Note 171 — PART I TERRITORIAL STUDIES

We might even be tempted to go far further than this, and to carry our discoveries to a logical conclusion. If, as is asserted, direct taxation ('geld') began in England with the need for raising money to buy off the Danes, let us ask ourselves how the Witan would proceed when confronted with a demand, let us say, for £10,000. As there had been hitherto, ex hypothesi, no direct taxation, there would be no statistical information at their disposal, enabling them to raise by a direct levy the sum required. Their only possible resource, we might hold, would be to apportionate it in round sums among the contributory shires. Proceeding on precisely the same lines, the county court, in its turn, would distribute the quota of the shire among its constituent Hundreds, and the Hundred court would then assign to each Vill its share. As the Vills were represented in the Hundred court, and the Hundreds in the Shire court, the just apportionment of the Shire's quota would be thus practically secured. The arrangement would, moreover, be as satisfactory to the Witan as it was fair to the contributors inter se; for, by this gradation of responsibility, the payment of the whole was absolutely secured. This explanation is very tempting, and, indeed, such a system of apportioning liability is to be traced from time immemorial in the Indian village community.171 Moreover, if the ratio of 'hides' to ploughlands were found to vary to any marked extent, according to county, the hypothesis that the quota, in the first instance, was laid upon each county would duly explain the ratio assessment being higher or lower in one county than in another.