villeinage
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
In spite of the prayers and resolutions and acts of the early fathers, a form of slavery grew up here, but it was milder than the English villeinage: it resembled apprenticeship except in the duration.
From Masterpieces of Negro Eloquence The Best Speeches Delivered by the Negro from the days of Slavery to the Present Time by Dunbar-Nelson, Alice Moore
The institution of villeinage is last mentioned in a commission of Queen Elizabeth, 1574, directing Lord Burleigh and others in certain counties to compound with all such bondmen or bondwomen for their manumission and freedom.
From Popular Law-making by Stimson, Frederic Jesup
The charter that contains this enactment treats of villeinage also, and orders that whoever has a man for sale within the limits of the viscounty shall fix the price, and shall not change it afterwards.
From Two Summers in Guyenne by Barker, Edward Harrison
During the century and a half which followed the Peasant Revolt villeinage died out so rapidly that it became a rare and antiquated thing.
From History of the English People, Volume II The Charter, 1216-1307; The Parliament, 1307-1400 by Green, John Richard
In Poland, at this day, the peasants seem to be in an absolute state of slavery, or at least of villeinage, to the nobility, who are the land-holders.
From Dissertation on Slavery With a Proposal for the Gradual Abolition of it, in the State of Virginia by Tucker, St. George
From Roget's 21st Century Thesaurus, Third Edition Copyright © 2013 by the Philip Lief Group.