numerous streams successively swelled the river of the
pontifical fortune, which without them would have run dry.
These are the affluents which are to engage our attention.
They are called the denarius of St. Peter (St. Peter's pence),
the apostolic tax, the annates, the tithes, the pallium, the
perquisites, the procurations, the vacancies, the subsidies, the
indulgences, the absolutions, the dispensations.

I. The Denarius of St. Peter ¹ was, in the first instance, an
alms sent by the kings of England to the English colony at
Rome, called Schola Saxonum. In this form it was instituted
by Ina, king of Wessex ( 689-726), and was extended to
Mercia by Offa II., king of that country ( 794). In 853 the
Anglo-Saxon king Ethelwulf, whose son a short time before
had received the royal unction from Leo IV. at Rome, went
to thank the Pope for his kindness, and as a token of his
gratitude promised to pay the apostolic see an annual revenue
of three hundred mangons. This gift received the same
name as the preceding one, and was called the denarius of
St. Peter. Thus the denarius of St. Peter from the middle
of the ninth century was designed to aid the English colony
at Rome and at the same time the apostolic see. For a time
it was devoted to this two-fold object. After a while the
Schola Saxonum disappeared, and the denarius of St. Peter
was devoted exclusively to the needs of the papacy.

When the Danish king Canute took possession of England
( 1017), he thought that the payment of the denarius of St.
Peter would make his conquest lawful, and would make him
the authentic heir of the Anglo-Saxon kings. He therefore
held it an honour to send the traditional alms to Rome. In
1027 he wrote from Rome, whither he had gone on a
pilgrimage, to the chief men in his kingdom, a letter in which
he said: "I came to Rome, knowing that the Apostle St.
Peter possesses great power to loose and to unloose, and that
he has the keys of the kingdom of heaven. I judged it
useful to solicit specially his favour and patronage. . . . I
ask all my bishops and all my officers so to act before my
return to England, as that all the ordinary debts may be

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