arch.; cf. BONDSMAN. [f. BOND sb.2 + MAN: cf. husband, husbandman; but in later times evidently connected in thought with senses of BOND sb.1]
1. = BOND sb.2 2. Obs. exc. Hist.
c. 1250. Owl & Night., 1577. Moni chapmon and moni cniht … And swa deþ moni bondeman.
a. 1300. Havelok, 32. Hym louede … Knict, bondeman, and swain.
1503–4. Act 19 Hen. VII., xv. § 4. Yf eny bondeman purches eny landes … in fee symple.
[1809. Bawdwen, trans. Domesday Bk., 289. The King has there sixteen villanes & two bordars & one bondman having four ploughs.]
2. A man in bondage; a villein; a serf, slave.
a. c. 1340. Richard Rolle of Hampole, Prick of Conscience, 1155. Whar-to serves man þe world þan, And mas hym þe worldes bondman.
1477. Earl Rivers (Caxton), Dictes, 25. To be solde as a prysonner or a Bondeman.
1580. Baret, Alv., B 920. A prysonner taken in warre, a bondeman, a captiue.
1605. Camden, Rem., 181. That no Christian should be bondman to a Jew.
1645. Milton, Tetrach., Wks. (1851), 150. Instead of freeing us … make us bondmen.
1866. Bryant, Death of Slavery, ii. Fields where the bondman’s toil No more shall trench the soil.
3. Bond-man-blind: old name of Blind-man’s-buff.
1783. Ainsworth, Lat. Dict. (Morell), v. Myinda … The play called bond-man-blind, blind-bob, or blind-man-buff.
