Among the records of the city of York are registers dating from 1272 of the 'freeman', that is men who had acquired the right or franchise to trade in the city. It should be noted that a widow 'inherited' her husband's franchise and lost it only if she remarried.
A rare verb, explained by one editor as the process of whitening and bleaching leather, and by another as a currier’s word, used when a pelt is split and the layer of fat between the flesh and the grain removed.
These words appear to share the same meaning and to refer to a small piece of ground, either the site of a former dwelling, or land attached to the front of a dwelling, a garden.
The noun has not been found earlier than a.1700, when it was used of a hoax or practical joke, although not long afterwards it referred to the amusement or pleasure caused by such diversions.