Free warren

Free warren—often simply warren—refers to a type of franchise or privilege conveyed by a sovereign in mediaeval England to a subject, promising to hold them harmless for killing game of certain species within a stipulated area, usually a wood or small forest. The sovereign involved might be either the monarch or a marcher lord.

The grant of free warren could be as a gift, or in exchange for consideration, and might be later alienated by the grantee. The stipulated area might be coextensive with the frank-tenement of the grantee, or it might be discontinuous or even at a considerable remove from the grantee's holdings. The right of free warren did not extend automatically to the freeholder of the soil.

Although the rights of free warren are usually discussed in the context of forest law, the only law which applied within the warren was common law. Thus, even though the warrant ultimately derived from the sovereign, the only statutes applied to poachers in a warren were the common-law crimes of theft and trespass.

The privilege of free warren was a reciprocal relationship. The grantee of the warren was granted an exemption from the law (under which all game in the realm was property of the sovereign), but the grantee owed the sovereign the stewardship and protection of the game from all others who might wish to hunt it.

Modern English warren ← ME warrene, warreine ← ONF warrenne ← Germanic present participle of *warian "to take care; to cause to care (for)" ← causative of *waran "to care" ← *war "care". Doublet of guarantor. Related to OHG werien (i.e. *wärian) "to defend, protect", and also to English "a-ware, wary".

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