Danegeld

A tax levied in Anglo-Saxon England to buy off Danish invaders in the reign of Ethelred II (978 - 1016); it also designates the recurrent gelds, or taxes, collected by the Anglo-Norman kings. The word is not recorded before the Norman Conquest, the usual earlier (Old English) term being gafol (�gavel,� or �tribute�). Though the Danes were sometimes bought off in the 9th century, the word Danegeld