Tiaglo

a system of state duties in cash, kind, and labor, levied upon peasants and posadskie liudi (merchants and artisans) in the Russian state from the 15th through the early 18th century. Under the system, the sokha was the basic unit of assessment (seeSOKHA). In addition to direct taxes, the system required the peasants and posadskie liudi to fulfill other obligations, which were frequently commuted to cash payments.

In the 17th century, the heaviest taxes were the following: the streletskii khleb, a duty in kind consisting of grain deliveries for the maintenance of the strel’tsy (musketeers); the streletskie den’gi, the monetary tax which replaced the streletskii khleb later in the century; the iamskie den’gi, a monetary payment for the maintenance of the postal system and public roads; the dannye den’gi, a regular direct tax paid to the government; and the obrochnye den’gi, or quitrent. In 1679 the unit of assessment was changed from the sokha to the dvor (household), and the most important direct taxes and some minor levies were combined in a single tax, the streletskaia podat’, an assessment for the support of the streltsy.

After the introduction of the poll tax (podushnaia podat’), the term tiaglo was supplanted by the term podat’. In the 18th and 19th centuries, the word tiaglo was used to refer to a conditional unit of assessment. After the Peasant Reform of 1861, the term went out of use.