Wat Tyler

Wat Tyler, commonly known as the leader of the Peasants' Revolt, rebelled against a poll tax in the late 1300s.

Background[edit]

With the renewal of hostilities with France in 1377, the pressure of taxation became more and more severe; and the Government, by repeatedly imposing a poll-tax, made this burden bear with direct and galling weight upon the poor. Attention has already been drawn to the capitation tax imposed in the last year of Edward III's reign. In 1379 another poll-tax was granted by Parliament, which exacted fourpence a head from the labouring classes; but much higher payments under it were required from the middle and upper classes, and this graduated tax was endured. But the next Parliament, at the end of 1380, voted a third poll-tax, which was framed on the harsh principle of that of 1377. The attempt to enforce this taxation was the immediate cause of the dreadful revolutionary uprising of the lower orders throughout nearly all England, which is commonly spoken of as the insurrection of Wat Tyler.

The Kentish insurgents, of whom this man was the leader, were doubtless the most formidable of all the insurgents, by reason of their numbers, their determination, and their proximity to the capital. And, inasmuch as Wat Tyler came into immediate collision with the chief officers of the Government, and was killed in a personal interview with the King himself, which was marked by many highly dramatic circumstances, the attention of historians has in general been almost exclusively directed to the proceedings of the Kentish men under Tyler, with some brief allusions to the contemporaneous disturbances in Essex and in Norfolk.

Wat Tyler's career began and ended in less than a month; but the revolutionary movement lasted for movement a much longer time; and it extended far beyond the sphere of his operations.^[1]

References[edit]

1. ↑ History of England from the Earliest to the Present Time: The history during the early and middle ages