It’s not a tax that can be called tasteful, but it shows how famous it is, a saying has remained about it ever since, even though the Held in Rome, AD Around 70. Emperor Vespasian introduced the “vectigal urinae”, in Hungarian a urine donort. Taxing natural human fluid was completely understandable, as it was worth its weight in gold at the time. Urine contains many important minerals, including phosphorus and potassium. Thus, it is not surprising that the service sector of the time used it in several ways, even if its composition was obviously not yet known in the way that modern science is today. The ammonia found in the dubious liquid was excellent for cleaning and bleaching clothes, but it was also used for tanning leather, bleaching woolen and linen fabrics, and making mouthwashes and toothpastes.
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Urine was collected in public toilets. After the accumulated liquid, the emperor levied the tax on the wool-cutters who operated or rented the toilets. According to the surviving story, Vespasian’s son Titus disapproved of the empire collecting money for this intimate matter. The emperor then took out a coin and asked his son this question: “Do you find the smell of money disturbing?” After the negative answer came the surprising explanation: “And it also comes from urine.” This is where the saying that money has no smell comes from, which nowadays means that the origin of money is irrelevant, we use it regardless of its origin.
Although the introduction of the tax was justified by reasonable considerations, it ended up being an unworthy revenge for the emperor: public toilets were later named after Vespasian in France (vespasiennes), Italy (vespasiani) and Romania (vespasiene).
Where it wasn’t worth it if a house had many windows, you could save a lot with baldness
The British were certainly at the forefront of introducing strange tax types. At the end of the 17th century, the treasury went for it and levied a tax on something that every resident had: windows. At that time, 2 shillings (about HUF 6,000 at today’s prices) had to be paid per house, but for properties with between 10 and 20 windows, an additional 4 shillings and for 20 or more windows an extra tax of 8 shillings had to be paid into Her Majesty’s coffers.
