freedman

freedman, former enslaved person set free. In ancient Athens, formerly enslaved people bore no stigma, and some rose to positions of political or economic power. During the later Hellenistic period, however, some Greek communities passed laws providing separate regulations and restrictions for formerly enslaved people. To the Greeks citizenship was a hereditary privilege and thus barred to freedmen, but under Roman law a manumitted enslaved person might become a citizen if the proper legal form was followed, although a freedman did not enjoy full civic rights. In Carolingian times the descendants of a freedman could claim the rights of the freeborn only after three generations had passed.

Later, notably in the conditions of North American Blacks from colonial times forward, racial differences between enslaved people and owners reinforced the tendency to attach the stigma of slavery to freedmen and the free offspring of enslaved people. See Reconstruction; Freedmen’s Bureau; Black code; Union Leagues; lynching.