- libertine
- late 14c., "an emancipated slave," from L. libertinus "member of a class of freedmen," from libertus "one's freedmen," from liber "free" (see liberal). Sense of "freethinker" is first recorded 1560s, from Fr. libertin (1540s) originally the name given to certain Protestant sects in France and the Low Countries. Meaning "dissolute or licentious person" first recorded 1590s; the darkening of meaning being perhaps due to misunderstanding of L. libertinus in Acts vi.9.