Render unto Caesar and the Local Elites
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 03 October 2019
Chapter 3 addresses taxation in Early Roman Palestine. It divides taxes into direct taxes (tributes), which were levied by the imperial state, and indirect taxes (tolls, customs duties, sales taxes, etc.), which were more often organized at the provincial and municipal levels. The structure of direct taxation changed repeatedly in the different regions of Early Roman Palestine. In general, the rates of Roman direct taxes were relatively low compared to those of other fiscal regimes. Moreover, censuses brought some regulation to the collection of taxes and thus helped to prevent abuses by officials. While direct taxes were transmitted to Rome, their collection was supervised by councils of local elites. For many Judaeans, indirect taxes were much more exacting. These taxes were levied by local elites and collected, often with little regulation, by tax-farmers and their agents. In addition to their political and economic power over the institutions of taxation, local elites were also involved in market oversight.
To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure [email protected] is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.
Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.
Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.
To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.
To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.