TONNAGE AND POUNDAGE

two subsidies granted since medieval times to the English crown by Parliament. Tonnage was a fixed subsidy on each tun (cask) of wine imported, and poundage was an ad valorem (proportional) tax on all imported and exported goods. Though of separate origin, they were granted together from 1373 and were used for the protection of trade at sea. From 1414 they were customarily granted for life to each successive king. Prior to the English Civil War (164251), their collection became an important issue in the constitutional struggle between Charles I and Parliament. The Parliament of 1625 had voted the subsidies to Charles for one year only; when the King later collected them without its consent, the Commons in 1629 passed two resolutions forbidding their collection and payment. In 1641, when the Long Parliament granted them for two months, it declared their levying to be illegal without Parliament's consent. At the Restoration of Charles II in 1660, they were again granted for life to the crown and under Anne and George I were made perpetual and mortgaged to the public debt. They were finally abolished in 1787.