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serfhood

 - 3 dictionary results

serf

  [surf]
Use serfhood in a Sentence
–noun
1. a person in a condition of servitude, required to render services to a lord, commonly attached to the lord's land and transferred with it from one owner to another.
2. a slave.
Origin:
1475–85; < MF < L servus slave

Related forms:
serfdom, serfhood, serfage, noun

Synonyms:
1. vassal, villein, peasant.
Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2009.
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Cultural Dictionary

serf

Under feudalism, a peasant bound to his lord's land and subject to his lord's will, but entitled to his lord's protection.

The American Heritage® New Dictionary of Cultural Literacy, Third Edition
Copyright © 2005 by Houghton Mifflin Company.
Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.
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Word Origin & History

serf 
1483, "slave," from M.Fr. serf, from L. servum (nom. servus) "slave" (see serve). Fallen from use in original sense by 18c. Meaning "lowest class of cultivators of the soil in continental European countries" is from 1611. Use by modern writers with ref. to medieval Europeans first recorded 1761 (contemporary Anglo-L. records used nativus, villanus or servus). Serfdom first attested 1850.
Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2001 Douglas Harper
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