The freemen's pennies or the pennies of freemen (Hungarian: szabadok dénárja; Latin: liberi denarii) was a direct tax in the Kingdom of Hungary in the 11th-13th centuries.

The distribution of different types of royal revenues in the Kingdom of Hungary during the reign of the Árpádian kings is unknown, but taxes-in-kind and obligatory labour service generated significant income for the monarchs.^[1][2] Although the origin of direct taxation is uncertain, historians assume that a direct tax payable by all freemen^[3] was introduced by the first king of Hungary, Stephen I, who died in 1038.^[1] The Byzantine kapnikon may have influenced the new tax, which was known as freemen's pennies, because both taxes yielded the same revenue in silver.^[4] Each freemen were to pay 8 denars to the king when the tax was first mentioned in the laws of Coloman the Learned around 1100.^[2]

Coloman the Learned exempted all freemen who lived on their own estates of the tax.^[5] Those who lived on another man's lands were to pay the tax, but they could redeem 50% of the sum if they provided military service to the monarch or supplied him with horses and carts.^[5] According to Coloman's law, the ispáns (or heads) of the counties were responsible for the collection of the tax and they had to transport the money to Esztergom.^[6] In Esztergom, they paid two-thirds of the tax to the royal treasury, but they could retain one-third of the collected sum.^[6]

Andrew II of Hungary granted tax exemption to freemen who lived in a prelate's estates in early 1222.^[5] In the same year, the king pledged that he would not collect the freemen's pennies on the estates of royal servants (or free warriors) either.^[5][7]

• Golden Bull of 1222

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