by Dave Franklin

Created on: January 18, 2007   Last Updated: May 08, 2007

Morton's fork is an interesting tale from medieval England that has comparisons and repercussions right up to the present day. The story concerns the John Morton who, in 1487 was the Lord Chancellor of England. Under King Henry VII (who had defeated Richard III a few years earlier), John Morton was in charge of collecting taxes from the subjects of the land. He had a very interesting and foolproof attitude towards people's ability to cough up the necessary taxes.

When Morton's men knocked at your door their assessment of the situation went like this. If the person was living in luxury and clearly spent a lot of money upon himself then clearly they were rich enough to easily afford the money due to the king. If on the other hand they seemed to be living a frugal life of poverty and want, they it was proof that they were hoarding their money away and so could afford to give the King his dues. Either way there was a no win situation for the poor subject. These two ways of looking at the situation were the two prongs of Morton's fork

In more recent times the phrase "Catch 22" has come to mean the same and is taken from Joseph Heller's book of the same name. It also ha a similar meaning to "between the devil and the deep blue sea" or "between a rock and a hard place".

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