Free Tenants, also known as Free Peasants, were peasant

Peasant

A peasant is an agricultural worker who generally tend to be poor and homeless-Etymology:The word is derived from 15th century French païsant meaning one from the pays, or countryside, ultimately from the Latin pagus, or outlying administrative district.- Position in society :Peasants typically...

s 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

Manorialism

Manorialism, an essential element of feudal society, was the organizing principle of rural economy that originated in the villa system of the Late Roman Empire, was widely practiced in medieval western and parts of central Europe, and was slowly replaced by the advent of a money-based market...

 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

Kent

Kent is a county in southeast England, and is one of the home counties. It borders East Sussex, Surrey and Greater London and has a defined boundary with Essex in the middle of the Thames Estuary. The ceremonial county boundaries of Kent include the shire county of Kent and the unitary borough of...

, for example, may well bear little resemblance to the Free Tenant in the Danelaw

Danelaw

The Danelaw, as recorded in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle , is a historical name given to the part of England in which the laws of the "Danes" held sway and dominated those of the Anglo-Saxons. It is contrasted with "West Saxon law" and "Mercian law". The term has been extended by modern historians to...

.

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

Middle Ages

The Middle Ages is a periodization of European history from the 5th century to the 15th century. The Middle Ages follows the fall of the Western Roman Empire in 476 and precedes the Early Modern Era. It is the middle period of a three-period division of Western history: Classic, Medieval and Modern...

, was to determine what kind of taxes or laws he had to obey. For example having to pay merchet

Merchet

A merchet was a fine paid on a marriage during the Middle Ages in England. The word derives from the plural form of daughter, merched, in old Welsh. A peasant would pay a merchet to his lord upon the marriage of a woman. The justification for this was that when a woman married, her lord was losing...

, a tax paid upon the marriage of a servile woman, was a key sign of being unfree.