‘Against the King’s Taxes’: The Second Manuscript

This paper studies the second, so far largely unknown, copy in London, British Library, MS Additional 10,374 of ‘Against the King’s Taxes’, a poem in Anglo-Norman and Latin on the taxation imposed by Edward III to finance his 1338 French campaign. It describes the manuscript and its history, and compares this copy to the well-known one in London, British Library, MS Harley 2253 from a scribal and textual aspect, concluding that the Harley copy is the better one. It proposes a stemma codicum and discusses historical background, circulation, author, and readership. The text of the Additional copy is given in the appendix.