into squares gave it the appearance of a chessboard, and from its chequered cloth the Exchequer took its name. The system of the abacus contained no zero; and in ordinary calculations the parallel columns of the board were employed for units, tens, hundreds and other denominations. For the purpose of monetary calculations, however, the system underwent a necessary modification. The first column stood for pence, the second for shillings, the third for pounds, the fourth for scores of pounds, the fifth for hundreds, the sixth for thousands, and the seventh (set raro) for tens of thousands1. The calculation was worked out by means of counters and the result was then recorded in writing. At the foot of the table sat the calculator, who-as the different items of the sheriff's account were enumerated-placed counters in the proper columns. Counters inserted on the upper portion of the board denoted the sum of money owed by the sheriff, and counters on the lower portion denoted disbursements; the accounts were then easily balanced, and the surplus or deficit ascertained at a glance 2. The value of the counters depended on their position inside the column. According to the account given by Robert Recorde3 in 1543: "For the pence a single counter above the units signifies 6d. In the shillings [and other columns] a single counter above the units on the right signifies 5, and a single counter on the left 10". A sum of £198: 19: II would appear thus: £180 (=nine score). £18. 19s. IId. 1 Dialogus, I. v. p. 75. 2 Mr. Poole, op. cit. 131, has pointed out that "the form in which the account of the farm is drawn up . . . is apt to cause difficulty to those who begin the study of the pipe rolls". And he owes so much' means that the sheriff has a balance over in the king's favour to meet royal expenses for the forthcoming year. 'And he has a surplus' implies that the sheriff has paid out on the king's behalf more than he has received, and will make good the deficit from the next year's account; thus the balance is against the Exchequer. 3 Dialogus, Introd. 39-40. (ii.) The methods of payment. (2) In the time of the Dialogus two distinct systems of payment were in operation at the Exchequer, payment by tale (numero) and payment by assay (blanch). We have to remember that the currency was generally below the legal standard of weight or fineness, and the sheriff was required to make good the deficiency. Where payment was made by tale it was counted out, but it was first necessary to ascertain how many pence balanced the standard pound; accordingly a pound weight was placed in the scales and the money was weighed. If more than two hundred and fortysix pence were needed to strike the balance, the money was rejected as quite inadequate; otherwise the money was accepted, but the sheriff was required to pay an extra shilling in the pound. Thus the sheriff did not get the full allowance even if the actual deficiency of weight was less than a shilling. This form of payment covered the king's revenue against loss from the wearing and clipping of coins, but not against false coining. The device here adopted was to submit the money to an assay, and all payment made in blanch money was tested by a mechanical process. We have a very detailed though not altogether clear account of how the assay was conducted1. A purse of forty-four shillings was set aside; from these twenty were taken for the purpose of the test. The melter purified the silver, and after the removal of the dross the loss arising from the assay was met by the sheriff. It is evident, though the Dialogus is silent on the point, that the assay was not intended to reduce the money to its value in pure silver entirely free from all alloy 2. Standard silver was not pure silver, but silver with eighteen dwts. of alloy to the pound 3. If pure silver had been demanded at the Exchequer, the sheriff's deficiency would never have fallen below eighteenpence in the pound, whereas on the contrary an increment of twelvepence was considered sufficient whenever an assay, for whatever reason, was inexpedient. There are traces in early times of two other methods of payment at the Exchequer-ad 1 Dialogus, I. iii. p. 64. 2 Ibid. Introd. 30-31. 3 Ibid. 30; G. J. Turner, "The Sheriff's Farm ", in Trans. Royal Hist. Soc. N.S. xii. 135. pensum and ad scalam. When money was paid ad pensum it was weighed, and a variable deduction was made according to the deficiency revealed by the scales. When money was paid ad scalam a vantage payment was offered of sixpence in the pound. This is regarded by Madox1 as a form of payment by weight, where to avoid the trouble of weighing the deficiency was averaged at a fixed rate of sixpence. To all appearance, however, payment ad scalam was really blanch payment, a fixed deduction of sixpence being made in lieu of a true assay. At any rate, the Exeter writs 2 of Henry I. use the term ad scalam as equivalent to blanch. Later the rate of payment for blanch money, where an actual trial by fire (combustio) did not take place, was raised from sixpence to a shilling in the pound. (3) The payment of money was receipted by means of official instruments called tallies. The tally was a stick, usually made of hazel, upon the edges of which the sum of money paid was cut in notches. On the lower edge, towards the holder of the tally, the incisions denoted the larger denominations, and on the upper edge the smaller denominations with the pence at the right-hand end. The stick was split through the incisions almost to the bottom, and a portion retained by each of the parties to the transaction. The sheriff kept the stock (stipes), the tally proper with the stump or handle attached to it, and the Exchequer held the counterfoil, the flat piece stripped off the tally. The tally was not without merits, for "as a financial instrument and evidence it was at once adaptable, light in weight and small in size, easy to understand and practically incapable of fraud . . . a handy and durable form of receipt "3. use of tallies was abolished in 1783, though they did not disappear completely until 1826. A recent discovery has brought to light the Exchequer tallies used in the thirteenth century; and this has made it possible for the first time to describe the Exchequer tally from actual specimens. The tally was cut according to definite rules. A thousand The 2 Round, Commune, 85, 87, 95. Exchequer Tallies ", in Archæologia, lxii. part ii. 368. 1 Madox, Exchequer, 187. (iii.) The issue of receipts. The origin of the Exchequer. (i.) The constitution pounds was marked by a cut as thick as the palm of the hand, a hundred by the breadth of the thumb, a score by the breadth of the little finger, a pound by the breadth of a grain of ripe barley, a shilling still less, and a penny by a single incision, nothing being cut out of the wood. We have now to consider the difficult problem of the origin of the Exchequer. We cannot regard it as a single homogeneous institution native to English soil, or transplanted bodily from the continent. Its composite character and complicated machinery serve to make it clear that the constituent elements in its formation were not created at one stroke, but came into existence separately. The questions to be resolved affect three characteristics: (1) the constitution of the court, (2) the monetary system, (3) the methods of calculation. (1) The existence of a central department of finance in of the court. England before the Norman Conquest may perhaps be taken for granted, for a system of finance is the first condition of organized government. We have, however, no information as to its constitution nor even as to its name, for the term 'Hoard' is never applied to the king's treasure 1. In Domesday there is mention of Henry the Treasurer, who had a house in Winchester "in King Edward's time", but it is not stated that he was treasurer before the Conquest 2. The Editors of the Dialogus de Scaccario regard the Treasury of Receipt as the older part of the Exchequer and as the successor of the Anglo-Saxon treasury, while they regard the Upper Exchequer as originally imported from abroad. This conclusion is based upon the identity of the staff of the Upper Exchequer with the staff of the king's household placed in charge of the financial administration, and "the constitution of the household is clearly of Frankish origin". There are signs, however, that the officers of the household already existed in the days of Edward the Confessor 4, and the staff of the Upper Exchequer may also therefore have been organized before the Norman Conquest. But with 2 Vict. County Hist. Hampshire, i. 426, 534. 1 Poole, Exchequer, 21. 3 Dialogus, Introd. 14, 28, 43. 4 Round, The Officers of Edward the Confessor", in English Hist. Review, xix. 90. this modification it may none the less be true that the organization of the Exchequer was originally imported from abroad, for Edward introduced many foreign practices and employed Norman officials. system. (2) With regard to the forms of payment we can speak (ii.) The with more certainty as to the date of their introduction. monetary The account given by the author of the Dialogus runs as follows: "According to the tradition handed down to us by our fathers, in the early state of the kingdom after the Conquest, the kings used to receive from their manors not sums of gold or silver but only provisions, from which were supplied the daily necessaries of the king's household. . . This system then prevailed during the whole reign of King William I. and down to the time of King Henry his son; so that I have myself met people who have seen provisions brought to the court at appointed times from the royal manors". An allowance was made for these to the sheriff. "But as time went on, when King Henry was engaged abroad or in remote parts of the country in suppressing rebellion, it became necessary that he should have coined money for his expenditure. And at the same time there poured into the king's court crowds of complaining husbandmen, or what was more disagreeable to him-often met him as he journeyed, holding up their ploughshares as a sign that agriculture was decaying. . . . Accordingly the king, moved by their complaints, acting on the advice of his magnates, sent through the kingdom men whom he knew to be wise and fitted for the work, in order that they might visit and inspect each manor with their own eyes and then estimate in money the value of the payments in kind. And they arranged that the sheriff of the county should be responsible at the Exchequer for the total amount due from all the manors in the shire"1. But since the currency was liable to deterioration the sheriff was compelled to make extra payment at a scale' (ad scalam) of sixpence in the pound. The next step was taken when the farm was required to be paid also by weight (ad pensum). These precautions were valid in regard to the number and weight 1 Dialogus, I. vii. p. 89. |
