Greetings, Hârniacs!

There are four bonding / toll houses marked in the atlas map of Meselynshire (from EH), located in Baseta, Bazine, Olokand, and Greaven.

My question is what their exact purpose is, how many men are stationed in them, what men (tax officials, soldiers...), whose men, what kind of a building this is... anything!

What kind of fees are collected there? Are they collected in cash or kind? How much would you expect to be in there?

The background for me asking is that we are gaming a Robin Hood like campaign and my players are planning to concentrate on toll/bonding houses...

I'm in need of help here!

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Steer me straight, O German one.
O flamer of mail, O Carver in Stone...

Spartan on HârnChat

I'm not sure about Bazine or Greaven because I don't have my Kaldor stuff here at work.

Olokand is a major stop on the Fur trail and most likely a toll/customs stop at that.

Baseta may have one due to its old ties to one of the older kingdoms, otherwise it may be a major collection point for wool or ore.



It is a warehouse where merchants can store (bond) their goods prior to paying the hawking tax. Most goods brought into a town are not put up for sale right away, they may have to wait for the market day, inspection, or a prospective buyer. By placing their goods here they have a guarded facility to keep them in and delay payment of the hawking tax till the goods are sold.

The facility is run by a bondmaster, he is responsible for the collection of hawking taxes and import duties. His staff may consist of an assistant or two, scribes, laborers, and guards.



Hawking Tax - A tax on all goods brought into a city to be sold, including raw materials for further processing, but excluding foodstuffs. It is usually a percentage of the good's value, the average being 10%.

Bonding Fees - a service fee for using the bonding house, it is payed in advance and the minimum is for one month. It is usually a percentage of the good's value, the average being 1% per month.

Import Duties - these are at GM descretion and usually reflect a protective stance towards locally produced goods or as a percentage of all goods entering into a kingdom as a kind of customs tax. I used a book by Robert Lopez on trade in the Mediterranian in the Middle Ages, don't have the exact title, for ideas on this part.

As plug, check out my article on Mercantylism at Lythia.com

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Roy Denton - the title says Baron, but Queen for a year. (Cheselyne I)

"Nathamh na hoibre an t-eolas"
(Knowledge comes through practice)

Hello,

Redenton, has talked about bonding houses, so I will only talk about toll houses. Toll houses are not directed against those in the town so much as they are directed against those using the roads. According to the toll houses described in canon text (such as Heroth and Hyen), the toll houses are simple structures on the side of the road with a sergeant (or corporal) and a handful of soldiers. They put a bar across the road and charge each passer-by a toll to use the King's road. The toll is "supposed" to be used to maintain the road and keep it free of bandits, but in practice I think it was probably more of a tax grab as the roads were rarely maintained.

To answer your questions Sir Eldaen:

They are like a toll booth on a modern highway and serve the same purpose to collect tolls from those using the road.

There would probably be about five men there (based on Hyen and Heroth).

They would probably be soldiers with perhaps a tax official who comes around daily to collect the money. The running of these toll booths is often "sub-contracted out" to the local lord who takes a cut of the money collected for services rendered and then passes the balance up to the King's tax collectors (in Olokand's case, the Sheriff).

The building is probably little more than a normal villein type hut with a bar across the road.

The fees collected are for transit. They would probably be paid in kind by the local farmers (chickens, eggs etc) and in cash by the big caravans. The amount kept at the toll house would probably be only one day's revenue (the rest would be taken up to the local manor house each evening for safe keeping). The day's revenue would be highly variable...see the Hyen and Heroth articles for the amount of the toll (it differs for person on foot, person on horse, wagon etc). Then you would have to determine the time of the year (during the annual caravan times, this could be quite large). During the winter, you might only have a dozen farmers go through the toll gate. During caravan time, you could have forty wagons in a day...that makes a big difference on how much toll is collected.

I hope this helps.

If you don't have access to Hyen or Heroth, let me know and I will post the toll amounts.

TTYL

Kerry

My take is that the toll houses depicted on the atlas maps are places where tariffs and other taxes on trade are collected. Road-use tolls might also be collected there, but road-use tolls will also be collected in many spots not depicted on the atlas maps.

See my discussion of this topic (here) but the short version is that a toll house collecting only road-use tolls and staffed with two or three toll collectors is probably barely paying for itself. It might, on a very busy road, manage to collect enough to maintain the nearby bridge, but it certainly is not making the king any real revenue.