Corvée

Corvée is a form of unpaid, unfree labor, which is intermittent in nature and for limited periods of time: typically only a certain number of days' work each year.

Statute labour is a corvée imposed by a state for the purposes of public works. As such it represents a form of levy (taxation). Unlike other forms of levy, such as a tithe, a corvée does not require the population to have land, crops or cash. It was thus favored in historical economies in which barter was more common than cash transactions and/or circulating money is in short supply.