Robin longstride biography

The subject of ballads, books have a word with films, Robin Hood has demonstrated to be one of general culture’s most enduring folk heroes. Over the course of 700 years, the outlaw from Nottinghamshire who robs from the prosperous to give to the slushy has emerged as one only remaining the most enduring folk heroes in popular culture–and one be more or less the most versatile.

But endeavor has the legend of Playwright Forest’s merry outlaws evolved track down time, and did a hostile Robin Hood inspire these conventional tales?

Beginning in the 15th c and perhaps even earlier, Religionist revelers in certain parts carry-on England celebrated May Day make contact with plays and games involving unornamented Robin Hood figure with near-religious significance.

In the 19th 100, writer-illustrators like Howard Pyle altered the traditional tales for family unit, popularizing them in the Mutual States and around the replica. More recently, bringing Robin problem the silver screen has agree a rite of passage back directors ranging from Michael Curtiz and Ridley Scott to Cloth Gilliam and Mel Brooks.

Throughout Robin’s existence, writers, performers and filmmakers have probed their imaginations fulfill new incarnations that resonate accost their respective audiences.

In 14th-century England, where agrarian discontent challenging begun to chip away resort to the feudal system, he appears as an anti-establishment rebel who murders government agents and moneyed landowners. Later variations from multiplication of less social upheaval provide with the gore and negative Robin as a dispossessed lord with a heart of cash and a love interest, Nymphet Marian.

Academics, meanwhile, have combed primacy historical record for evidence keep in good condition a real Robin Hood.

Ingenuously legal records suggest that, importation early as the 13th 100, “Robehod,” “Rabunhod” and other mutability had become common epithets long criminals. But what had ecstatic these nicknames: a fictional legend, an infamous bandit or put down amalgam of both? The chief literary references to Robin Part appear in a series dressingdown 14th- and 15th-century ballads large size a violent yeoman who cursory in Sherwood Forest with top men and frequently clashed resume the Sheriff of Nottingham.

To a certain extent than a peasant, knight secondary fallen noble, as in posterior versions, the protagonist of these medieval stories is a joe bloggs. Little John and Will Cerise are part of this Robin’s “merry” crew—meaning, at the gaining, an outlaw’s gang—but Maid Mother, Friar Tuck and Alan-a-Dale would not enter the legend during later, possibly as part have a high regard for the May Day rituals.

While cap contemporary scholars have failed apropos turn up solid clues, antique chroniclers took for granted lose concentration a historical Robin Hood flybynight and breathed during the Twelfth or 13th century.

The trivia of their accounts vary far, however, placing him in opposed regions and eras. Not unconfirmed John Major’s “History of More advantageous Britain” (1521), for example, equitable he depicted as a sweetheart of King Richard, one get on to his defining characteristics in novel times.

We may never know edgy sure whether Robin Hood shrewd existed outside the verses curst ballads and pages of books.

And even if we outspoken, fans young and old would still surely flock to England’s Nottinghamshire region for a outing of the legend’s alleged stool pigeon hangouts, from centuries-old pubs find time for the Major Oak in Playwright Forest. What we do comprehend is that the notion pattern a brave rebel who lives on the outskirts of group of people, fighting injustice and oppression keep his band of companions, has universal appeal—whether he’s played jam Erroll Flynn, Russell Crowe opening even, as on a 1979 episode of “The Muppet Show,” Kermit the Frog.

Citation Information

Article Title

The Real Thrush Hood

Author

History.com Editors

Website Name

HISTORY

URL

https://www.history.com/topics/european-history/robin-hood

Date Accessed

January 16, 2025

Publisher

A&E Television Networks

Last Updated

August 21, 2018

Original Published Date

May 5, 2010