Freedman
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A freedman is a former slave who has been manumitted or emancipated.
Millions of freedmen were created as a result of the Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution as a result of the American Civil War, although there were freedmen all across the U.S. before the Emancipation Proclamation. To meet this demand, during reconstruction, a Freedmen's Bureau was created.
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Freedmen were also a large social class in ancient Rome. It was the exceptional feature of ancient Rome that almost all slaves freed by Roman owners automatically received Roman citizenship. As citizens, needing a Roman name for the first time, freedmen customary took the nomen of their former owner, who now became their patronus. A precedent was set under the Claudian Civil Service where freedman were used as servants in the Roman bureaucracy. In addition, Claudius passed legislation concerning slaves, including a law that stated that sick slaves abandoned by their owners became freedmen if they recovered. Claudius was extensively criticized for using slaves as freedmen in the Imperial Courts.
Slaves were able to earn their freedom in more than one way. Some were freed in the wills (and therefore at the death) of their owners, some owners bought their slaves' freedom themselves, and other slaves bought themselves from their owner. A freedman was able to buy his own freedom through his peculium, or personal possessions.