VILLANAGE

Etymology

Noun

villanage (countable and uncountable, plural villanages)

Alternative form of villeinage

Source: Wiktionary


Vil"lan*age (; 48), n. Etym: [OF. villenage, vilenage. See Villain.]

1. (Feudal Law)

Definition: The state of a villain, or serf; base servitude; tenure on condition of doing the meanest services for the lord. [In this sense written also villenage, and villeinage.] I speak even now as if sin were condemned in a perpetual villanage, never to be manumitted. Milton. Some faint traces of villanage were detected by the curious so late as the days of the Stuarts. Macaulay.

2. Baseness; infamy; villainy. [Obs.] Dryden.

Source: Webster’s Unabridged Dictionary 1913 Edition



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Coffee Trivia

The word “coffee” entered the English language in 1582 via the Dutch “koffie,” borrowed from the Ottoman Turkish “kahve,” borrowed in turn from the Arabic “qahwah.” The Arabic word qahwah was traditionally held to refer to a type of wine.

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