Yeoman
a term which seems, in early English history, to have been applied to a common attendant menial servant, but after the 15th century came to a denote forming the next grade below gentlemen.
The term yeoman was also given to the 40-shillings freeholder, or, more loosely, to any small farmer or countryman class of small freeholders, above the grade of laborer. The term is also familiar in the titles of functionaries in royal households, such as yeoman usher of the black rod, yeoman of the robes, etc.