2578: freelance Jan 4, 2022

'Freelance' now refers to work done across several companies by a person, rather than a fixed position. That said, people nowadays would almost never have any connection to lances, but the original sense denoted mercenaries, who presumably would have. That said, this was not from a medieval word, but is from around the 19th century at least, with many ascribing it to author Sir Walter Scott. The more general sense was taken on soon after.