Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. One of a class of feudal serfs who held the legal status of freemen in their dealings with all people except their lord.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- See villain.
Wiktionary
GNU Webster's 1913
- n. (Feudal Law) See villain, 1.
WordNet 3.0
- n. (Middle Ages) a person who is bound to the land and owned by the feudal lord
Etymologies
- From Anglo-Norman villein, variant of villain; from Medieval Latin villanus "field hand", from Latin villa "country home". (Wiktionary)
- Middle English vilein; see villain. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“Vinogradoff and others have conclusively established that there was not a real difference in status between the so-called villein regardant and villein in gross, and that in any case the villein was not properly a slave but rather a serf. [”
“The investigation of Paul Vinogradoff and others have conclusively established that there was not a real difference in status between the so-called villein regardant and villein in gross, and that in any case the villein was not properly a slave but rather a serf. [”
“villein" was real property and in the same case as land: also that when Parliament came to legislate so as to make lands in the American”
“Could she truly be so shallow as to be drawn to a weak-minded, contemptible villein better suited to walk behind an ox plowing fields than dare to lift his eyes to a queen?”
Simon & Schuster: Secret History of Elizabeth Tudor, Vampire Slayer
“From magnate to baron, from workman to villein, from publicist to court agent and retainer, will be changes of state and function so slight as to elude all but the keenest eyes.”
“The villein villages till the soil among them, and pay their communal dues together, though every man has his dwelling and his cattle and his fair share of the land.”
“I can think of three explanations for the “villein” claim in the Triads:”
“As a villein is an unfree peasant or serf, this is unlikely to be literally true.”
“In addition to this legislation, landowners began to enforce their manorial privileges strictly, making certain that they received their full amount of "villein dues, and in particular labour obligations" (Saul, 60).”
“We read of Mogg, daughter of a villein peasant and Jack, her half-wit brother, who save the family cow from the clutches of the lord.”
Good Masters! Sweet Ladies! Voices from a Medieval Village, by Laura Amy Schlitz
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘villein’.
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Land
A list of terms for land, landholdings, or words that contain the string -land-.
scabland, wheatland, cornland, slander, land-locked, dryland, riceland, clandestine, acreage, island, Iceland, Greenland and 269 more...
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Logolepsy
"Luciferous Logolepsy is a collection of over 9,000 obscure English words. Though the definition of an 'English' word might seem to be straightforward, it is not. There exist so many adopted, deriv...
Anschauung, Areopagus, Argus, Briarean, Dei gratia, Dei judicium, Deo volente, Duecento, Foehn, Geflugelte Worte, Gegenschein, Hakenkreuz and 9230 more...
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Enter the Rustics
A fanfare for the Common Man. Words for rustics, yokels, and woolhats of all sorts.
woolhat, yokel, rustic, hucklebuck, hick, redneck, bogan, goober, hayseed, bumpkin, countryman, peasant and 70 more...
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Carlos' Words
monstropolous, absquatulate
triffid, calque, pinguid, refulgent, monstropolous, Seanchaí, clinquant, Chryselephantine ..., peavey, milium, swage, Burtillon, Burtil... and 224 more...
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traipsin' 'long through dis 'ear book...
Words which are either entirely new to me or;
Words which I comprehend generally but would prefer a more precise definition.
venality, seigneurial, mendicant, perforce, manse, glebe, trenchant, saw, obstreperous, profligate, dissipation, galliard and 176 more...
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sionnach's Words
contumely, fomite, holmgang, poltroon, eleemosynary, obsidian, nugatory, grindcore, felch, recrudescent, pyx, parenteral and 3271 more...
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Bits and pieces
neverwasbian, proddywoddy, militant relativism, cverglan, điđe-miđe, goomba, churlsome, skancewards, luftmensch, šmizla, sbc, villayet and 567 more...
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General Loveliness
hirsute, indubitably, gossamer, continuum, murderous, harpy, chimera, foofaraw, hoi polloi, mollycoddle, villein, nonplussed and 121 more...
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Archaic Occupations
Some of these professions still exist today but the word for them has changed; some (mason or boatswain, for example), are still in use but are included for their rich historical associations. Som...
yeoman, summoner, chandler, ostler, carter, chapman, slaver, mason, cordwainer, cooper, glazier, dyer and 187 more...
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looked up
Words I've come across while reading and looked up in the dictionary.
deesis, pendentive, revetment, aedicule, stemma, patera, ephod, entrepot, corbel, exedra, volute, archivolt and 1408 more...
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Kaichi's Wordie Darlings, or I'm a Lo...
persnickety, discombobulated, braggadoccio, anthropomorphous, antelucan, confluxible, anomalous, poseur, gallivant, poppycock, falderal, gewgaw and 705 more...
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Unnamed
zwieback, prophylactic, sidereal, demesne, manorial, dressage, arboretum, colporteur, intaglio, incise, pithecanthropus, incunabulum and 71 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for villein.
knitandpurl "A solid ancient leaning on his hoe, shuffling backwards and forwards to his shed. The villein with his small corner of England."
London Orbital by Iain Sinclair, p 135 of the Penguin paperback edition Jan 28, 2012
whichbe Not to be confused with a villain, of course. Dec 3, 2008