I need a list of possible medieval offices. These will ge given but the king (or another high level kingdom official) to players. These can be kingdom level offices and city level offices and other if can think of any.
Kingdom offices:
- taxcollector
- royal guard (and captain of the royal guard)
- cupbearer, swordbearer
- royal chancellor
- royal councillor
City offices:
- city guard (and captain of the city guard)
- head of merchants guild
- head of craftsmen guild
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List of medieval offices
Started by Acharis, Oct 21 2011 01:52 AM
5 replies to this topic
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#3 Members - Reputation: 1088
Posted 21 October 2011 - 03:49 AM
Might I suggest reading some history books?
"tax collector", as an example, was not really a medieval office.
Firstly very few people had noticeable monetary incomes. So there was no universal income tax. Much of the taxation arrived as duties levied on various things -- England, for example, taxed wool exports. These were usually imposed on things that were easy to find -- wool export needs a port, it's fairly easy therefore to see it happening.
Collection of the monies was delegated down through various structures to people such as bailiffs (typically non-landholding tax collectors), sheriffs (landowners who also collected taxes, and also ran local courts) and coroners (in addition to their duties investigating deaths). There was also a scheme of purchasing the rights to collect taxes. For a pre-determined price one would buy from one's Lord the right to tax others; any excess monies collected over the purchase price were your reward. Similarly some grants of land included the right/obligation to collect tax from subholders.
Very rich landowners were expected to pay an amount of money determined by the worth of their holdings. So a landholder with land worth 5000 pounds a year might be required to pay a tenth of that. Terms were somewhat flexible, and the payment might be in money or goods or personal military service or by supplying soldiers or by various other means. These taxes were granted by parliament on a case by case basis -- some years a fifteenth would suffice. In wartime a tenth. One year the King proposed an eighth and nearly provoked a revolution..
In other areas, the church might be responsible for gathering taxation at a local level (the ecclesiastical tenth) and funnelling the money to deliver both to the church structures themselves and also to the King's wardrobe.
So, "tax collector" isn't a medieval job. "steward" (working for a lord running his estates and also collecting taxes), "sheriff" or "coroner" would all be jobs which may include collecting taxes. "bailiff" isn't an office, it's a sort of collective title -- "mayors" are also sometimes included in the term but at various through medieval England it also referred to those who administered a hundred.
These sorts of things are complicated and if you want to be realistic, you shouldn't be just making them up based on a sort of SCA view of what was actually quite a long period of history.
"tax collector", as an example, was not really a medieval office.
Firstly very few people had noticeable monetary incomes. So there was no universal income tax. Much of the taxation arrived as duties levied on various things -- England, for example, taxed wool exports. These were usually imposed on things that were easy to find -- wool export needs a port, it's fairly easy therefore to see it happening.
Collection of the monies was delegated down through various structures to people such as bailiffs (typically non-landholding tax collectors), sheriffs (landowners who also collected taxes, and also ran local courts) and coroners (in addition to their duties investigating deaths). There was also a scheme of purchasing the rights to collect taxes. For a pre-determined price one would buy from one's Lord the right to tax others; any excess monies collected over the purchase price were your reward. Similarly some grants of land included the right/obligation to collect tax from subholders.
Very rich landowners were expected to pay an amount of money determined by the worth of their holdings. So a landholder with land worth 5000 pounds a year might be required to pay a tenth of that. Terms were somewhat flexible, and the payment might be in money or goods or personal military service or by supplying soldiers or by various other means. These taxes were granted by parliament on a case by case basis -- some years a fifteenth would suffice. In wartime a tenth. One year the King proposed an eighth and nearly provoked a revolution..
In other areas, the church might be responsible for gathering taxation at a local level (the ecclesiastical tenth) and funnelling the money to deliver both to the church structures themselves and also to the King's wardrobe.
So, "tax collector" isn't a medieval job. "steward" (working for a lord running his estates and also collecting taxes), "sheriff" or "coroner" would all be jobs which may include collecting taxes. "bailiff" isn't an office, it's a sort of collective title -- "mayors" are also sometimes included in the term but at various through medieval England it also referred to those who administered a hundred.
These sorts of things are complicated and if you want to be realistic, you shouldn't be just making them up based on a sort of SCA view of what was actually quite a long period of history.
#4 Members - Reputation: 889
Posted 21 October 2011 - 05:50 AM
Might I suggest reading history books of more than one country?Might I suggest reading some history books?
"tax collector", as an example, was not really a medieval office.
Firstly very few people had noticeable monetary incomes. So there was no universal income tax. Much of the taxation arrived as duties levied on various things -- England, for example, taxed wool exports. These were usually imposed on things that were easy to find -- wool export needs a port, it's fairly easy therefore to see it happening.
Collection of the monies was delegated down through various structures to people such as bailiffs (typically non-landholding tax collectors), sheriffs (landowners who also collected taxes, and also ran local courts) and coroners (in addition to their duties investigating deaths). There was also a scheme of purchasing the rights to collect taxes. For a pre-determined price one would buy from one's Lord the right to tax others; any excess monies collected over the purchase price were your reward. Similarly some grants of land included the right/obligation to collect tax from subholders.
Very rich landowners were expected to pay an amount of money determined by the worth of their holdings. So a landholder with land worth 5000 pounds a year might be required to pay a tenth of that. Terms were somewhat flexible, and the payment might be in money or goods or personal military service or by supplying soldiers or by various other means. These taxes were granted by parliament on a case by case basis -- some years a fifteenth would suffice. In wartime a tenth. One year the King proposed an eighth and nearly provoked a revolution..
In other areas, the church might be responsible for gathering taxation at a local level (the ecclesiastical tenth) and funnelling the money to deliver both to the church structures themselves and also to the King's wardrobe.
So, "tax collector" isn't a medieval job. "steward" (working for a lord running his estates and also collecting taxes), "sheriff" or "coroner" would all be jobs which may include collecting taxes. "bailiff" isn't an office, it's a sort of collective title -- "mayors" are also sometimes included in the term but at various through medieval England it also referred to those who administered a hundred.
These sorts of things are complicated and if you want to be realistic, you shouldn't be just making them up based on a sort of SCA view of what was actually quite a long period of history.
That's British system, don't generalize it to all nations. Sheriffs existed only in England as far as I know. Tax collector is a general name for that office type that fit with various kingdoms more. Also, you completely ignored merchants, just as if everyone back then was a feudal lord or a peasant. Cities basicly always had taxes for their residents (plus, these usually had no lord to whom they could pay taxes, at least the big and rich cities which bought their city rights).As for tarrifs (tax on exports), I think it was named some other way "custom officer"? And that's definitely a separate office from a tax collector.
#6 Members - Reputation: 337
Posted 24 October 2011 - 04:46 AM
Sheriff (shortened from Shire Reave) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reeve_(England)
Bailiff http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bailiff
Sexton http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sexton_(office)
master of the horse
judge
deputy X
Sergeant
Guild Master
burgermeister
Elder
magistrate
Jurist
knight
Szlachta
magnate
Councilor
mayor
Bailiff http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bailiff
Sexton http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sexton_(office)
master of the horse
judge
deputy X
Sergeant
Guild Master
burgermeister
Elder
magistrate
Jurist
knight
Szlachta
magnate
Councilor
mayor
--------------------------------------------Ratings are Opinion, not Fact
