A poll tax, also known as head tax or capitation, is a
tax levied as a fixed sum on every liable individual (typically every adult), without reference to income or resources.
Head taxes were important sources of revenue for many governments from ancient times until the 19th century. In the United Kingdom, poll taxes were levied by the governments of
John of Gaunt in the 14th century,
Charles II in the 17th and
Margaret Thatcher
Margaret Hilda Thatcher, Baroness Thatcher (; 13 October 19258 April 2013) was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1979 to 1990 and Leader of the Conservative Party from 1975 to 1990. She was the first female British prime ...
in the 20th century. In the United States, voting poll taxes (whose payment was a precondition to voting in an election) have been used to
disenfranchise impoverished and minority voters (especially under
Reconstruction).
By their very nature, poll taxes are considered regressive. Many other economists brand them as highly harmful taxes for low incomes (100 monetary units of a fortune of 10,000 represent 1% of said wealth, while 100 monetary units of a fortune of 500 represents 20%). Its acceptance or "neutrality" (there is no truly neutral tax on the population) will depend on the amount of payment that is agreed upon and set by the government body. Therefore, low amounts generally go unnoticed just as high amounts generate many tax revolts.
Examples of such tax riots are the 1381
Peasants' Revolt
The Peasants' Revolt, also named Wat Tyler's Rebellion or the Great Rising, was a major uprising across large parts of England in 1381. The revolt had various causes, including the socio-economic and political tensions generated by the Blac ...
in England and the 1906
Bambatha Rebellion
The Bambatha Rebellion (or the Zulu Rebellion) of 1906 was led by Bambatha kaMancinza (c. 1860–1906?), leader of the Zondi clan of the Zulu people, who lived in the Mpanza Valley (now a district near Greytown, KwaZulu-Natal) against Britis ...
against colonial rule in South Africa.
The word "poll" is an archaic term for "head" or "top of the head". The sense of "counting heads" is found in phrases like
polling place
A polling place is where voters cast their ballots in elections. The phrase polling station is also used in American English and British English, although polling place is the building and
opinion poll
An opinion poll, often simply referred to as a survey or a poll (although strictly a poll is an actual election) is a human research survey of public opinion from a particular sample. Opinion polls are usually designed to represent the opinion ...
.
Religious law
Mosaic Law
As prescribed in
Exodus
Exodus or the Exodus may refer to:
Religion
* Book of Exodus, second book of the Hebrew Torah and the Christian Bible
* The Exodus, the biblical story of the migration of the ancient Israelites from Egypt into Canaan
Historical events
* Exo ...
,
Jewish law
''Halakha'' (; he, הֲלָכָה, ), also transliterated as ''halacha'', ''halakhah'', and ''halocho'' ( ), is the collective body of Jewish religious laws which is derived from the written and Oral Torah. Halakha is based on biblical command ...
imposed a poll tax of a half-
shekel
Shekel or sheqel ( akk, 𒅆𒅗𒇻 ''šiqlu'' or ''siqlu,'' he, שקל, plural he, שקלים or shekels, Phoenician: ) is an ancient Mesopotamian coin, usually of silver. A shekel was first a unit of weight—very roughly —and became c ...
, payable by every man above the age of twenty.
The money was designated for the
Tabernacle
According to the Hebrew Bible, the tabernacle ( he, מִשְׁכַּן, mīškān, residence, dwelling place), also known as the Tent of the Congregation ( he, link=no, אֹהֶל מוֹעֵד, ’ōhel mō‘ēḏ, also Tent of Meeting, etc.), ...
in the Exodus narrative and later for the upkeep of the
Temple of Jerusalem
The Temple in Jerusalem, or alternatively the Holy Temple (; , ), refers to the two now-destroyed religious structures that served as the central places of worship for Israelites and Jews on the modern-day Temple Mount in the Old City of Jerus ...
. Priests, women, slaves and minors were exempted, although they could offer it voluntarily. Payment by
Samaritans
Samaritans (; ; he, שומרונים, translit=Šōmrōnīm, lit=; ar, السامريون, translit=as-Sāmiriyyūn) are an ethnoreligious group who originate from the ancient Israelites. They are native to the Levant and adhere to Samarit ...
or
Gentiles
Gentile () is a word that usually means "someone who is not a Jew". Other groups that claim Israelite heritage, notably Mormons, sometimes use the term ''gentile'' to describe outsiders. More rarely, the term is generally used as a synonym for ...
was rejected. It was collected yearly during the month of
Adar, both at the Temple and at special collection bureaux in the provinces.
Islamic law
Zakat al-Fitr is an obligatory charity that must be given by every Muslim (or their guardian) near the end of every
Ramadan. Muslims in dire poverty are exempt from it. The amount is 2 kg of wheat or barley, or its cash equivalent. Zakat al-Fitr is to be given to the poor.
Jizya
Jizya ( ar, جِزْيَة / ) is a per capita yearly taxation historically levied in the form of financial charge on dhimmis, that is, permanent non-Muslim subjects of a state governed by Islamic law. The jizya tax has been understood in Isla ...
was either imposed as a land tax or a poll tax imposed under
Islamic law
Sharia (; ar, شريعة, sharīʿa ) is a body of religious law that forms a part of the Islamic tradition. It is derived from the religious precepts of Islam and is based on the sacred scriptures of Islam, particularly the Quran and the ...
on non-Muslims permanently residing in a Muslim state as part of their ''
dhimmi
' ( ar, ذمي ', , collectively ''/'' "the people of the covenant") or () is a historical term for non-Muslims living in an Islamic state with legal protection. The word literally means "protected person", referring to the state's obligatio ...
'' status. As a poll tax, the tax usually only applied to free, abled-bodied adult men. The jizya could also be qualified by the income of the individual. Various rationales have been posited for the poll-tax. A common one is that it is a fee in exchange for being able to practice one's religion under an Islamic state, or being a fee in exchange for Muslim protection from outside aggregation. Some interpreters saw it as evidence of the humiliated status of religious minorities. For instance,
Amr ibn al-As
( ar, عمرو بن العاص السهمي; 664) was the Arab commander who led the Muslim conquest of Egypt and served as its governor in 640–646 and 658–664. The son of a wealthy Qurayshite, Amr embraced Islam in and was assigned import ...
, after conquering Egypt, set up a census to measure the population for the jizya, and thus the total expected jizya revenue for the whole province, but organized the actual collection by partitioning the population into wealth classes, so that the rich paid more and the poor less jizya of that total sum. Elsewhere, it is reported customary to partition into three classes, e.g. 48
dirhams for the rich, 24 for middle class and 12 for the poor. In 1855, the
Ottoman Empire
The Ottoman Empire, * ; is an archaic version. The definite article forms and were synonymous * and el, Оθωμανική Αυτοκρατορία, Othōmanikē Avtokratoria, label=none * info page on book at Martin Luther University) ...
abolished the jizya tax, as part of reforms to equalize the status of Muslims and non-Muslims. It was replaced by a military-exemption tax on non-Muslims, the Bedel-i Askeri.
It was once thought that the Islamic poll-tax was related to a Byzantine poll-tax in pre-Islamic times, but all such sources for the Byzantine poll-tax have now been redated to the Islamic period, leaving no Byzantine evidence for this practice in pre-Islamic times.
Canada
The
Chinese head tax was a fixed fee charged to each
Chinese person entering
Canada
Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tota ...
. The
head tax
A poll tax, also known as head tax or capitation, is a tax levied as a fixed sum on every liable individual (typically every adult), without reference to income or resources.
Head taxes were important sources of revenue for many governments f ...
was first levied after the
Canadian parliament
The Parliament of Canada (french: Parlement du Canada) is the federal legislature of Canada, seated at Parliament Hill in Ottawa, and is composed of three parts: the King, the Senate, and the House of Commons. By constitutional convention, the ...
passed the
Chinese Immigration Act of 1885 and was meant to discourage Chinese people from entering Canada after the completion of the
Canadian Pacific Railway
The Canadian Pacific Railway (french: Chemin de fer Canadien Pacifique) , also known simply as CPR or Canadian Pacific and formerly as CP Rail (1968–1996), is a Canadian Class I railway incorporated in 1881. The railway is owned by Canad ...
. The tax was abolished by the
Chinese Immigration Act of 1923
The Chinese Immigration Act, 1923, known today as the Chinese Exclusion Act (the duration of which has been dubbed the Exclusion Era), was an act passed by the government of Liberal Prime Minister William Lyon Mackenzie King, banning most forms o ...
, which stopped all Chinese immigration except for business people, clergy, educators, students, and other categories.
[James Morton. " In the Sea of Sterile Mountains: The Chinese in British Columbia". Vancouver, BC: J.J. Douglas, 1974.] The 1923 act was revoked in 1947.
Ceylon
In Ceylon, a poll tax was levied by the British colonial government of Ceylon in 1920. The tax charged 2 rupees per year per male adult. Those who did not pay had to work on the roads for one day in lieu of the tax. The Young Lanka League protested the tax, led by
A. Ekanayake Gunasinha, and it was repealed by the
Legislative Council of Ceylon
The Legislative Council of Ceylon was the legislative body of Ceylon (now Sri Lanka) established in 1833, along with the Executive Council of Ceylon, on the recommendations of the Colebrooke-Cameron Commission. It was the first form of represen ...
in 1925 following a motion submitted by
C. H. Z. Fernando.
Great Britain
The poll tax was essentially a lay subsidy, a tax on the
movable property of most of the population, to help fund war. It had first been levied in 1275 and continued under different names until the 17th century. People were taxed a
percentage
In mathematics, a percentage (from la, per centum, "by a hundred") is a number or ratio expressed as a fraction of 100. It is often denoted using the percent sign, "%", although the abbreviations "pct.", "pct" and sometimes "pc" are also ...
of the assessed value of their movable goods. That percentage varied from year to year and place to place, and which goods could be taxed differed between
urban and
rural
In general, a rural area or a countryside is a geographic area that is located outside towns and cities. Typical rural areas have a low population density and small settlements. Agricultural areas and areas with forestry typically are descri ...
locations.
Churchmen were exempt, as were the poor, workers in the
Royal Mint
The Royal Mint is the United Kingdom's oldest company and the official maker of British coins.
Operating under the legal name The Royal Mint Limited, it is a limited company that is wholly owned by His Majesty's Treasury and is under an exclu ...
, inhabitants of the
Cinque Ports
The Confederation of Cinque Ports () is a historic group of coastal towns in south-east England – predominantly in Kent and Sussex, with one outlier ( Brightlingsea) in Essex. The name is Old French, meaning "five harbours", and alludes to ...
,
tin workers in
Cornwall
Cornwall (; kw, Kernow ) is a historic county and ceremonial county in South West England. It is recognised as one of the Celtic nations, and is the homeland of the Cornish people. Cornwall is bordered to the north and west by the Atlan ...
and
Devon
Devon ( , historically known as Devonshire , ) is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in South West England. The most populous settlement in Devon is the city of Plymouth, followed by Devon's county town, the city of Exeter. Devon is ...
, and those who lived in the
Palatinate counties of
Cheshire
Cheshire ( ) is a ceremonial and historic county in North West England, bordered by Wales to the west, Merseyside and Greater Manchester to the north, Derbyshire to the east, and Staffordshire and Shropshire to the south. Cheshire's coun ...
and
Durham.
14th century
The Hilary Parliament, held between January and March 1377, levied a poll tax in 1377 to finance the
war against France at the request of
John of Gaunt who, since
King Edward III was mortally sick, was the de facto head of government at the time. This tax covered almost 60% of the population, far more than lay subsidies had earlier. It was levied two more times, in
1379 and 1381. Each time the taxation basis was slightly different. In 1377, every lay person over the age of 14 years who was not a beggar had to pay a
groat (4d) to the Crown. By 1379 that had been graded by social class, with the lower age limit changed to 16, and to 15 two years later. The levy of 1381 operated under a combination of both flat rate and graduated assessments. The minimum amount payable was set at 4d, however tax collectors had to account for a 12d a head mean assessment. Payments were therefore variable; the poorest would theoretically pay the lowest rate, with the deficit being met by a higher payment from those able to afford it. The 1381 tax has been credited as one of the main reasons behind the
Peasants' Revolt
The Peasants' Revolt, also named Wat Tyler's Rebellion or the Great Rising, was a major uprising across large parts of England in 1381. The revolt had various causes, including the socio-economic and political tensions generated by the Blac ...
in that year, due in part to attempts to restore feudal conditions in rural areas.
17th century
The poll tax was resurrected during the 17th century, usually related to a military emergency. It was imposed by
Charles I in 1641 to finance the raising of the army against the Scottish and Irish uprisings. With the
Restoration of
Charles II in 1660, the
Convention Parliament of 1660 instituted a poll tax to finance the disbanding of the
New Model Army
The New Model Army was a standing army formed in 1645 by the Parliamentarians during the First English Civil War, then disbanded after the Stuart Restoration in 1660. It differed from other armies employed in the 1639 to 1653 Wars of the Thr ...
(pay arrears, etc.) (12 Charles II c.9). The poll tax was assessed according to "rank", e.g. dukes paid £100, earls £60, knights £20, esquires £10. Eldest sons paid 2/3rds of their father's rank, widows paid a third of their late husband's rank. The members of the
livery companies paid according to company's rank (e.g. masters of first-tier guilds like the Mercers paid £10, whereas masters of fifth-tier guilds, like the Clerks, paid 5 shillings). Professionals also paid differing rates, e.g. physicians (£10), judges (£20), advocates (£5), attorneys (£3), and so on. Anyone with property (land, etc.) paid 40 shillings per £100 earned, anyone over the age of 16 and unmarried paid twelvepence and everyone else over 16 paid sixpence.
To finance the
Nine Years' War, a poll tax was imposed again by
William III and
Mary II
Mary II (30 April 166228 December 1694) was List of English monarchs, Queen of England, List of Scottish monarchs, Scotland, and Monarchy of Ireland, Ireland, co-reigning with her husband, William III of England, William III & II, from 1689 unt ...
in 1689 (1 Will. & Mar. c.13), reassessed in 1690 adjusting rank for fortune, and then again in 1691 back to rank irrespective of fortune. The poll tax was imposed again in 1692, and one final time in 1698 (the last poll tax in England until the 20th century).
A poll tax ("polemoney") was simultaneously imposed in
Scotland
Scotland (, ) is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a border with England to the southeast and is otherwise surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean to th ...
by the
Edinburgh parliament in 1693, again in 1695, and two in 1698.
As the greater weight of the 17th century poll taxes fell primarily upon the wealthy and powerful, it was not too unpopular. There were grumblings within the taxed ranks about lack of differentiation by income within ranks. Ultimately, it was the inefficiency of their collection (what they brought in routinely fell far short of expected revenues) that prompted the government to abandon the poll tax after 1698.
Far more controversial was the
hearth tax
A hearth tax was a property tax in certain countries during the medieval and early modern period, levied on each hearth, thus by proxy on wealth. It was calculated based on the number of hearths, or fireplaces, within a municipal area and is co ...
introduced in 1662 (13 & 14 Charles II c.10), which imposed a hefty two shillings on every hearth in a family dwelling, which was easier to count than persons. Heavier, more permanent and more regressive than the poll tax proper, the intrusive entry of tax inspectors into private homes to count hearths was a very sore point, and it was promptly repealed with the
Glorious Revolution in 1689. It was replaced with a "window tax" in 1695 since inspectors could count windows from outside homes.
20th century
The Community Charge, popularly dubbed the "poll tax", was a tax to fund
local government
Local government is a generic term for the lowest tiers of public administration within a particular sovereign state. This particular usage of the word government refers specifically to a level of administration that is both geographically-lo ...
, instituted in 1989 by the government of
Margaret Thatcher
Margaret Hilda Thatcher, Baroness Thatcher (; 13 October 19258 April 2013) was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1979 to 1990 and Leader of the Conservative Party from 1975 to 1990. She was the first female British prime ...
. It replaced the
rates that were based on the notional rental value of a house. The abolition of rates was in the
Conservative Party manifesto for the
1979 general election; the replacement was proposed in the Green Paper of 1986, ''Paying for Local Government'' based on ideas developed by Dr.
Madsen Pirie
Duncan Madsen Pirie (born 24 August 1940) is a British researcher and author. He is a co-founder and current President of the Adam Smith Institute, a UK neoliberal think tank which has been in operation since 1978.
Early life and education
B ...
and
Douglas Mason
Douglas Calder Mason (30 September 1941 – 13 December 2004) was a Scottish policymaker, writer and antiquarian bookseller. He came to be known as the "father of the poll tax". of the
Adam Smith Institute. It was a
fixed tax per adult resident, but there was a reduction for those with lower household income. Each person was to pay for the services provided in their community. This proposal was contained in the
Conservative Party manifesto
A manifesto is a published declaration of the intentions, motives, or views of the issuer, be it an individual, group, political party or government. A manifesto usually accepts a previously published opinion or public consensus or promotes a ...
for the
1987 general election. The new tax replaced the rates in Scotland from the start of the 1989/90 financial year and in England and Wales from the start of the 1990/91 financial year.
The system was very unpopular since many thought it shifted the tax burden from the rich to the poor, as it was based on the number of occupants living in a house, rather than on the estimated market value of the house. Many tax rates set by local councils proved to be much higher than earlier predictions since the councils realised that not they but the central government would be blamed for the tax, which led to resentment, even among some who had supported the introduction of it. The tax in different boroughs differed because local taxes paid by businesses varied and grants by central government to local authorities sometimes varied capriciously.
Mass protests were called by the
All Britain Anti-Poll Tax Federation with which the vast majority of local
Anti-Poll Tax Unions (APTUs) were affiliated. In Scotland, the APTUs called for mass nonpayment, which rapidly gathered widespread support and spread as far as
England and Wales
England and Wales () is one of the three legal jurisdictions of the United Kingdom. It covers the constituent countries England and Wales and was formed by the Laws in Wales Acts 1535 and 1542. The substantive law of the jurisdiction is ...
even though no-payment meant that people could be prosecuted. In some areas, 30% of former ratepayers defaulted. While
owner-occupiers were easy to tax, nonpayers who regularly changed accommodation were almost impossible to trace. The cost of collecting the tax rose steeply, and its returns fell. Unrest grew and resulted in a number of
poll tax riots. The most serious was in a protest at
Trafalgar Square
Trafalgar Square ( ) is a public square in the City of Westminster, Central London, laid out in the early 19th century around the area formerly known as Charing Cross. At its centre is a high column bearing a statue of Admiral Nelson commem ...
, London, on 31 March 1990, of more than 200,000 protesters.
Terry Fields
Terence Fields (8 March 1937 – 28 June 2008) was a British politician and firefighter. A member of the Militant group, he was the Labour Member of Parliament for Liverpool Broadgreen from 1983 to 1992. He was expelled from the Labour Party ...
, Labour MP for
Liverpool Broadgreen, was jailed for 60 days for his refusal to pay the poll tax.
This unrest was a factor in the fall of Thatcher. Her successor,
John Major
Sir John Major (born 29 March 1943) is a British former politician who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom and Leader of the Conservative Party from 1990 to 1997, and as Member of Parliament (MP) for Huntingdon, formerly Hunting ...
, replaced the Community Charge with the
Council Tax
Council Tax is a local taxation system used in England, Scotland and Wales. It is a tax on domestic property, which was introduced in 1993 by the Local Government Finance Act 1992, replacing the short-lived Community Charge, which in turn re ...
, similar to the rating system that preceded the Community Charge. The main differences were that it was levied on capital value rather than notional rental value of a property, and that it had a 25% discount for single-occupancy dwellings.
In 2015,
Lord Waldegrave reflected in his memoirs that the Community Charge was all his own work and that it was a serious mistake. Although he felt the policy looked like it would work, it was implemented differently from his predictions "They went gung-ho and introduced it overnight in one go, which was never my plan and I thought they must know what they were doing - but they didn't."
France
In France, a poll tax, the
capitation of 1695, was first imposed by King
Louis XIV
, house = Bourbon
, father = Louis XIII
, mother = Anne of Austria
, birth_date =
, birth_place = Château de Saint-Germain-en-Laye, Saint-Germain-en-Laye, France
, death_date =
, death_place = Palace of Ve ...
in 1695 as a temporary measure to finance the
War of the League of Augsburg
The Nine Years' War (1688–1697), often called the War of the Grand Alliance or the War of the League of Augsburg, was a conflict between France and a European coalition which mainly included the Holy Roman Empire (led by the Habsburg monarch ...
, and thus repealed in 1699. It was resumed during the
War of Spanish Succession
The War of the Spanish Succession was a European great power conflict that took place from 1701 to 1714. The death of childless Charles II of Spain in November 1700 led to a struggle for control of the Spanish Empire between his heirs, Phil ...
and in 1704 set on a permanent basis, remaining until the end of the ''
Ancien regime''.
Like the English poll tax, the French capitation tax was assessed on rank – for taxation persons, French society was divided in twenty-two "classes", with the
Dauphin (a class by himself) paying 2,000
livres, princes of the blood paying 1500 livres, and so on down to the lowest class, composed of day laborers and servants, who paid 1 livre each. The bulk of the common population was covered by four classes, paying 40, 30, 10 and 3 livres respectively. Unlike most other direct French taxes, nobles and clergy were not exempted from capitation taxes. It did, however, exempt the
mendicant orders and the poor who contributed less than 40 sous.
The French clergy managed to temporarily escape capitation assessment by promising to pay a total sum of 4 million livres per annum in 1695, and then obtained permanent exemption in 1709 with a lump sum payment of 24 million livres. The ''
Pays d'états'' (Brittany, Burgundy, etc.) and many towns also escaped assessment by promising annual fixed payments. The nobles did not escape assessment, but they obtained the right to appoint their own capitation tax assessors, which allowed them to escape most of the burden (in one calculation, they escaped of it).
Compounding the burden, the assessment on the capitation did not remain stable. The ''pays de taille personelle'' (basically, ''
pays d'élection'', the bulk of France and Aquitaine) secured the ability to assess the capitation tax proportionally to the taille – which effectively meant adjusting the burden heavily against the lower classes. According to the estimates of
Jacques Necker
Jacques Necker (; 30 September 1732 – 9 April 1804) was a Genevan banker and statesman who served as finance minister for Louis XVI. He was a reformer, but his innovations sometimes caused great discontent. Necker was a constitutional mona ...
in 1788, the capitation tax was so riddled in practice, that the privileged classes (nobles and clergy and towns) were largely exempt, while the lower classes were heavily crushed: the lowest peasant class, originally assessed to pay 3 livres, were now paying 24, the second lowest, assessed at 10 livres, were now paying 60 and the third-lowest assessed at 30 were paying 180. The total collection from the capitation, according to Necker in 1788, was 41 million livres, well short of the 54 million estimate, and it was projected that the revenues could have doubled if the exemptions were revoked and the original 1695 assessment properly restored.
The old capitation tax was repealed with the
French Revolution
The French Revolution ( ) was a period of radical political and societal change in France that began with the Estates General of 1789 and ended with the formation of the French Consulate in November 1799. Many of its ideas are conside ...
and replaced, on 13 January 1791, with a new poll tax as part of the ''contribution personnelle mobilière'', which lasted well into the late 19th century. It was fixed for every individual at "three days's labor" (assessed locally, but by statute, no less than 1 franc 50 centimes and no more than 4 francs 50 centimes, depending on the area). A dwelling tax (''impôt sur les portes et fenêtres'', similar to the English window-tax) was imposed in 1798.
New Zealand
New Zealand imposed a poll tax on Chinese immigrants during the 19th and early 20th centuries as part of their broader efforts to reduce the number of Chinese immigrants. The poll tax was effectively lifted in the 1930s following the
invasion of China by Japan, and was finally repealed in 1944. Prime Minister
Helen Clark
Helen Elizabeth Clark (born 26 February 1950) is a New Zealand politician who served as the 37th prime minister of New Zealand from 1999 to 2008, and was the administrator of the United Nations Development Programme from 2009 to 2017. She was ...
offered New Zealand's Chinese community an official apology for the poll tax on 12 February 2002.
Poland–Lithuania
The
Jewish poll tax The Jewish poll tax ( pl, poglówne żydowskie) was a poll tax imposed on the Jews in Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. It was later absorbed into the ''hiberna'' tax. ''Scepter of Judah: The Jewish Autonomy in the Eighteenth-Century Crown Poland''p ...
was a poll tax imposed on the
Jews
Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""T ...
in