the the coins almost exclusively used in local transactionswas also an important, and unpopular, source of revenue for the royal treasury. Charles took out forced loans whenever he needed "immediately a large sum of money for certain arduous and pressing business", as he explained in one of his decrees. Purveyances, the requisitioning of goods, increased the unpopularity of Charles's government in southern Italy and Sicily. His subjects were also liable to be forced to guard prisoners or lodge soldiers in their homes. The restoration of old fortresses, bridges and aqueducts and the building of new castles required the employment of craftsmen, although most of them were unwilling to participate in such lengthy projects. Thousands of people were forced to serve in the army in foreign lands, especially after 1279. Trading in salt was declared a royal monopoly. In December 1281, Charles again ordered the collection of the , requiring the payment of 150% of the customary amount. Charles did not pay attention to the island of Sicily, although it had been the centre of resistance against him in 1268. He transferred the capital from Palermo to Naples. He did not visit the island after 1271, preventing Sicilians from directly informing him of their grievances. Sicilian noblemen were seldom employed as royal officials, although he often appointed their southern Italian peers to represent him in his other realms. Furthermore, having seized large estates on the island in the late 1260s Charles almost exclusively employed French and Provençal clerics to administer them. Popular stories credited John of ProcidaManfred of Sicily's former chancellorwith staging an international plot against Charles. Legend says that he visited Constantinople, Sicily and Viterbo in disguise in 1279 and 1280 to convince Michael VIII, the Sicilian barons and Pope Nicholas III to support a revolt. On the other hand, Michael VIII would later claim that he "was God's instrument in bringing freedom to the Sicilians" in his memoirs. The Emperor's wealth enabled him to send money to the discontented Sicilian barons. Peter III of Aragon decided to lay claim to the Kingdom of Sicily in late 1280: he did not hide his disdain when he met with Charles's son, Charles, Duke of Salerno, in Toulouse in December 1280. He began to assemble a fleet, ostensibly for another crusade to Tunis. Rioting broke out in Sicily after a burgher of Palermo killed a drunken French soldier who had insulted his