ABSTRACT
Lippe's earliest tax grants were made to pay for imperial war efforts. The fifteenth-century federal tax system had provided the methods that were basically adhered to until the eighteenth century. Military taxes were granted at imperial assemblies, with all rulers listed according to their status in the Empire and as from the later sixteenth century according to circle membership. Assessment was according to number of pikes during the Hussite Wars and by the end of Frederick Ill's reign was divided according to horse and footsoldiers and their war pay. It stood at this until the War of the Spanish Succession when horsemen were commuted to footsoldiers as eighteenth-century armies found less use for cavalry. Assessments were for the campaigning month. It was understood that a horseman cost 12 fl. per campaigning month and a footsoldier 4 fl. Territories could be expected to provide their assessed troop numbers themselves for a given number of months and on top of this pay their troops' campaigning salaries. Thus at worst an imperial troop tax could entail recruitment, equipment and salary payments for the whole time that a territorial contingent was campaigning. Less burdensome was the system where territories only paid salaries in lieu of troops and left the matter to condottieri. Other territories were equally willing to supply mercenaries and attract the money of the less militaristic.
