uk bat.com - 17th century
1603
By the time of Queen Elizabeth I's death, England has become the wealthiest country in Europe (partly thanks to its dominant role in the tobacco trade) and is taxing the crop at 2d (2 pennies) per pound weight.
King James I publishes A Counterblaste to Tobacco, one of the first anti-smoking polemics. But his disapproval doesn't stop the King from increasing the duty on tobacco by more than 40 times as much as the tax levied by Queen Elizabeth, to 6/10d (6 shillings and 10 pennies) per pound weight. Consumption of tobacco increases as belief spreads that the leaf helps ward off the plague.
1606
King Philip III of Spain decrees tobacco could only be grown in Spanish colonies. Production by foreigners is punishable by death.
1614
James I grants two traders exclusive rights to import tobacco - paying £3,500 for the first year, rising to £7,000 each year for the next decade.
1619
King James I bans domestic cultivation of tobacco – and announces that it is to become a royal monopoly.
1623
Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand III bans "tobacco drinking" under threat of fines – but smoking continues.
1624
Pope Urban VIII bans snuff claiming it takes users too close to "sexual ecstasy". King James I decrees that all tobacco should arrive at the port of London. Smuggling increases and sizeable amounts of duty are lost. The British Government widens the number of ports where tobacco can land.
1629
Following the advice of his minister Cardinal Richelieu, Louis XIII of France levies a tax of 30 sols on every pound of tobacco. Two centuries later Napoleon III would observe: "This vice brings in one hundred million francs in taxes every year. I will certainly forbid it at once – as soon as you can name a virtue that brings in as much revenue." Government monopolies prove so lucrative they persist in several European countries late into the twentieth century.
1633
Turkish sultan Murad IV forbids smoking with the threat of execution. He also demolishes coffee-houses in Constantinople and confiscates the assets of executed smokers.
1640's
Tsar Michael of Russia declares smoking a deadly sin. Arrested smokers are flogged or have their lips slit. A 1643 visitor to Moscow says: "Those convicted of taking snuff, both men and women, can expect to have their noses taken away."
1699
The court physician to Louis XIV, Fagon, offers a contemporary view: "When he opened his snuff box, did he not know that he was opening a Pandora's box, from which would spring a thousand ills, each worse than another?" Louis XIV is said to hate tobacco but does not ban it, as it would have meant giving up money from the state monopoly.
