Skattar og dauðinn

Ég má til með að deila þessu með ykkur. Ég er áskrifandi af skemmtilegu fræðiefni (www.wordsmith.com) sem miðar að því að kenna grunn og sögu enskrar tungu. Ég fæ í tölvuboxið mitt í hverri viku nýtt orð og sögulegar þýðingar orðanna. Þessa viku mun ég fá orð sem tengjast sköttum og dauðanum. Eftirfarandi kynning á hvers vegna þessi tvö orð eru tekin saman er mjög hnyttin:

Ben Franklin once said, "In this world nothing is certain but death and taxes." And the same goes for this week's words: nothing is certain but death and taxes, or at least a discussion of them. Don't worry, nobody dies and no one has to pay a tax to learn these words. Each of the words this week has something to do with either death or taxes.

Over the ages, the world's rulers have imposed all imaginable kinds of taxes on the populace. Taxes were once based on the number of hearths in a house (fumage), and there have been taxes to pay off raiding Danes (Danegeld).

In late seventeenth century, William III of UK imposed a window tax, levied on each window in a house. Three hundred years later, William III of US imposed a Windows tax, levied on each personal computer manufactured, whether it had Windows or not, but I digress.

Death too comes in unexpected places. When we buy a house and sign a mortgage, let's keep in mind that the word derives from Old French mort (death) + gage (pledge).

In the US, April 15 is the deadline for filing tax return for the previous year. At one time the consequences of failure to pay taxes were severe but thankfully, today, the "dead"line is only metaphorical.

publican (PUB-li-kuhn) noun

1. A tax collector.
2. An owner or manager of a pub or hotel.

[From Latin publicanus, from publicum (public revenue), from publicus (public), from populus (people).]

In ancient Rome, the state farmed out the collection of taxes. The right to collect tax was auctioned off to the highest bidder. Tax collection agents, known as publicans, employed lower-level collectors who made best use of their license. For their severe extraction of taxes, publicans were widely despised. Now, if a publican is a tax collector, what is a republican?