window tax

noun

history a tax on windows in houses levied between 1696 and 1851

Nearby words

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

Examples from the Web for window tax

It may be likened also to a tax on the light of day, like the English window-tax, which you do not think of imposing.
Charles Sumner; His Complete Works, Volume XI (of 20)|Charles Sumner
The strong light and heat of the sun has the effect of a window-tax in limiting the size and number of the windows.
Town Life in Australia|R. E. N. (Richard) Twopeny
Why should the ghost in Hamlet have been liable to the window-tax?
How to Solve Conundrums|Anonymous
Every window that could be spared was shut up, to save the window-tax.
A History of Epidemics in Britain, Volume II (of 2)|Charles Creighton

The window-tax was originally a device of the statesmen of the Revolution for making good the deficiency of the clipped money.
A History of Epidemics in Britain, Volume II (of 2)|Charles Creighton