Hearth tax a baker who, to avoid chimney tax, had knocked through the wall from her oven to her neighbour's chimney. After the Glorious Revolution, the hearth tax was repealed by the newly empowered English Parliament and agreed to by the newly installed William III and Mary II in 1689, as "not only a great oppression to the poorer sort, but a badge of slavery upon the whole people, exposing every man’s house to be entered into, and searched at pleasure, by persons unknown to him." At the end of the Glorious Revolution in 1688, William III and Mary II also agreed
Hearth tax Hearth tax A hearth tax was a property tax in certain countries during the medieval and early modern period, levied on each hearth, thus by proxy on each family unit. It was calculated based on the number of hearths, or fireplaces, within a municipal area. Hearth tax was levied in the Byzantine Empire from the 9th century, France and England from the 14th century, and finally in England, Scotland and Ireland in the 17th century. In the Byzantine Empire a tax on hearths, known as kapnikon, was first explicitly mentioned for the reign of Nicephorus I (802–811), although its context