an act whereby a slave or villain is set at liberty, or let out of bondage. The word comes from the Latin manus, "hand;" and mittere, "to send;" quia servus mittetur extra manum seu potestatem domini sui. Some authors define manumission an act by which a lord enfranchises his tenants, who till that time had been his vassals, and in a state of slavery inconsistent with the sanctity of the Christian faith.

Among the Romans, the manumission of slaves was performed three several ways. 1. When, with his master's consent, a slave had his name entered in the cenus or public register of the citizens. 2. When the slave was led before the praetor, and that magistrate laid his wand called vindicta on his head. 3. When the master gave the slave his freedom by his testament. Servius Tullius is said to have set on foot the first manner; and P. Valerius Publicola the second. A particular account is given of the third in the Institutes of Justinian. It was not necessary that the praetor should be on his tribunal to perform the ceremony of manumission: he did it anywhere indifferently, in his house, in the street, in going to bathe, &c. He laid the rod on the slave's head, pronouncing these words, Dico eum liberum esse mo Quiritium, "I declare him a freeman, after the manner of the Romans." This done, he gave the rod to the lictor, who struck the slave with it on the head, and afterwards with his hand on his face and back; and the notary or scribe entered the name of the new freedman in the register, with the reasons of his manumission. The slave had likewise his head shaved, and a cap given him by his master as a token of freedom. Tertullian adds, that he had then also a third name given him: if this were so, three names were not a token of nobility, but of freedom. The emperor Constantine ordered the manumissions at Rome to be performed in the churches.

Of manumission there have also been various forms in England. In the time of the Conqueror, villains were manumitted, by the master's delivering them by the right hand to the viscount, in full court, showing them the door, giving them a lance and a sword, and proclaiming them free. Others were manumitted by charter. There was also an implicit manumission: as when the lord made an obligation for payment of money to the bondman at a certain day, or sued him where he might enter without suit, and the like.