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A man slave, or one bound to service without wages. "To enfranchise bondmen." Macaulay.

A slave; a villain; a serf; a bondman. Carnal, greedy people, without such a precept, would have no mercy upon their poor bondsmen. Derham.

A slave; a bondman. Chaucer. Gurth, the born thrall of Cedric. Sir W. Scott.

ds by a base, or servile, tenure, or in villenage; a feudal tenant of the lowest class, a bondman or servant. [In this sense written also villan, and villein.] If any of my ansectors was a tenant, and a servant, and held his lands as a villain to his lord, his posterity also must do so, though accidentally they become…