Yes, the word ‘freelance’ did originally refer to a mercenary warrior

For years, social media users have claimed that the word “freelance” originates from a medieval term for a mercenary warrior. 

In early February 2024, one Instagram user, whose post had amassed more than 96,000 likes as of this writing, shared a screenshot of a 2022 X post (archived) by freelance editor Emily Readman that read: “Obsessed with the discovery that  ‘freelance’ comes from a medieval term for a mercenary warrior (who is sworn to no lord.) A literal free lance. I am a knight.”

Other examples of the rumor have appeared elsewhere on X.

This claim is indeed true. As discussed in a blog post by dictionary publisher Merriam-Webster, “when [the word] freelance first came into English in the early 1800s, it was used to refer to a medieval mercenary who would fight for whichever nation or person paid them the most.”

These mercenary fighters were, as Readman’s tweet stated, literal “free lances” — referring to military spears or javelins. The earliest printed use that Merriam-Webster located is found in novelist and poet Sir Walter Scott’s novel Ivanhoe that was first published in 1819. It describes events that occurred in the year 1194:

I offered Richard the service of my Free Lances, and he refused them—I will lead them to Hull, seize on shipping, and embark for Flanders; thanks to the bustling times, a man of action will always find employment.

The Oxford English Dictionary provides the same etymology for the word “freelance.”

Whether the term was actually used in the medieval time period Scott wrote about in Ivanhoe, or if it was an invention of his own time, is a different question. According to Merriam-Webster, the term gained popularity and a wide range of additional meanings throughout the century following Ivanhoe:

The evocative word took root quickly, and also swiftly gained broader meanings: one referring to a politician without political affiliation (who we’d call an independent these days), and one referring to a person who does any type of work on one’s own terms and without any permanent or long-term commitment to an employer. Though freelancer is the noun we now usually use to refer to this last set of people, it’s a newer term than freelance. So while “He’s a freelance” may sound like modern jargon, it is the original term.

According to the Online Etymology Dictionary, the term became associated with journalism specifically by 1882.

Because the origin of the word freelance is indeed a literary reference to “free lances” hired to fight in medieval armies, we have rated this claim as true.