Social and Political Life in the Vijayanagara Empire (A.D. 1346 – A.D. 1646) v1.c10.s4.4

v1.c10.s4.4

Some definiteness about the rate of taxation seems to have been common since the earliest times of Vijayanagara history. We are told, for example, that the persons who constituted the Toṭṭigan caste in Pulliyūr-nāḍu in about A.D. 1369 had to pay one paṇam for every village situated in the 18 nāḍus.³ In addition to this tax on caste mentioned above, we have numerous other taxes which can be gathered mostly from inscriptions. The tax on shoe-makers is mentioned in A.D. 1375.⁴ Camels were taxed in A.D. 1382.⁵ Two years later they had suṅka (customs), kāruka, hoḍake, hombali, magame, vaṭṭa, and kaṭṭige.¹ Some of the taxes granted in A.D. 1388 by Bhaṭṭa Bāchiyappa's son Bukkaṇṇa were the following—tax on the threshing floor, on houses, kiṛukuḷa, bēḍa, binugu, grāma-gadyāṇa, mēḍi-deṛe, daḷavaḷi, tax on carts, hādara, hombali, daṇṇayaka-svāmya, meṇapu nōṭa, mala-braya, the good ox, nalleṇḍige, kūlu, koṭṭige, sollage, and mallige.² In A.D. 1396 the artisan tax, the loom tax, sale of branded cattle, marriage tax, oil mill tax, the huḍike tax, the furnace tax, the sāvantike are mentioned.³ Mallana Oḍeyar in the next year issued an order (nirūpa) that the Seṭṭis, Kaikkōḷars, Vāṇigas, Oil-Vāṇigas included in the eighteen paṭṭaḍai (castes) in the village of Pāḍi-Tiruvallidāyam must make over the taxes payable by them, viz., paṭṭaḍai-āyam, paṭṭaḍai-nūlāyam, mādaviraṭṭi, sammādam, sekku, etc., for the benefit of the temple of their village.⁴ Bukka II in Saka 1326 (A.D. 1404-5) fixed the taxes payable by the Seṭṭis, Kaikkōḷars, and the Vāṇiyas living in the premises of the temple at Pulipparakōvil, at two paṇam a year on each individual, and two paṇam on each loom.⁵ From an inscription of about the same date (? A.D. 1402), we gather that they had the local dues, the sugar-cane mill tax, the goat tax, the egg dues, the baking tax and the cooking tax in the villages of Pura and Māramanaḥaḷḷi.⁶