a legal action ordering a debt to be paid or a debtor's property to be surrendered to his creditor(s) free alms this was one of the four conditions on which lands could be granted by charter. In the Middle Ages, it was a grant of property made to a monastery or church in return for prayers for the granter's soul and those of his family; later, as the mortification it becomes a grant to a university or other institution. (The idea behind the name was that the grant had not been made to a normal vassal but to a group of people who went on and on, the institution being 'deathless') freeholders were those who were entitled to elect (or be elected) members of Parliament on the grounds that they held lands worth more than a certain sum fruits simply the produce of a piece of land (which did not depend on whether it had any orchards or not)