Webster
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Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary · 1913

Villain

Vil′lain (·lĭn), n. [OE. vilein, F. vilain, LL. villanus, from villa a village, L. villa a farm. See Villa.]

1. (Feudal Law) One who holds lands by a base, or servile, tenure, or in villenage; a feudal tenant of the lowest class, a bondman or servant. [In this sense written also villan, and villein.]

If any of my ansectors was a tenant, and a servant, and held his lands as a villain to his lord, his posterity also must do so, though accidentally they become noble. Jer. Taylor.

☞ Villains were of two sorts; villains regardant, that is, annexed to the manor (LL. adscripti glebæ); and villains in gross, that is, annexed to the person of their lord, and transferable from one to another. Blackstone.

2. A baseborn or clownish person; a boor. [R.]

Pour the blood of the villain in one basin, and the blood of the gentleman in another, what difference shall there be proved? Becon.

3. A vile, wicked person; a man extremely depraved, and capable or guilty of great crimes; a deliberate scoundrel; a knave; a rascal; a scamp.

Like a villain with a smiling cheek. Shak.

Calm, thinking villains, whom no faith could fix. Pope.

Vil′lain, a. [F. vilain.] Villainous. [R.] Shak.

Vil′lain, v. t. To debase; to degrade. [Obs.] Sir T. More.

Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Noah Porter, editor (Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913). Public domain. Text as transcribed by MICRA, Inc., from Project Gutenberg. Changed for Deep Dive Bible: Greek, which our source spelled in Latin letters, set in Greek letters; entries of one spelling merged into one article; Greek words our source left out (shown as “?”), read from the 1898 printing, from the same plates (the Library of Congress’s copy), where the place could be found with certainty. Of the others, 1,362 (a word or a single letter each) were inferred by AI from the context by the dictionary’s own rules and are marked with a wavy underline (tap or point at one to see the note); the rest, which could not be inferred with confidence, are left as “?”.