I've gotten a lot of mixed answers looking into this. There seems to be some evidence supporting it was real, but a derogatory term. One person said that there was an archaic definition of hedge which meant something that was lowly and was generally negative. Can anyone verify that? I know about knight errantry stories and the like. I'm just curious as to whether hedge knight was ever used to refer to such people, whether or not it had a negative connotation.