Free tenant

Free tenants, also known as free peasants, were peasants in medieval England who occupied a unique place in the medieval hierarchy. They were characterised by the low rents they paid to their manorial lord as well as being subject to fewer laws and ties than villeins.

Definition

One of the major challenges in examining the free peasants of this era is that no one single definition can be attached to them. The disparate nature of manorial holdings and local laws mean the free tenant in Kent, for example, may well bear little resemblance to the Free Tenant in the Danelaw.

Attempts were made by some contemporary scholars to set out a legal definition of freedom, one of the most notable being the treatise by Ranulf de Glanvill written between 1187 and 1189. This stated that:

Another way to identify a freeman in the Middle Ages, was to determine what kind of taxes or laws he had to obey. For example having to pay merchet, a tax paid upon the marriage of a servile woman, was a key sign of being unfree.