For the Jews could no longer support the Crown in times of financial difficulty as they had been able to do in previous reigns. The contraction of their business that was the result of their exclusion from many towns, and the losses that they had suffered through the extortions of Henry III. and the plundering attacks of the barons, had very greatly diminished their revenue-paying capacities, and the legislation of 1270 must have affected them still more deeply. At the end of the twelfth century they had probably paid to the Treasury about £3,000 a year, or one-twelfth of the whole royal income,[98] and for some parts of the thirteenth century the average collection of tallage has been estimated at £5,000;[99] but in 1271--by which time the royal income had probably grown to something like the £65,000 a year which the Edwards are said to have enjoyed in time of peace[100]--Henry III., when pledging to Richard of Cornwall the revenue from the Jewry, estimated its annual value, apart from what was yielded by escheats and other special claims, at no more than 2,000 marks.[101] And while the resources of the Jews had fallen off, the needs of the Crown had increased. Not only must Edward have conducted his foreign enterprises at a much greater cost than did his predecessors, under whom the English knighthood had been accustomed to serve without serious opposition, but, in addition, he had to make the best of a vast heritage of debt that his father had left him.[102] He had to seek richer supporters than the Jews, and such were not wanting. The Italian banking companies were the only organisations in Europe that could supply him with such sums of money as he needed. From all the greatest cities of Italy--from Florence, Rome, Milan, Pisa, Lucca, Siena, and Asti--they had spread to many of the chief countries of Europe, to France, England, Brabant, Switzerland, and Ireland.[103] They were merchants, money-lenders, money-changers, and international bankers, and in this last occupation their supremacy over all rivals was secured by the great advantage which the wide extent of their dealings enabled them to enjoy, of being able to save, by the use of letters of credit on their colleagues and countrymen, the cost of the transport of money from country to country.[104] They were thus the greatest financial agents of the time. They transacted the business of the Pope. At the Court of Rome ambassadors had to borrow from them.[105] In France their position was established by a regular diplomatic agreement between the head of their corporation and Philip III.[106] In England they had in their hands the greater part of the trade in corn and wool;[107] and the protection and favour of English kings was often besought by the Popes on their behalf in special bulls.[108]