‘Milites, _Leg. Malc. Mab._, c. 2, and generalie in the auld lawes of this realme, are called freehalders, haldand their landes of barons in chief.’—Skene, _De Verborum Sig._, sub voce. Footnote 304: _Acts of Parliament_, vol. i. pp. 375, 377, 380, 382. Footnote 305: _Ib_. vol. i. pp. 400, 403. Footnote 306: _Ib_. p. 652. Footnote 307: _Ant. Ab. and Banff_, s. 492, iii. 112, iv. 116. The same loose notions have prevailed of the position of the _libere tenentes_ as of the thanes, and therefore it has been necessary to treat of both somewhat at length. _Libere tenentes_ are usually translated ‘free tenants,’ just as _tenant du Roi_, in Ragman Roll, is usually translated ‘king’s tenant,’ as if they were tenants in the modern sense of the term, from the unfortunate propensity to render a word in one language by its phonetic equivalent in another, though the meaning may be different; but the true rendering of the one is ‘freeholders,’ and of the other, ‘holding of the king _in capite_.’ Ware defines the _libere tenentes_ in Ireland as those _qui prædia habebunt, ad hæredes transmittenda_ (_Ant. Hib._, 209); and Craig gives a very clear account of these in Scotland (_Jus feudale_, 87. 6; 248. 28; 362. 42). According to Cowell, ‘Freehold frank tenement, _liberum tenementum_, is that land or tenement which a man holdeth in fee, feetail, or at least for term of life.’ Freeholders in the ancient law of Scotland were called _milites_; and tenement or tenementum, he says, ‘signifies, most properly, a house or homestall, but more largely either for a house or land that a man holdeth of another, and joined with the adjective Frank, it contains lands, houses, and offices, wherein we have estate for term of life or in fee.’ Footnote 308: Ochiern, ‘Ogitharius,’ is ane name of dignitie and of ane freehalder.—Skene, _De Verborum Sig._ Footnote 309: See Erskine’s _Institutes_, vol. i. p. 370, for a good account of the rentallers or kindlie tenants. Footnote 310: _Chart. of Arbroath_, pp. 44, 88. The word _terra_, here translated land, means usually arable land only. Treiglas is probably _Traighghlais_ or sea-shore, from Traigh, strand; and Glas, an old word for the sea. Footnote 311: _Acts of Parliament_, vol. i. p. 397. Footnote 312: Quod rex debet habere forisfactum _comitum si thani eorum_ remanserunt ab exercitu, etc.—_Acts of Parliament_, vol. vi. p. 398. CHAPTER VII. THE THANAGES AND THEIR EXTINCTION. [Sidenote: Review of the Thanages and their conversion into Baronies.]