84 THE ORIGINS OF FREEMASONRY FROM ANCIENT TIMES TO THE MIDDLE AGES
its owner or lord a vassal to a suzerain. At the beginning of the four-
teenth century, Boutillier wrote in his Somme rurale (1, 84): "[T]o hold as
a franc-alleu is to hold land from God alone and owe neither cens,
allowance, debts, service, nor any fee; the tenant holds the land freely from
God." In the sixteenth century the legal counselor Guy Coquille pro-
claimed, "The franc-alleu is called free because it is not in the sphere of
any landed lord's influence." Among the different kinds of franc-alleu
there was the franche-aumone, a land donated to the Church free of any
charge. Because this property ceased to be feudally dependent upon a lord,
its transfer could be made without the lord's consent.
With respect to individuals, a franc homme or franc hons [free
man] was not only the opposite of a serf but also the opposite of a vil-
lain.^1 This latter was free, but lived as the dependent of a lord. The free
man, although a commoner, escaped this state of dependency. The term
is found in Beaumanoir's Coutume du Pantagrue: "A franc hons who is
not a gentleman"... In the prologue to the fourth book of Pantagruel,
Rabelais speaks of francs gontiers. These individuals were most likely
peasants benefiting from specific franchises.
Free Archers were an order of soldiers who were only to serve dur-
ing times of war and were created for that purpose by Charles VII in
1448:
This ruler [Charles VII] commanded that the most reliable inhabi-
tant in each parish of the kingdom be elected for training in the
bow, and that this individual also be under the obligation to fur-
nish a crew... Each of the Archers would receive 4 pounds a
month when serving in war... But they enjoyed a general exemp-
tion from all manner of taxes or fees. It is for this reason that they
were known as Free Archers.^2The inhabitants of towns and cities who had obtained charters of
exemption were called the bourgeois—in other words, free men. They
were, however, distinguished from the francs bourgeois "who did not
have to pay and did not pay any to the lord for any bourgeois right, and
were free and quit of him," to use the terms employed by the Coutume
de Berry. In Paris the bourgeoisie owed the king both the tallage and