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The term franklin denotes a member of a social class or rank in England in the 12th to 15th centuries. In the period when Middle English was in use, a franklin was simply a freeman; that is, a man who was not a serf, in the feudal system under which people were tied to land which they did not own, in bondage to a member of the nobility who owned that land.
The meaning of the word "franklin" evolved to mean a freeholder; that is, one who holds title to real property in fee simple. In the 14th and 15th centuries, franklin was "the designation of a class of landowners ranking next below the landed gentry" [1].
A franklin is one of the characters in The Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer.
According to the OED, the term franklin is derived from Middle English franklen, frankeleyn, francoleyn, from Anglo-Latin francalanus a person owning francalia, "territory held without dues". Collins mentions the Anglo-French fraunclein, "a landowner of free, but not noble birth", from Old French franc free + -lein, "-ling", formed on the model of "chamberlain"; all these go back to Late Latin francus "free" or "a free man", from Frankish *Frank, "a freeman", literally, "a Frank"; cognate with Old High German Franko, which meant a German from a confederation in Franconia of which a branch conquered Gaul, from which event is also explained the name of the country France.
The social class of franklin, meaning (latterly) a person not only free (not in feudal servitude) but also owning the freehold of land, and yet not even a member of the "landed gentry" (knights, esquires and gentlemen, the lower grades of the upper class) let alone of the nobility (barons, viscounts, earls/counts, marquis, dukes), evidently represents the beginnings of a real-property-owning middle class in England in the 14th and 15th centuries.
Note that the land and property owned by this English middle class might well be in the country, one factor distinguishing it from the mainland European bourgeoisie which term means "town-dwellers".
Unlike some other terms referring to social class or status in mediaeval England such as esquire and gentleman, franklin has no modern usage other than historical reference to the medieval period.