Danegeld (/ˈdeɪnɡɛld/;[1] "Danish tax", literally "Dane yield" or tribute) was atax raised to paytribute orprotection money to theViking raiders to save a land from being ravaged. It was called thegeld orgafol in eleventh-century sources. It was characteristic of royal policy in bothEngland andFrancia during the ninth through eleventh centuries, collected both astributary, to buy off the attackers, and asstipendiary, to pay the defensive forces. The termDanegeld did not appear until the late eleventh century. InAnglo-Saxon England tribute payments to the Danes was known asgafol and the levy raised to support the standing army, for the defence of the realm, was known asheregeld (army-tax).
In England, ahide was notionally an area of land sufficient to support one family; however their true size and economic value varied enormously. The hide's purpose was as a unit of assessment and was the basis for theland-tax that became known as Danegeld. Initially it was levied as a tribute to buy off Viking invaders but after theDanish Conquest of 1016 it was retained as a permanent land-tax to pay for the realm's defence.[2]The Viking expeditions to England were usually led by theDanish kings, but they were composed of warriors from all overScandinavia, and they eventually brought home more than 100 tonnes ofsilver.[3]
Although the tribute payments made to the Vikings, prior to the Norman Conquest, are commonly known as Danegeld, the payments were at the time actually calledgafol, meaning "tax" or "tribute".[a][4] In 1012Æthelred the Unready introduced an annual land tax to pay for a force of Scandinavian mercenaries, led byThorkell the Tall, to help defend the realm. Following Æthelred the kings of England used the same tax collection method to fund their own standing armies; this was known asheregeld (army-tax). Heregeld was abolished byEdward the Confessor in 1051. It was the Norman administration who called the tax Danegeld.[5][6]
An English payment of 10,000Roman pounds (3,300 kg) of silver was first made in 991 following the Viking victory at theBattle of Maldon in Essex, when Æthelred was advised bySigeric,Archbishop of Canterbury, and the aldermen of the south-western provinces to buy off the Vikings rather than continue the armed struggle. One manuscript of theAnglo-Saxon Chronicle saidOlav Tryggvason led the Viking forces.[a][7]
In 994 the Danes, under KingSweyn Forkbeard and Olav Tryggvason, returned and laid siege to London. They were once more bought off, and the amount of silver paid impressed the Danes with the idea that it was more profitable to extort payments from the English than to take whatever booty they could plunder.[a]
Further payments were made in 1002, and in 1007 Æthelred bought two years peace with the Danes for 36,000troy pounds (13,400 kg) of silver. In 1012, following the capture and murder of the Archbishop of Canterbury, and the sack ofCanterbury, the Danes were bought off with another 48,000 troy pounds (17,900 kg) of silver.[a]
In 1016 Sweyn Forkbeard's son,Canute, became King of England. After two years he felt sufficiently in control of his new kingdom to the extent of being able to pay off all but 40 ships of his invasion fleet, which were retained as a personal bodyguard, with a huge Danegeld of 72,000 troy pounds (26,900 kg) of silver collected nationally, plus a further 10,500 pounds (3,900 kg) of silver collected from London.
This kind of extorted tribute was not unique to England: according toSnorri Sturluson andRimbert,Finland,Estonia andLatvia (see also Grobin, nowGrobiņa) paid the same kind of tribute to theSwedes. In fact, thePrimary Chronicle relates that theregions paying protection money extended east towardsMoscow, until the Finnic and Slavic tribesrebelled and drove the Varangians overseas. Similarly, theSami peoples were frequently forced to pay tribute in the form of pelts. A similar procedure also existed inIberia, where the contemporary Christian states were largely supported on tribute gold from thetaifa kingdoms.[b]
It is estimated that the total amount of money paid by the Anglo-Saxons amounted to some sixty millionpence,[8] and at the farm where therunestone Sö 260 talks of a voyage in the West, a hoard of several hundred English coins was found.[8]
In southern England the Danegeld was based onhidages, an area of agricultural land sufficient to support a family, with the exception of Kent,[c] where the unit was asulung of four yokes, the amount of land that could be ploughed in a season by a team of oxen; in the north the typical unit was the carucate, or ploughland, equivalent to Kent's sulung; and East Anglia was assessed by thehundred. Everywhere thetax was farmed (collected) by local sheriffs. Records of assessment and income pre-date the Norman conquest, indicating a system which James Campbell describes as "old, but not unchanging".[9] According to David Bates, it was "a national tax of a kind unknown in western Europe";[10] indeed,J. A. Green asserts that the national system ofland taxation developed to raise the Danegeld was the first to reappear in Western Europe since the collapse of the Western Roman Empire.[11] It was used byWilliam the Conqueror as the principal tool for underwriting continental wars, as well as providing for royal appetites and the costs of conquest, rather than for buying-off theViking menace. He and his successors levied the geld more frequently than the Anglo-Saxon kings, and at higher rates; the six-shilling geld of 1084 is infamous, and the geld in Ely of 1096, for example, was double its normal rate.[11][12] Judith Green states that from 1110, war and theWhite Ship calamity led to further increases in taxation efforts.[13] By 1130Henry I was taxing the Danegeld annually, at two shillings on thehide. That year, according to the chronicle ofJohn of Worcester the king promised to suspend the Danegeld for seven years, a promise renewed byStephen at his coronation but which was afterwards broken.Henry II revived the Danegeld in 1155–1156, but 1161–1162 marks the last year the Danegeld was recorded on apipe roll, and the tax fell into disuse.[14]
The importance of the Danegeld to theExchequer may be assessed by its return of about £2400 in 1129–1130, which was about ten per cent of the total (about £23,000) paid that year.[15]
Judged by an absolute rather than a contemporary standard, there is much to criticise in the collection of the Danegeld by the early 12th century: it was based on ancient assessments of land productivity, and there were numerous privileged reductions or exemptions, granted as marks of favour that served to cast those left paying it in an "unfavoured" light: "Exemptions were very much a matter of royal favour, and were adjusted to meet changing circumstances ... in this way Danegeld was a more flexible instrument of taxation than most historians have been prepared to allow."[16]Henry I granted tax liberties toLondon in 1133, and exempted the city from taxes such asscot, Danegeld, andmurdrum.[17] From the late twelfth century, a levy on moveables, which required the consent of parliament, replaced the geld. The principle of "no consent, but exemption", gave way to that of "consent, but no exemption".[18]
That a country-wide Danegeld was ever collected in theDuchy of Brittany is uncertain. Certainly they were paid off on more than one occasion, and such payouts may have included money (besides other valuables), but the imposition of a tax on the people to pay either astipend or atribute is not recorded in the sources, although it is possible that some monies were raised this way. It is more likely that purely local Danegeld were raised in times of emergency.[19] In 847 the Breton leaderNominoe was defeated three times by someDanish Vikings before finally opening negotiations with their leaders and enticing them to leave by offering them gifts, as recorded in the contemporaryAnnales Bertiniani:
Dani partem inferioris Galliae quam Brittones incolunt adeuntes, ter cum eisdem bellantes, superant; Nomenogiusque victus cum suis fugit, dein [per] legatos muneribus a suis eos sedibus amovit.[19]
A smaller group of Danes left Gaul intending to settle among the Bretons. Thrice doing battle with the same, they overcame them. The vanquished Nominoe fled with his own, then through messengers bearing gifts removed the same Danes from their settlements.
The possibility that the Danes were bought off by methods other than the raising of cash is raised by an incident in 869, recorded in the aforementionedAnnales and byRegino of Prüm. In that yearSalomon, King of Brittany, put an end to some pagan raids by payment of five hundred heads of cattle.[19]
The more local type of Danegeld is exemplified by two chronologically close events in theCounty of Vannes. According to a record in thecartulary ofRedon Abbey, thebishop Courantgenus was ransomed from Viking captivity in 854.[19] His ransom was quite probably raised on a local level. In 855 the monks of Redon had to ransom the count,Pascwet, from a similar captivity by handing over achalice and apaten, weighing together sixty-sevensolidi in gold. Sometime later Pascwet managed to redeem the sacred vessels from the pagans, and this payment too may have been raised as a sort of Danegeld. Certainly, according to Regino of Prüm, Pascwet later (in 873) paid a stipendiary Danegeld of an undisclosed amount to hire as mercenaries some Vikings with which to harass his opponent for the ducal throne of Brittany,Vurfand,Count of Rennes.[19]
The most important Danegeld raised inEast Francia was that used byCharles the Fat to end theSiege of Elsloo and convert the Viking leaderGodfrid into a Christian and aDuke of Frisia (882).[20] Local Danegeld may have been raised in the Eastern kingdom as needed, such as by one Evesa to ransom her son, Count Eberhard, at a "very great price" in 880, according toRegino of Prüm.[21]
The first Danegeld ever raised was collected inFrisia in 810.[22] In that year a Danish fleet of some two hundred vessels landed in Frisia, harassing first all the coastal islands and then the mainland before defeating the Frisians in three battles. The victorious Danes then demanded a large tribute from the conquered. Soon after, a report was sent toCharlemagne, then atAachen contemplating a campaign against the Danish king,Godfred, stating that the Frisians had already collected through taxation and paid a sum of one hundred pounds of silver. These events are recorded in theAnnales regni Francorum and theVita Karoli Magni, both works of Charlemagne's court historian,Einhard, and in the separateReichsannalen called theAnnales Mettenses and theAnnales Maximiniani, as well as the work of the so-called "Poeta Saxo".[22] The total sum paid out is unknown, but it was without doubt raised through taxes, as Einhard in hisVita explicitly says: "And the victorious Danes imposed a tribute on the vanquished, by means of taxes one hundred pounds of silver from the Frisians is already released" (Danosque victores tributum victis inposuisse, et vectigalis nomine centum libras argenti a Frisionibus iam esse solutas).[22]
No further Danegeld was collected in Frisia until late in the reign ofLouis the Pious (died 840). In 836 some Northmen, having burntAntwerp and the marketplace atWintla, agreed to leave on the payment of some tribute, the amount of which theAnnales Fuldenses do not specify.[23] In 837, either because the Frisians were unprepared or defected from their Frankish overlords, some Vikings managed to land onWalcheren, capture several counts and other leading men and kill them or hold them for ransom.[24] They then proceeded to exact acensus wherever they could, funnelling an "infinite" amount of money "of diverse kinds" into their coffers. They then moved to the mainland, where they assaultedDorestad and extorted a tribute from the population of the region before leaving.[24] This event is recorded in theAnnales Fuldenses,Annales Bertiniani,Annales Xantenses, and theVita Hludowici imperatoris ofThegan of Trier. In 846, during the reign of Louis's sonLothair I, the Vikings compelled the Frisians to collect acensus to pay them off.[24] TheBertiniani andXantenses annals record how Lothair, though aware of the outrage, was unable to stop it, and the Vikings left Frisia laden with booty and captives.
The last recorded Danegeld raised by the Frisians was paid in 852. In that year 252 Viking ships laid anchor off the Frisian coast and demanded tribute (of what kind we do not know), which was procured. Their demands met, the Vikings left without devastating the territory, as recorded in theAnnales Bertiniani and theMiracula sancti Bavonis, a life ofSaint Bavo.[24] That these various Viking impositions were paid by the taxation of the Frisians is made evident in a record of events in 873. In that year, according to the annalsFuldenses,Bertiniani, andXantenses, the Viking leaderRodulf sent messengers to theOstergau calling for tribute. The Frisians replied that they owed taxes only to their king,Louis the German, and his sons (Carloman,Louis, andCharles), and a battle ensued, in which Rodulf was killed and his troops routed.[24] One later, tenth-century source,Dudo of Saint-Quentin'sDe moribus et actis primorum Normanniae ducum, records thatRollo forced the Frisians to pay tribute, but this is unlikely.[24] All the various Frisian Danegeld was purely local in nature, raised by the local leaders and the people without royal aid or approval.
InLotharingia the Danegeld was only collected once. In 864Lothair II exacted fourdenarii from everymansus in the kingdom, as well as large number of cattle and much flour, wine, and beer.[d] The whole amount is not recorded, nor whether it was paid as astipend or as atribute, but it was paid to a Viking band led by oneRodulf. It has been suggested that Lothair was imitating the example set by Charles the Bald in 860, when he hired the Vikings ofWeland to attack those encamped on the island ofOscellus in theSeine. Neither the reason for Lothair's payment nor the result is recorded in the only source to mention it, the contemporaryAnnales Bertiniani:
Hlotharius, Hlotharii filius, de omni regno suo quattuor denarios ex omni manso colligens, summam denariorum cum multa pensione farinae atque pecorum necnon vini ac sicerae Rodulfo Normanno, Herioldi filio, ac suis locarii nomine tribuit.[25]
Lothair, son of Lothair, collecting from his whole kingdom fourdenarii from everymansus, allotted the sum of thedenarii with a great payment of flour and cattle and even wine and beer to the Northman Rodulf, son of Heriold, and to his hirelings.
There is also a story told byDudo of Saint-Quentin in hisDe moribus et actis primorum Normanniae ducum of howReginar Langhals was ransomed by his wife in 880 for all the gold inHainault, but this is probably a legend.[21]
The first payment of the Danegeld to the Vikings in West Francia took place in 845 when, underRagnar Lothbrok, they tried to attackParis. The Viking army was bought off from destroying the city by a massive payment of nearly six tons of silver and gold bullion. In November 858 a Danegeld was being collected, probably to pay offBjørn (Berno), who had ravaged the Seine and its district for the whole previous year (857).[26]
In 862 two groups of Vikings—one the larger of two fleets recently forced out of theSeine byCharles the Bald, the other a fleet returning from aMediterranean expedition—converged onBrittany, where one (the Mediterranean group) was hired by the Breton dukeSalomon to ravage theLoire valley.[27]Robert the Strong,Margrave of Neustria, captured twelve of their ships, killing all on board save a few who fled. He then opened negotiations with the former Seine Vikings, and hired them against Salomon for 6,000 pounds of silver. The purpose of this was doubtless to prevent them from entering the service of Salomon.[e] Probably Robert had to collect a large amount in taxes to finance what was effectively a non-tributary Danegeld designed to keep the Vikings out of Neustria.[f] The treaty between the Franks and the Vikings did not last more than a year: in 863 Salomon made peace and the Vikings, deprived of an enemy, ravaged Neustria.[citation needed]
In Kievan Rus during the rule of the SwedishRus (from where the name Russia derives), the Slavs had to pay an annual tribute to the Vikings known as thedan from at least 859 onward.[28] PrinceOleg, who was a relative of Rurik the Viking, after moving to Kiev, imposed adan on the people of Novgorod of 300griveni / per year "for the preservation of peace".[29] The payments to Kiev continued until 1054 with the death of Prince Jaroslav of Kiev.[29] When Prince Oleg made his expedition against Constantinople in 907, he demanded that the Romans "pay tribute to his men on his 2,000 ships at the rate of 12griveni per man, 40 men reckoned to a ship".[29] The treaty negotiated between Oleg and the Roman EmperorLeo VI the Wise committed the emperor to pay 1grivna to every man on Oleg's ships in exchange for going away.[30] According to the Russian chronicles, the followers of PrinceIgor in 945 :
... said to him "The servants of Sveiald are adorned with weapons and fine raiment, but we are naked. Go forth with us, oh Prince, that you and we may profit thereby.” Igor heeded their words and attacked Dereva in search of tribute (dan). He demanded the previous tribute and collected by violence from the people with the assistance of his followers....[31]
William Shakespeare made reference to Danish tribute inHamlet, Prince of Denmark,Act 3, scene 1 (King Claudius is talking ofPrince Hamlet's insanity):
... he shall with speed to England,
For the demand of our neglected tribute
Danegeld is the subject of the poem "Dane-geld" byRudyard Kipling, whose most famous lines are "once you have paid him the Danegeld/ You never get rid of the Dane." The poem ends thus:[32]
It is wrong to put temptation in the path of any nation,
For fear they should succumb and go astray;
So when you are requested to pay up or be molested,
You will find it better policy to say: –
"We never payany-one Dane-geld,
No matter how trifling the cost;
For the end of that game is oppression and shame,
And the nation that plays it is lost!"
Kipling's poem was set to music byfilk musicianLeslie Fish on her 1991 album,The Undertaker's Horse.[33]
In theUnited Kingdom, the term "Danegeld" has come to refer to a general warning and a criticism of any coercive payment, whether in money or kind. For example, as mentioned in theBritish House of Commons during the debate on theBelfast Agreement:
I feared that the Belfast agreement might be built on sand, but I hoped otherwise. But as we have seen, Danegeld has been paid, and the thing about Danegeld is that one keeps on having to pay it. Concession after concession has been made. What will be the next one?[34]
To emphasise the point, people often quote Kipling's poem "Dane-Geld", especially its two most famous lines. For example, journalistTony Parsons quoted the poem inThe Daily Mirror, when criticising the Rome dailyLa Repubblica for writing "Ransom was paid and that is nothing to be ashamed of", in response to the announcement that the Italian government paid $1 million for the release of two hostages in Iraq in October 2004.[35]
In Britain the phrase is often coupled with the experience ofChamberlain'sappeasement ofHitler.[g] On 22 July 1939, two British newspapers,The Daily Telegraph and theNews Chronicle, reported thatRobert Hudson of the Department of Overseas Trade had visited the German Embassy in London two days before, to meet the German AmbassadorHerbert von Dirksen andHelmuth Wohlthat of theFour Year Plan organisation, to offer Germany a huge loan worth hundreds of millions of pound sterling in exchange for not attacking Poland.[36] The media reaction to Hudson's proposed loan was overwhelmingly negative with the newspapers calling Hudson's plan "paying the Danegeld".[37] Much to Hudson's humiliation, Chamberlain announced in the House of Commons that Hudson was acting on his own, and Britain would not offer Germany any such loan as a solution to the Danzig crisis.[38]
