieval taxation and how carcucage fits into it would be great help. Eubulides (talk) 00:02, 12 January 2010 (UTC)
 * I can do the intro to taxation (ideally there would be a Taxation in medieval England article.. .note the redlink) It'll be probably tomorrow, I just had a rather... LARGE project dumped on my lap at one of my side-jobs. The problem of course, is that when that redlink becomes blue, the intro in this article will be redundant. (Hell, it might make THAT article... gees...) Ealdgyth - Talk 00:21, 12 January 2010 (UTC)
 * But but but... the article has ALT text! Aren't you going to notice that??? (smiles at Eubulides) Ealdgyth - Talk 00:25, 12 January 2010 (UTC)


 * He didn't notice my recent ALT text either. I think it was the first time I did it without whining, and my reward was ... silence. :)  SlimVirgin  TALK  contribs 00:39, 12 January 2010 (UTC)
 * Silence is golden. And I liked what you wrote below, about "I am the king, and I get my income from feudal rights, the judicial courts, profits from other royal courts, the royal forests, and the Jews": that's good muscular prose and we should see more like that in Wikipedia. The new intro in Background is much better; thanks. (Can you work "I am the king" into that? ...) Eubulides (talk) 06:27, 14 January 2010 (UTC)


 * (outdent again) Okay, I've thrown together Taxation in medieval England, which is more indepth than the additonal paragraph I've thrown into Carucage. Mainly, this covers the fact that there is no strict separation between royal and governmental income, relative percentages for revenues in 1130 and 1194. As far as Tallage is concerned, it's not a term much used by my sources... I'll note that our Tallage article has no inline citations, and appears to derive mainly from the 1911 EB, a 1895 article, and the Jewish Encyclopedia of 1901-1905. Any mentions of Tallage in England should probably go in the new article anyway. I've added a line to explicitly state that serfs weren't subject to carucage, and a line on the Templars being bankers (which, took forever to source, since it's "common knowledge" in the field... ) I think this should address most of the concerns? (I cannot believe I wrote ANOTHER article on taxation... blech!) Ealdgyth - Talk 18:32, 12 January 2010 (UTC)

Image review: single image, File:Medievalplowingwoodcut.jpg, is verifiably in the public domain. I am curious though; how was it identified as "redrawn from the Luttrell Psalter, an illuminated manuscript of c. 1330" (article caption) when the source Mediaeval and Modern History only identified it as coming from a "14th century manuscript"? Jappalang (talk) 03:18, 12 January 2010 (UTC)
 * Johnbod added the bit about the Luttrell psalter, you'll have to ask him. If he can't source it, I can remove it, obviously, but I assumed he had a source...Ealdgyth - Talk 03:31, 12 January 2010 (UTC)
 * It is the sort of image art historians are given to describing rather optimistically as "famous" (sigh); the whole page is on the Luttrell Psalter Commons page, or the BL website. Johnbod (talk) 04:22, 20 January 2010 (UTC)
 * Jappalong, will sourcing the fact to the original image from the Psalter work? or do I need to remove the Psalter bit? Ealdgyth - Talk 15:25, 21 January 2010 (UTC)
 * I've put the bit about the Lutrell Psalter into a hidden comment, pending resolution of this matter for sourcing. Ealdgyth - Talk 23:28, 24 January 2010 (UTC)

SlimVirgin and Ealdgyth, above you were wondering about the Templars - they were known for their financial skills, and I think it was pretty usual for them to be involved in tax-collecting (they collected the Saladin tithe in 1188 for the Third Crusade, at least, and I think they were involved in collecting the 1183 tax in Jerusalem, etc). They had become somewhat of an international banking house, because there were no other truly international institutions like them at the time (discounting "the church" in general). I don't know as much as I'd like about the Templars in England, but there are plenty of books about them, if you want to find out more. Adam Bishop (talk)


 * Thanks, Adam. It would be interesting to add a sentence about that, or maybe link to an article that explains it if we have one. SlimVirgin  TALK  contribs 11:07, 12 January 2010 (UTC)
 * We do indeed have an article that explains it.. Knights Templar which is linked in the article from Templar Order. Our templar article is actually pretty good, and has a pretty decent paragraph in it about their financial empire. Ealdgyth - Talk 14:12, 12 January 2010 (UTC)


 * Would it make sense to add something to the article about it? SlimVirgin  TALK  contribs 16:36, 12 January 2010 (UTC)


 * I will shortly. Just got Taxation in medieval England non-redlinked, which should help. Have to bathe the dog, be back at work shortly. Ealdgyth - Talk 16:44, 12 January 2010 (UTC)


 * What you added here is very good. I have the same suggestion again, though, about the writing. You write as though your reader already understands the vocabulary. For example, two of the main sources of income were from feudal rights and from the judicial courts. Very few people will understand what that means. I realize you're linking where appropriate, but I think the aim is to keep people on the page as far as possible. It's not that you need to explain endlessly, just that you need to slightly shift the audience you're addressing (in my opinion, which you're free to ignore, of course). :) There's was a famous newspaper editor (so famous that I can't rememer his name), but I think he was the editor of the Washington Post, who had a sign up in the editorial dept for the writers, which said something like, "Remember, they're only 10!" His point was that the best person to write for, and this applies to a great many levels of writing, is a very intelligent 10-year-old, someone who will immediately grasp what you say, but you do need to offer at least a minimal explanation, while avoiding going off on long tangents. That would be the position I'd adopt for this article: addressing a very clever reader who has never heard of most of the expressions you're using, and who doesn't want to have to read a lot of other articles in order to understand this one. SlimVirgin  TALK  contribs 18:47, 12 January 2010 (UTC)


 * Included in that is this: "The main sources of royal income were: (1) income from the royal estates, (2) income from feudal rights, such as feudal aids or feudal reliefs which derived from the king's position as a feudal overlord, (3) taxation, and (4) the fees and other profits from the royal courts, which were paid to the king." I can't GET much simpler for feudal rights than "which derived from the king's position as a feudal overlord", without going into a mini-essay and off topic. I've added "the judical courts" in #4, which hopefully will make clear what judicial courts means. Some of this is NOT simple subjects. The whole topic of feudal rights isn't going to be easily broken down into a short phrase explanation, sometimes links will just have to do. I do not want to oversimplify and become inaccurate either. Part of the problem is that the whole concept of feudalism is undergoing a historiographical revolution right now, our old understanding of the system is undergoing a rather large controversy, and it's just not possible to go into that much detail. Frankly, since the subject of this article is a tax that isn't connected with feudal rights, I think we've covered it in enough detail and linked to further discussions, so that trying to explain MORE in this article (especially now that I've written a whole article on the overview subject) would be getting off track and subject. I realize you're fascinated, but some things just aren't germaine to the topic, and an extended discussion of the whole topic of feudal rights and the income the English kings derived from them, isn't really needed here. To some degree I understand you want to understand the background, but puffing up this article with long discussion of incomes not even derived from taxation is probably not something that needs to be done. I've bent over backwards here, written another whole article on taxation to give background, and unless you can point me to something about the actual subject of the article that's unclear (and not the related topic of royal revenues) I'm not inclined to continue adding information not related to the topic. Ealdgyth - Talk 19:02, 12 January 2010 (UTC)
 * Additionally, I think a good comparision here would be to some of the more specialized mathematics articles, where we aren't expected to write to a 10-year-old, but someone who has encountered the term in more specialized literature and is looking for a more indepth explanation. See Group (mathematics) or Problem of Apollonius, which is about the level of interest for this topic, quite honestly. You're not going to run into a mention of carucage in the newspaper, you're more likely to see it in an undergrad textbook or the like. Perhaps in one of the better written romance novels, and someone might come here looking for more information. Just because this is a history article doesn't mean it has to be totally dumbed down, we can have highly specialized articles on history subjects just like we do in math or science. Ealdgyth - Talk 19:09, 12 January 2010 (UTC)


 * What you say about maths article is true. But I think the point is this: I'm British, I've studied British history, I've been to university, and I've edited some WP articles that touch on the points in your article, but if I were forced at gunpoint to explain precisely what is meant by, "I am the king, and I get my income from feudal rights, the judicial courts, profits from other royal courts, the royal forests, and the Jews," without looking it up, I'd be in trouble. I could give the broadest of brushstrokes, but no more, and I think that applies to almost all of your readership, including the undergraduates who might come here from a textbook. So it depends how many of your readers you want to carry with you. I think that, given that you yourself have a really good grasp of the subject, you'll be surprised at how much you can clarify without dumbing down or becoming too tangential. But again, I want to stress that these are just suggestions. I know it's frustrating, so do feel free to ignore. SlimVirgin  TALK  contribs 19:26, 12 January 2010 (UTC)

Source comments Everything fine. Minor stuff: RB88 (T) 03:27, 14 January 2010 (UTC)
 * How about some punctuation in references (i.e. commas separating author, title, and page no.)?
 * There is no need for them (grins). As long as it's consistent, this system has worked fine. Ealdgyth - Talk 03:34, 14 January 2010 (UTC)
 * Do the book titles really need to be repeated every time for a cite, especially when there is a sources section?
 * Yes, because I prefer it that way. For different works by the same author, I find it much easier to see the shortened title than a meaningless year. Easier to keep separate. This is a style used by historians, and again, as long as its consistent, it works. Ealdgyth - Talk 03:34, 14 January 2010 (UTC)
 * Fair dos. At least it's not a pony bishop article. ;) RB88 (T) 05:09, 14 January 2010 (UTC)


 * Comment. How about using some images from the kings, or anyone else mentioned in the article? There's a nice one here of John, for example. SlimVirgin  TALK  contribs 19:04, 14 January 2010 (UTC)
 * That one of John can't be used, as there is no source of the image given. And, honestly, what would a medieval illustration add? I'd rather add a coin image, honestly, it would give the feel better. But, quite honestly, I avoid putting images in at FAC because jumping through the sourcing/templating/alt text hoops is a pain and I try to keep it to images that are close to contemporary and relavent. There is a nice File:Richard I pictavinus 722697.jpg shot of a Poitivean coin of Richard I, but since this is an English tax, it's not very relevant. File:Penny-of-henry-III.jpg is a possibility, it's a drawing of a coin, but it's undated, so it's not clear if the coin was contemporary with the tax. When I was doing the taxation article, I hunted for a good Exchequer table manuscript illustration that had enough source information to survive at FAC, but could not find one. In the end, it comes down to .. if I'm going to bother to jump through all the hoops for an image at FAC, it's going to have to add a lot to the article, not just decorate to have a picture or three. Ealdgyth - Talk 19:20, 14 January 2010 (UTC)


 * I think images help the reader to navigate through the text. They break it up into units, and they'd give the reader a better idea of what we're talking about in terms of the period. The John image is cut from this one, by the way. I take your point about the hoops. SlimVirgin  TALK  contribs 19:25, 14 January 2010 (UTC)


 * There seems to be an increasing trend for reviewers to assess articles against their own personal preferences rather than against the FA criteria. Which part of FA criterion 3 is this article in breach of? --Malleus Fatuorum 19:39, 14 January 2010 (UTC)


 * A lot of the FA criteria boil down to preference, Malleus&mdash;what one reviewer might think is well-written, for example, another might think isn't. I think the criteria use to say something about "appropriately illustrated," but I may be misremembering, and anyway, you're right, they don't say anything about that now. Bear in mind that the above was just a comment, not an oppose. SlimVirgin  TALK  contribs 19:46, 14 January 2010 (UTC)


 * A lot of reviewers interpret them as personal preference, true, but that's not quite the same thing. --Malleus Fatuorum 19:54, 14 January 2010 (UTC)


 * Note The FAC page is backlogged and slow to load; if any of the above is fully resolved, can it be moved to talk, leaving a link here? Sandy Georgia  (Talk) 21:39, 17 January 2010 (UTC)


 * Deacon's comments: Support.  Good work. I think this article would have been better organised thematically rather than chronologically. It would be more work, but the educated general reader would benefit more if there were sections on purposes/origin, collection, conflict and revenue (with tables), and so on. The way it is currently written makes it harder to follow (and I'd bet if it were done that way, you'd have had more feedback by now too!). The chronological structure is also completely pointless as it stands, because there is no development narrative making use of it. But I know it is too late to reorganize, so I will overlook this. :) I'll support then,. Some points however:
 * Given any choice, I always approach things chronologically. This makes biographies easy for me to write, but other subjects... (My thesis advisor always teased me about this... said I was "old-fashioned") Ealdgyth - Talk 15:25, 21 January 2010 (UTC)
 * The clergy and ecclesiastics resisted Richard's attempt to collect the 1198 carucage from their estates. In response, Richard withdrew the clergy's right to use the royal courts, forcing them to buy the right to do so back for a sum greater than the carucage that had been levied
 * Would like to read more about that, if your sources have it. Seems like it's worth more than one sentence anyway.
 * I can't find anything in Gillingham's Richard I about it, and I'm still awaiting delivery of Turner's Richard. The source that I drew the information from, doesn't elaborate any further. Ealdgyth - Talk 15:25, 21 January 2010 (UTC)
 * William de Wrotham is designated as receptores carucagii, or receivers of the carucage, in official records. 
 * receptores carucagii means "receivers of the carucage": I've fixed it to make sense. This part is still a bit choppy though. You'll need to introduce William or something ... just looks like two random sentences put together atm.
 * Working on phrasing of this... Ealdgyth - Talk 15:25, 21 January 2010 (UTC)
 * the King capitulated and recognised the Cistercian immunity from taxation'
 * Would prefer some kind of rephrasing that doesn't imply that we think such an immunity already existed. Perhaps "agreed to Cistercian immunity"?
 * Took your wording. Ealdgyth - Talk 15:25, 21 January 2010 (UTC)
 * The last carucage was imposed in 1224,[19] after which revenue was collected by levying taxes on moveable, or personal property, instead of land
 * I don't understand this sentence. Do you mean "after 1224 there was never any other tax based on land"? Seems unlikely phrased as broadly as that. And it goes on to say Taxes on moveable property were first assessed in 1207, which seemingly contradicts the above sentence, as the latter could imply that such tax wasn't levied until after 1224.
 * Reworded, see if it works better now? Ealdgyth - Talk 15:25, 21 January 2010 (UTC)
 * And


 * medieval chronicler
 * You might as well say just chronicle if you are gonna say this. 1) "Medieval" covers more than a millennium of history, 2) what English chronicler isn't medieval? 3) specifying the century or decade or something is actually useful. I made relevant alterations for the article, but I thought I'd make a point of it since some of your other FACs have done this too. :)


 * Good work again! Deacon of Pndapetzim ( Talk ) 00:41, 20 January 2010 (UTC)

SV, Eubulides, is there anything else that needs to be done to garner ya'lls support? Or are you two only planning on making comments? Ealdgyth - Talk 16:22, 21 January 2010 (UTC)


 * Hi, I just sat down to read it again, and tried to tweak the lead a little, but I'm confused about some of the vocabulary. Lead says, "Carucage was introduced by King Richard I in 1194, and was sporadically assessed during the following two reigns. It was collected for the last time in 1224, and was replaced by taxes on income and personal property. The tax was levied only six times between 1194 and 1224, and never raised as much as other taxes."


 * Assessed, collected, and levied -- are they being used to mean the same thing here? SlimVirgin  TALK  contribs 22:27, 22 January 2010 (UTC)
 * Replied on the talk page of the article. Ealdgyth - Talk 22:48, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

I still find I'm having to click off the page a lot to understand the article. I know some clicking is always going to be necessary, but there's a lot of it in this article, so that reading it is hard work.


 * For example, what does this mean? "The carucage was raised in order to pay John's feudal relief—payment due on inheriting lands—for his 1199 inheritance of lands in France.[20] The relief had been set by King Philip II of France at 20,000 marks." SlimVirgin  TALK  contribs 00:01, 23 January 2010 (UTC)
 * I've amended to "feudal relief - payment to a feudal overlord on inheriting lands - for his 1199 inheritance of lands in France. The relief had been set by King Philip II of France, John's overlord, at 20,000 marks.". I had to guess at what you didn't understand though, because you didn't tell me what parts of those two sentences were confusing. Ealdgyth - Talk 00:51, 23 January 2010 (UTC)


 * This sentence, "In medieval England there was no clear separation between the government and the king's own household, and the governmental structure grew out of the royal household." This makes it sound as though there was a central government, just not an independent one. I think you need to flesh out slightly what you mean by "government" here. SlimVirgin  TALK  contribs 00:06, 23 January 2010 (UTC)
 * I've expanded that to "In medieval England there was no clear separation between the government and the king's own household, and while the central governmental organs grew out of the royal household, it wasn't until late in the medieval period that government could be said to be mostly separate from the royal household. During the late 12th and early 13th century, taxes could be paid either to the government or the royal household, and all types of taxes and other royal income could be used for either governmental expenses or the personal expenses of the king." which if you think needs copyediting let me know. The point is that money paid to the government or the king was fungiable, and could be used for any purpose, governmental or personal. (Later in medieval England the theory grew up that the kings would support themselves out of the income from royal estates and that taxation wouldn't be necessary except in extraordinary circumstances, which led to Parliament getting the power of the purse... but that's AFTER the time covered by this tax ... thankfully. ) Ealdgyth - Talk 00:51, 23 January 2010 (UTC)


 * To what extent was there any central government, apart from the royal household, at that time? SlimVirgin  TALK  contribs


 * If you mean any government that didn't shade into the royal household? Not much. The exchequer is no longer wandering around with the king, but it's still directly responsible to the king and all the appointees are controlled by the king pretty much. Same for the Chancery. There is no real Wardrobe yet. The great seal is the king's seal. It's only when you get to the point where the Privy seal and Wardrobe start to detatch from the Chancery (which held the Great Seal) and the Exchequer under Edward I that you can start speaking of a "separate" government and even then... Parliament is somewhat separate by the later part of Henry III's reign (Simon de Montfort) but... not in this time frame. in this time, there is no "central government" as we would think of it, although we're no longer in the period of the early medieval period where there is nothing but the royal household either. Some historians think that the time of separation was earlier, some think it was later, but the important point here is that money might go to the exchequer or the royal household interchangably, and that money, once in the either place might either pay for what we'd call "governmental expenses" such as wars, or might pay for personal expenses, such as royal upkeep or gifts to the king's friends. The main thrust of this paragraph is to show that the governmental situation isn't like modern times or even late medieval times (such as the 15th century during the Wars of the Roses). Ealdgyth - Talk 01:20, 23 January 2010 (UTC)


 * Would it make more sense, in that case, to say there was no real separation between the king's household and the exchequer, rather than the govt? When I first read that sentence, it jumped out that there wasn't really a government in any sense we would recognize, so it seemed misleading. SlimVirgin  TALK  contribs 01:26, 23 January 2010 (UTC)


 * That would work, but would you want some of the additions I've added cut then? Ealdgyth - Talk 01:30, 23 January 2010 (UTC)


 * It may just be me, but I feel it's quite unclear: "In medieval England there was no clear separation between the government and the king's own household, and while the central governmental organs grew out of the royal household, it wasn't until late in the medieval period that government could be said to be mostly separate from the royal household. During the late 12th and early 13th century, taxes could be paid either to the government or the royal household, and all types of taxes and other royal income could be used for either governmental expenses or the personal expenses of the king. What does the source say?  SlimVirgin  TALK  contribs 01:55, 23 January 2010 (UTC)


 * The source is about four pages of discussion on the development of the government from 1066 to 1485, so it'd take a bit to show you. The book is basically an encyclopedia of topics connected with medieval england, discussing them for an high undergrad level student, basically. Saul's an expert on later medieval England, so the articles are overviews, but for this information, it's perfect, because it's summarizing what is generally agreed upon. How about we do this in the article "In medieval England in the 12th and 13th century there was no clear separation between the king's household and the treasury.(ref to saul) The main sources of royal income were income from the royal estates..." since I introduced the rest of it under what I thought you were confused about, but apparantly i was wrong. Does that make it clearer? Ealdgyth - Talk 02:04, 23 January 2010 (UTC)


 * Yes, that sounds better. The ref is Saul p. 115. What does he say on that page that's relevant to this? SlimVirgin  TALK  contribs 02:55, 23 January 2010 (UTC)

(outdent) "In the Midle Ages the king was the personification of government, and the branches of his household were the first government ministries. This was why medieval government retained a domestic and informal quality right down to the 16th century." is on p. 115, but since we're discussing the treasury also, I've extended the ref to cover the financial arrangements, which he discusses on p. 116 and 117. Since the whole section only goes one more page, I've just cited it to the entire entry on "government" which covers pages 115 to 118. I've gone ahead and made the change in the article also. Ealdgyth - Talk 03:04, 23 January 2010 (UTC)


 * Thanks. So what he's saying is that the king's household was the government. Does he use the same language about the treasury? If yes, we shouldn't say "no clear separation," if in fact the treasury was the king's treasury de jure and de facto. SlimVirgin  TALK  contribs 03:08, 23 January 2010 (UTC)
 * By this time, there exists the Exchequer which is "parked" at Westminster and handles the audits of most of the revenue. The king also has a household treasury, but the Exchequer no longer travels with the king, so it's ... sorta ... separate. How the Exchequer was "parked" by this time is what Saul discusses on pages 116 and 117. Using the terms "de jure" and "de facto" is a dichotomy that is much more modern than this time frame though. "No clear separation" means that there is the start of separation at this period in time, but it's not total yet. Saul just spends almost a page discussing it in detail, which would be fine in the Exchequer article but.. not here. (It's two pages becaue it spreads across the pages, half on each page, about.). Trust me, if I'd oversimplified or got something wrong, Deacon would have hauled me up short, he's not shy about that at all. (Just look at the trials of the damned he's put me through with Urse d'Abetot or Hemming's Cartulary, but it's always worthwhile.) Ealdgyth - Talk 03:16, 23 January 2010 (UTC)


 * John land inheritance reference: 1200 in lead, 1199 in the text. Which thing happened in which year? SlimVirgin  TALK  contribs 00:47, 23 January 2010 (UTC)
 * He assessed the tax in 1200, he inherited in 1199 (when Richard died). Ealdgyth - Talk 00:51, 23 January 2010 (UTC)


 * And why was it his inheritance relief if he was the one having to pay it? SlimVirgin  TALK  contribs 00:49, 23 January 2010 (UTC)
 * That's just the terminology. it's his "relief" payment to his overlord in order to inherit. Ealdgyth - Talk 00:51, 23 January 2010 (UTC)


 * I think the article would benefit from being gone through once more, and expanding sentences or passages that are unclear, sourcing it all clearly, and sticking closely to the sources and what they say. Just to give one example: "Under Henry's son, King Richard I, the geld was replaced by the carucage, and was established by Hubert Walter, the Archbishop of Canterbury and Justiciar of England." What does it mean for it to be "established" by Herbert Walter? There are lots of sentences like this. I think there needs to be a general fleshing out of these tight sentences, perhaps with a history student in mind as your reader, but someone who's never studied this period. SlimVirgin  TALK  contribs 03:31, 23 January 2010 (UTC)


 * I'll reply to this in the morning because quite honestly, my initial reaction is to withdraw the nomination if you want me to explain what the word "established" means, because I find that to be a very weird concern. What ELSE does established mean but that he initiated the carucage?  Ealdgyth - Talk 04:11, 23 January 2010 (UTC)


 * What does it mean for the Archbishop to initiate it or establish it? What does an Archbishop do when he establishes a tax, and why would he do it? Why was he representing the king? It needs to be expressed in a way that makes it meaningful.


 * I had stopped commenting here a few days ago, because it was obvious that you didn't agree with my input, which is fair enough. But then you asked me to comment again, so I read it again today, wanting to support, but found I couldn't. The reason I want to support is that it's a nice, succinct article, and I learned something from it, and that's refreshing compared to the hulks that are often submitted at FAC (mine included). The reason I feel I can't support is that it's too succinct, to the point of sometimes appearing not quite right. It needs to come alive a bit more, so that people not already familiar with it can understand it. It also needs to stick closely to the sources, because (apart from the accuracy issue) that will help it to come alive. It needs to be written to minimize the number of times an intelligent reader who knows nothing about this will have to click off the page to another article in order to understand it. I'm sorry if that makes you want to withdraw, and I very much hope you don't, but it's my honest opinion, intended to be constructive. SlimVirgin  TALK  contribs 04:32, 23 January 2010 (UTC)


 * See, that bit about the archbishop makes it clear WHAT part of the sentence you found unclear. Before, you didn't explain that it was the archbishop reference that confused you, just saying "What does it mean for it to be "established" by Herbert Walter?" since you emphasized "established" i assumed that was the difficulty. HW was both Justiciar AND Archbishop of Canterbury. It wasn't his office as ABC that led to him establishing the carucage, it was the Justiciar bit. I've cut the ABC refernce (which I type on autopilot, quite honestly, since I end up typing it so much.. "Hubert Walter, Archbishop of Canterbury" is just something I type a LOT, so I always include the ABC part.) Hopefully, minus that, it's clearer now. To be fair, you were being a bit TOO succinct yourself. (grins). Ealdgyth - Talk 04:58, 23 January 2010 (UTC)

I wrote the stuff below before the above, but got an edit conflict with you when I tried to save, so I'll just post what I'd written already, but won't continue unless you say you'd like to hear more.
 * I've gone through again, and added and subtracted bits, hoping to avoid confusions where information was given that wasn't needed (I've cut the bit about scutage, since it was only one of the revenues that the carucage was supposed to supplement and put in place a more general (and hopefully less confusing) "Carucage was an attempt to secure new sources of revenue to supplement existing sources of income." which is accurate without introducing a minor bit that's of interest to historians but only serves to confuse the general reader. Ealdgyth - Talk 05:00, 23 January 2010 (UTC)

Some other unclear sentences:


 * "The main sources of royal income were income from the royal estates, income from feudal rights—such as feudal aids or feudal reliefs, which derived from the king's position as a feudal overlord, taxation, and the judicial courts—which included the fees and other profits from the royal courts that were paid to the king." I think you need to explain feudal aids and reliefs&mdash;as it stands, unclear terms are explained with reference to other unclear terms. Also, the sentence structure isn't clear e.g. "the king's position as a feudal overlord, taxation and the jud. courts". Also, how are you distinguishing in this sentence between the judicial courts and the royal courts?
 * This one, was introduced today during a copyedit by someone else, I thought I got all the things that got scrambled, but apparantly not. It's now back to what it should be "The main sources of royal income were income from the royal estates, income from feudal rights (such as feudal aids or feudal reliefs, which derived from the king's position as a feudal overlord), income from taxation, and income from the judicial courts (which included the fees and other profits from the royal courts that were paid to the king)." which hopefully is a bit clearer. Ealdgyth - Talk 04:58, 23 January 2010 (UTC)


 * You mention exemptions to the danegeld in the lead and text, but what the exemptions were or why they existed aren't explained, or the difficulties there were in collecting it. A few words of explanation would help. And why was the carucage easier to collect, or regarded as easier?
 * The exemptions just piled up, so a new tax without all the old exemptions would have been easier to collect. And people being gullible, they might pay a new tax that is seen as more fairly assessed easier. But the sources don't say exactly what the difficulties were. Huscroft says "The tax was also difficult to collect and unpopular, and there are signs that it was producing ever smaller yields." And the king could grant exemptions to favoured folks, pretty much. We're a bit in the dark during Henry I's reign, as we only have one Pipe Roll and no other financial records to speak of. Ealdgyth - Talk 04:58, 23 January 2010 (UTC)


 * "In response, Richard withdrew the clergy's right to use the royal courts, forcing them to buy the right back for a sum greater than the carucage that had been levied." What did that right consist of?
 * The right to use the royal courts. This wasn't something that was an inalienable right at the time, the Angevin kings were despots in a way that the later Tudor's only dreamed of. This is before Magna Carta, so if the king said "no you can't get justice from my courts" ... well, you were out of luck. I've added "forcing them to buy that judicial right back" in. Ealdgyth - Talk 04:58, 23 January 2010 (UTC)

SlimVirgin TALK  contribs 04:36, 23 January 2010 (UTC)


 * Support. I think that perhaps too heavy a burden has been placed on this article to explain the medieval English social, legal, and taxation systems, which are not well dealt with in the articles that, in a perfect world, would be supporting this one. Carucage is an article about one tax, collected only six times in the 30 years between 1194 and 1224. I doubt if a more informative and better researched account could be found online anywhere. --Malleus Fatuorum 01:32, 24 January 2010 (UTC)
 * Support. I've been watching this article since it was nominated. I am familiar with the topic of medieval England (though not to this extent) and don't find the article difficult to read. It's a comprehensive explanation of a single tax that replaced a different tax (danegeld) and within the scope of the topic, treated and developed well. I have one single suggestion: I'd remove the "only" from the first para in the Henry III section. His father collected once, his uncle twice, so in fact Henry III collected the most. This is the type of article I'd want to find somewhere; preferably on Wikipedia! Truthkeeper88 (talk) 03:48, 24 January 2010 (UTC)
 * Good point, removed. Ealdgyth - Talk 19:23, 24 January 2010 (UTC)


 * Comment. I understand SlimVirgin's questions; I'm a grad student in medieval history and I find English administration extremely complex and confusing. There are rows and rows of shelves in the library dedicated to it, so it's not easy to summarize it in an article like this. I think it has been summarized well, but perhaps only for a person who already has some background in the subject; I don't think that is a problem though, because is a random person ever going to want to randomly know about the carucage? Probably not. Having said that, there is one bit that could be clarified - why did the Cistercians claim to be exempt from taxation? I suppose they recognized no authority but the Pope or at least the head of their own order, but I wasn't sure.  Also, maybe this is a bit off-topic, but did England's technical status as a papal fief in the early thirteenth century have any effect on the carucage? Adam Bishop (talk) 06:41, 25 January 2010 (UTC)
 * I have run across absolutely nothing that mentions anything aobut the papal fief status impacting on the carucage. I'll dig a bit into the Cistercian bit, but I'm not sure it's easily answerable. Digging now. Ealdgyth - Talk 23:48, 25 January 2010 (UTC)
 * Upon digging a bit more, it seems (and I stress seems here) that they claimed it under the 1179 Church council that forbade secular taxation of the clergy. Note that no source says why they claimed a exemption in the case of THIS tax or what the exemption entailed, just that they claimed it, but had no luck. I found nothing in Knowles' Monastic Order in England, but I do not have his three volume history of monasticism so I don't have total access to the nitty-gritty details. Madden "Business Monks" Catholic Historical Review (1963) just says that the Cisterican's claimed an exemption from taxation, and implies it was from the 1179 canons. I don't feel safe enough to make the leap, since Madden doesn't explicily say so, just... implies it for other taxation, not this one. Ealdgyth - Talk 00:10, 26 January 2010 (UTC)
 * Okay, well that's all that jumped out at me, so I support. Adam Bishop (talk) 21:19, 27 January 2010 (UTC)


 * Support I made some trivial edits. This was partly to improve the last sentence of the lead, but I also hyphenated ploughteam, which I'm happy for you to revert. (incidentally, I bet Americans love the highly logical BE spelling of "plough" {:  Jimfbleak  -  talk to me?  16:27, 29 January 2010 (UTC)
 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.