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{{Short description|Heroic outlaw in English folklore}}
{{Other uses}}
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{{Use British English|date=December 2019}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=January 2025}}
[[File:Robin Hood on a Horse.jpg|thumb|15th-century print of Robin Hood on horseback]]

'''Robin Hood''' is a legendary [[noble outlaw|heroic outlaw]] originally depicted in [[English folklore]] and subsequently featured in literature, theatre, and cinema. According to legend, he was a highly skilled [[archer]] and [[swordsman]].<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.thedockyards.com/tale-robin-hood-sherwood-forest-fact-fiction/|work=The Dockyards|first=Victor |last=Rouă|title=The Tale Of Robin Hood Of Sherwood Forest: Between Fact And Fiction|date=20 April 2017|accessdate=4 June 2021}}</ref> In some versions of the legend, he is depicted as being of noble birth, and in modern retellings he is sometimes depicted as having fought in the [[Crusades]] before returning to [[England]] to find his lands taken by the [[Sheriff of Nottingham]]. In the oldest known versions, he is instead a member of the [[yeoman]] class. He is traditionally depicted dressed in [[Lincoln green]]. Today, he is most closely associated with his stance of "[[redistribution of income and wealth|robbing the rich to give to the poor]]".

Through retellings, additions, and variations, a body of familiar characters associated with Robin Hood has been created. These include his lover, [[Maid Marian]]; his band of outlaws, the [[Merry Men]]; and his chief opponent, the Sheriff of Nottingham. The Sheriff is often depicted as assisting [[John, King of England|Prince John]] in usurping the rightful but absent [[Richard I of England|King Richard]], to whom Robin Hood remains loyal. He became a popular folk figure in the [[Late Middle Ages]], and his partisanship of the common people and opposition to the Sheriff are some of the earliest-recorded features of the legend, whereas his political interests and setting during the [[Angevin Empire|Angevin era]] developed in later centuries. The earliest known [[ballad]]s featuring him are from the 15th century.

There have been numerous variations and adaptations of the story over the subsequent years, and the story continues to be widely represented in literature, film, and television media today. Robin Hood is considered one of the best-known tales of English folklore. In popular culture, the term "Robin Hood" is often used to describe a heroic outlaw or rebel against tyranny.

The origins of the legend as well as the historical context have been debated for centuries. There are numerous references to historical figures with similar names that have been proposed as possible evidence of his existence, some dating back to the late 13th century. At least eight plausible origins to the story have been mooted by historians and folklorists, including suggestions that "Robin Hood" was a stock alias used by or in reference to bandits.

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==Ballads and tales==
The first clear reference to "rhymes of Robin Hood" is from the alliterative poem ''[[Piers Plowman]]'', thought to have been composed in the 1370s, followed shortly afterwards by a quotation of a later common proverb,<ref>Brockman 1983, p.69</ref> "many men speak of Robin Hood and never shot his bow",<ref name="Dean 1991">{{cite web|url=https://d.lib.rochester.edu/teams/text/dean-six-ecclesiastical-satires-friar-daws-reply#232|author=Dean|year=1991|title=Friar Daw's Reply|access-date=5 May 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190518195733/https://d.lib.rochester.edu/teams/text/dean-six-ecclesiastical-satires-friar-daws-reply#232|archive-date=18 May 2019|url-status=live}}</ref> in ''Friar Daw's Reply'' ({{circa}} 1402)<ref>{{cite web|url=https://d.lib.rochester.edu/teams/text/dean-six-ecclesiastical-satires-friar-daws-reply-introduction|author=Dean|year=1991|title=Friar Daw's Reply: Introduction|access-date=5 May 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191116223956/https://d.lib.rochester.edu/teams/text/dean-six-ecclesiastical-satires-friar-daws-reply-introduction|archive-date=16 November 2019|url-status=live}}</ref> and a complaint in ''[[Dives and Pauper]]'' (1405–1410) that people would rather listen to "tales and songs of Robin Hood" than attend Mass.<ref name="Blackwood 2018, p.59">Blackwood 2018, p.59</ref> Robin Hood is also mentioned in a [[Lollardy|Lollard]] tract<ref>Cambridge University Library MS Ii.6.26</ref> dated to the first half of the 15th century<ref name="James 2019, p.204">James 2019, p.204</ref> (thus also possibly predating his other earliest historical mentions)<ref>{{cite web|url=https://robinhoodlegend.com/updates/|title=Robin Hood – The Facts and the Fiction » Updates|work=Robin Hood - The Facts and the Fiction &#124; The Facts and the Fiction |date=28 June 2010 |access-date=4 May 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190403171048/https://robinhoodlegend.com/updates/|archive-date=3 April 2019|url-status=live}}</ref> alongside several other folk heroes such as [[Guy of Warwick]], [[Bevis of Hampton]], and [[Libeaus Desconus|Sir Lybeaus]].<ref>Hanna 2005, p.151</ref>

However, the earliest surviving copies of the narrative ballads date to the second half of the 15th century or the first decade of the 16th century. In these early accounts, Robin Hood's partisanship of the lower classes, his [[Marian devotions|devotion to the Virgin Mary]] and associated special regard for women, his outstanding skill as an archer, his [[anti-clericalism]], and his particular animosity towards the [[Sheriff of Nottingham]] are already clear.<ref>''[[A Gest of Robin Hood]]'' stanzas&nbsp;10–15, stanza&nbsp;292 (archery) [http://www.sacred-texts.com/neu/eng/child/ch117.htm 117A: The Gest of Robyn Hode] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20111107024333/http://sacred-texts.com/neu/eng/child/ch117.htm |date=7 November 2011 }}. Retrieved 15 April 2008.</ref> [[Little John]], [[Much the Miller's Son]], and [[Will Scarlet]] (as Will "Scarlok" or "Scathelocke") all appear, although not yet [[Maid Marian]] or [[Friar Tuck]]. The [[friar]] has been part of the legend since at least the later 15th century, when he is mentioned in a Robin Hood play script.<ref>Dobson and Taylor, p. 203. Friar Tuck is mentioned in the play fragment ''Robyn Hod and the Shryff off Notyngham'' dated to {{circa}} 1475.</ref>

In modern popular culture, Robin Hood is typically seen as a contemporary and supporter of the late-12th-century King [[Richard I of England|Richard the Lionheart]], Robin being driven to outlawry during the misrule of Richard's brother [[John, King of England|John]] while Richard was away at the [[Third Crusade]]. This view first gained currency in the 16th century.<ref>Dobson and Taylor, pp. 5, 16.</ref> It is not supported by the earliest ballads. The early compilation, ''[[A Gest of Robyn Hode]]'', names the king as 'Edward'; and while it does show Robin Hood accepting the king's pardon, he later repudiates it and returns to the greenwood.<ref name="auto">{{cite web|url=http://www.sacred-texts.com/neu/eng/child/ch117.htm|title=The Child Ballads: 117. The Gest of Robyn Hode|work=sacred-texts.com|access-date=15 April 2008|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20111107024333/http://sacred-texts.com/neu/eng/child/ch117.htm|archive-date=7 November 2011|url-status=live}}</ref><ref name="auto1">{{cite web|url=https://d.lib.rochester.edu/teams/text/gest-of-robyn-hode|title=A Gest of Robyn Hode|work=lib.rochester.edu|access-date=10 February 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200331050954/https://d.lib.rochester.edu/teams/text/gest-of-robyn-hode|archive-date=31 March 2020|url-status=live}}</ref> The oldest surviving ballad, ''[[Robin Hood and the Monk]]'', gives even less support to the picture of Robin Hood as a partisan of the true king. The setting of the early ballads is usually attributed by scholars to either the 13th or 14th century, although it is recognised they are not necessarily historically consistent.<ref>Dobson and Taylor, pp. 14–16.</ref>

The early ballads are also quite clear on Robin Hood's social status: he is a [[yeoman]]. While the meaning of this term changed over time, including free retainers of an aristocrat and small landholders, it always referred to commoners. The essence of it in the present context was "neither a knight nor a peasant or 'husbonde' but something in between".<ref>Dobson and Taylor, p. 34.</ref> Artisans (such as millers) were among those regarded as 'yeomen' in the 14th century.<ref>Dobson and Taylor, pp. 34–35.</ref> From the 16th century on, there were attempts to elevate Robin Hood to the nobility, such as in [[Richard Grafton]]'s ''Chronicle at Large'';<ref name="Knight and Ohlgren, 1997">Knight and Ohlgren, 1997.</ref> [[Anthony Munday]] presented him at the end of the century as the [[Robert Fitzooth|Earl of Huntingdon]] in two extremely influential plays, as he is still commonly presented in modern times.<ref>Dobson and Taylor, pp. 33, 44, and 220–223.</ref>

The legend was also transmitted by 'Robin Hood games' or plays that were an important part of the late medieval and early modern [[May Day]] festivities. The first record of a Robin Hood game was in 1426 in [[Exeter]], but the reference does not indicate how old or widespread this custom was at the time. The Robin Hood games are known to have flourished in the later 15th and 16th centuries.<ref>Singmam, 1998, ''Robin Hood; The Shaping of the Legend'' p.&nbsp;62.</ref> It is commonly stated as fact that Maid Marian and a jolly friar (at least partly identifiable with Friar Tuck) entered the legend through the May Games.<ref>Dobson and Taylor, p. 41. 'It was here [the May Games] that he encountered and assimilated into his own legend the jolly friar and Maid Marian, almost invariably among the performers in the 16th century morris dance,' Dobson and Taylor have suggested that theories on the origin of Friar Tuck often founder on a failure to recognise that 'he was the product of the fusion between two very different friars,' a 'bellicose outlaw', and the May Games figure.</ref>

=== Early ballads ===

[[File:Robin Hood and guy of Gisborne Bewick 1832.jpg|thumb|Robin Hood and Guy of Gisborne. [[Woodcut]] print by [[Thomas Bewick]], 1832]]

The earliest surviving text of a Robin Hood ballad is the 15th-century "[[Robin Hood and the Monk]]".<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.lib.rochester.edu/camelot/teams/monk.htm |title=Robin Hood and the Monk |publisher=Lib.rochester.edu |access-date=12 March 2010 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20091224124209/http://www.lib.rochester.edu/camelot/TEAMS/monk.htm |archive-date=24 December 2009 |url-status=live }}</ref> This is preserved in [[Cambridge University]] manuscript Ff.5.48. Written after 1450,<ref>[http://www.lib.rochester.edu/camelot/teams/monkint.htm Introduction] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060903063447/http://www.lib.rochester.edu/camelot/teams/monkint.htm |date=3 September 2006 }} accompanying Knight and Ohlgren's 1997 ed.</ref> it contains many of the elements still associated with the legend, from the [[Nottingham]] setting to the bitter enmity between Robin and the [[Sheriff of Nottingham (position)|local sheriff]].

[[File:Fairbanks Robin Hood standing by wall w sword.jpg|thumb|[[Douglas Fairbanks]] as Robin Hood; the sword he is depicted with was common in the oldest [[ballad]]s]]

The first printed version is ''[[A Gest of Robyn Hode]]'' ({{circa}} 1500), a collection of separate stories that attempts to unite the episodes into a single continuous narrative.<ref>Ohlgren, Thomas, ''Robin Hood: The Early Poems'', 1465–1560, (Newark: University of Delaware Press, 2007), ''From Script to Print: Robin Hood and the Early Printers'', pp. 97–134.</ref> After this comes "[[Robin Hood and the Potter]]",<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.lib.rochester.edu/camelot/teams/potter.htm |title=Robin Hood and the Potter |publisher=Lib.rochester.edu |access-date=12 March 2010 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100214060051/http://www.lib.rochester.edu/camelot/teams/potter.htm |archive-date=14 February 2010 |url-status=live }}</ref> contained in a manuscript of {{circa}} 1503. "The Potter" is markedly different in tone from "The Monk": whereas the earlier tale is "a thriller"<ref name=Holt/> the latter is more comic, its plot involving trickery and cunning rather than straightforward force. Other early texts are dramatic pieces, the earliest being the fragmentary ''[[Robyn Hod and the Shryff off Notyngham]]''<ref name="Lib.rochester.edu">{{cite web |url=http://www.lib.rochester.edu/camelot/teams/sheri.htm |title=Robyn Hod and the Shryff off Notyngham |publisher=Lib.rochester.edu |access-date=12 March 2010 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100818023049/http://www.lib.rochester.edu/camelot/teams/sheri.htm |archive-date=18 August 2010 |url-status=live }}</ref> ({{circa}} 1475). These are particularly noteworthy as they show Robin's integration into May Day rituals towards the end of the Middle Ages; ''Robyn Hod and the Shryff off Notyngham'', among other points of interest, contains the earliest reference to Friar Tuck. The plots of neither "the Monk" nor "the Potter" are included in the ''Gest''; and neither is the plot of "[[Robin Hood and Guy of Gisborne]]", which is probably at least as old as those two ballads although preserved in a more recent copy. Each of these three ballads survived in a single copy, so it is unclear how much of the medieval legend has survived, and what has survived may not be typical of the medieval legend. It has been argued that the fact that the surviving ballads were preserved in written form in itself makes it unlikely they were typical; in particular, stories with an interest for the gentry were by this view more likely to be preserved.<ref>Singman, Jeffrey L. ''Robin Hood: The Shaping of the Legend'' (1998), Greenwood Publishing Group, p.&nbsp;51. {{ISBN|0-313-30101-8}}.</ref> The story of Robin's aid to the 'poor knight' that takes up much of the ''Gest'' may be an example.

The character of Robin in these first texts is rougher edged than in his later incarnations. In "Robin Hood and the Monk", for example, he is shown as quick tempered and violent, assaulting Little John for defeating him in an archery contest; in the same ballad, Much the Miller's Son casually kills a "little [[Page (servant)|page]]" in the course of rescuing Robin Hood from prison.<ref name="RHAM">[[Robin Hood and the Monk]]. From Child's edition of the ballad, online at Sacred Texts, [http://www.sacred-texts.com/neu/eng/child/ch119.htm 119A: Robin Hood and the Monk] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120519171814/http://sacred-texts.com/neu/eng/child/ch119.htm |date=19 May 2012 }} Stanza&nbsp;16:

{{Poem quote|{{lang|enm|Then Robyn goes to Notyngham,}}
{{lang|enm|Hym selfe mornyng allone,}}
{{lang|enm|And Litull John to mery Scherwode,}}
{{lang|enm|The pathes he knew ilkone.}}
}}</ref> No extant early ballad actually shows Robin Hood "giving to the poor", although in "A Gest of Robyn Hode" Robin does make a large loan to an unfortunate [[knight]], which he does not in the end require to be repaid;<ref>Holt, p. 11.</ref> and later in the same ballad Robin Hood states his intention of giving money to the next traveller to come down the road if he happens to be poor.

{{Poem quote|{{lang|enm|Of my good he shall haue some,}}
{{lang|enm|Yf he be a por man.}}<ref>[[Child Ballads]] 117A:210, i.e. "A Gest of Robyn Hode" stanza 210.</ref>}}

As it happens the next traveller is not poor, but it seems in context that Robin Hood is stating a general policy. The first explicit statement to the effect that Robin Hood habitually robbed from the rich to give the poor can be found in [[John Stow]]'s ''Annales of England'' (1592), about a century after the publication of ''Gest''.<ref name="Robin Hood p43">[[Stephen Thomas Knight]] 2003 ''Robin Hood: A Mythic Biography'' p. 43 quoting John Stow, 1592, ''Annales of England'': "{{lang|enm|poor men's goodes hee spared, aboundantly releeving them with that, which by thefte he gote from Abbeyes and the houses of riche Carles}}".</ref><ref>for it being the earliest clear statement see Dobson and Taylor (1997), ''Rhymes of Robyn Hood'' p.  290.</ref> But from the beginning Robin Hood is on the side of the poor; ''Gest'' quotes Robin Hood as instructing his men that when they rob:

{{Poem quote|{{lang|enm|loke ye do no husbonde harme}}
{{lang|enm|That tilleth with his ploughe.}}
{{lang|enm|No more ye shall no gode yeman}}
{{lang|enm|That walketh by gren-wode shawe;}}
{{lang|enm|Ne no knyght ne no squyer}}
{{lang|enm|That wol be a gode felawe.}}<ref name="auto"/><ref name="auto1"/>}}

And in its final lines ''Gest'' sums up:

{{Poem quote|{{lang|enm|he was a good outlawe,}}
{{lang|enm|And dyde pore men moch god.}}}}

Within Robin Hood's band, medieval forms of courtesy rather than modern ideals of equality are generally in evidence. In the early ballad, Robin's men usually kneel before him in obedience: in ''Gest,'' the king even observes that "{{lang|enm|His men are more at his byddynge/Then my men be at myn.}}" Their social status, as yeomen, is shown by their weapons: they use swords rather than [[quarterstaff]]s.{{Explain|date=June 2023|reason=In what way does this indicate their social status?}} The only character to use a quarterstaff in the early ballads is the Potter, and Robin Hood does not take to a staff until the 17th-century ''[[Robin Hood and Little John]]''.<ref>Holt, p. 36.</ref>

The political and social assumptions underlying the early Robin Hood ballads have long been controversial. [[J. C. Holt]] influentially argued that the Robin Hood legend was cultivated in the households of the gentry, and that it would be mistaken to see in him a figure of [[peasant]] revolt. He is not a peasant but a yeoman, and his tales make no mention of the complaints of the peasants, such as oppressive taxes.<ref>Holt, pp. 37–38.</ref> He appears not so much as a revolt against societal standards as an embodiment of them, being generous, pious, and courteous, opposed to stingy, worldly, and churlish foes.<ref>Holt, p. 10.</ref> Other scholars have by contrast stressed the subversive aspects of the legend, and see in the medieval Robin Hood ballads a plebeian literature hostile to the [[Feudalism|feudal]] order.<ref>Singman, Jeffrey L. ''Robin Hood: The Shaping of the Legend'', 1998, Greenwood Publishing Group, p.&nbsp;46, and first chapter as a whole. {{ISBN|0-313-30101-8}}.</ref>

===Early plays, May Day games, and fairs===

By the early 15th century at the latest, Robin Hood had become associated with May Day celebrations, with revellers dressing as Robin or as members of his band for the festivities. This was not common throughout England, but in some regions the custom lasted until [[Elizabethan]] times, and during the reign of [[Henry VIII]] was briefly popular at [[Noble court|court]].<ref name=Hutton270>Hutton, 1997, pp. 270–271.</ref> Henry disguised himself as Robin in January 1510, with eleven courtiers and a Maid Marian to surprise [[Catherine of Aragon]] in her chamber.<ref>Peter Happé, "Dramatic Genre and the Court of Henry VIII", Thomas Betteridge and [[Suzannah Lipscomb]], ''Henry VIII and the Court: Arts, Politics and Performance'' (Ashgate, 2013), p. 274.</ref>

Robin was often allocated the role of a [[King of the May|May King]], presiding over games and processions, but plays were also performed with the characters in the roles,<ref>Hutton (1996), p. 32.</ref> sometimes performed at [[Parish ale|church ales]], a means by which churches raised funds.<ref>Hutton (1996), p. 31.</ref> A complaint of 1492, brought to the [[Star Chamber]], accuses men of acting riotously by coming to a fair as Robin Hood and his men; the accused defended themselves on the grounds that the practice was a long-standing custom to raise money for churches, and they had not acted riotously but peaceably.<ref>Holt, pp. 148–149.</ref>

[[File:Robin Hood and Maid Marian.JPG|left|thumb|Artist's impression of Robin Hood and [[Maid Marian]]]]

It is from the association with the May Games that Robin's romantic attachment to Maid Marian (or Marion) apparently stems. A "Robin and Marion" figured in 13th-century French '[[pastourelle]]s' (of which ''[[Jeu de Robin et Marion]]'' {{circa}} 1280 is a literary version) and preside over the French May festivities; "This Robin and Marion tended to preside, in the intervals of the attempted seduction of the latter by a series of knights, over a variety of rustic pastimes."<ref name=DAT42>Dobson and Taylor, p. 42.</ref> In the ''Jeu de Robin and Marion'', Robin and his companions have to rescue Marion from the clutches of a "lustful knight".<ref>Maurice Keen ''The Outlaws of Medieval England'' Appendix&nbsp;1, 1987, Routledge, {{ISBN|0-7102-1203-8}}.</ref> This play is distinct from the English legends,<ref name=Hutton270/> although Dobson and Taylor regard it as 'highly probable' that this French Robin's name and functions travelled to the English May Games, where they fused with the Robin Hood legend.<ref>Dobson and Taylor (1997), p. 42.</ref> Both Robin and Marian were certainly associated with May Day festivities in England (as was Friar Tuck), but these may have been originally two distinct types of performance. [[Alexander Barclay]] in his ''Ship of Fools'', writing in {{circa}} 1500, refers to '{{lang|enm|some merry fytte of Maid Marian or else of Robin Hood}}' – but the characters were brought together.<ref name="Jeffrey Richards p. 190">Jeffrey Richards, ''Swordsmen of the Screen: From Douglas Fairbanks to Michael York'', p. 190, Routledge & Kegan Paul, Lond, Henly and Boston (1988).</ref> Marian did not immediately gain the unquestioned role; in ''[[Robin Hood's Birth, Breeding, Valor, and Marriage]]'', his sweetheart is "Clorinda the Queen of the Shepherdesses".<ref name=Holt165>Holt, p.&nbsp;165</ref> Clorinda survives in some later stories as an alias of Marian.<ref name=AWW>Allen W. Wright, [http://www.boldoutlaw.com/robbeg/robbeg2.html#lj "A Beginner's Guide to Robin Hood"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070304084654/http://www.boldoutlaw.com/robbeg/robbeg2.html#lj |date=4 March 2007 }}</ref>

''Robyn Hod and the Shryff off Notyngham'' appears to tell the story of Robin Hood and Guy of Gisborne.<ref>Dobson and Taylor (1997), "Rhymes of Robyn Hood", p. 204.</ref> There is also an early playtext appended to a 1560 printed edition of ''Gest''. This includes a dramatic version of the story of [[Robin Hood and the Curtal Friar]] and a version of the first part of the story of [[Robin Hood and the Potter]]. (Neither of these ballads is known to have existed in print at the time, and there is no earlier record known of the "Curtal Friar" story.) The publisher describes the text as a '{{lang|enm|playe of Robyn Hood, verye proper to be played in Maye games}}', but does not seem to be aware that the text actually contains two separate plays.<ref>Dobson and Taylor (1997), "Rhymes of Robyn Hood", p. 215.</ref> An especial point of interest in the "Friar" play is the appearance of a ribald woman who is unnamed but apparently to be identified with the bawdy Maid Marian of the May Games.<ref>Dobson and Taylor, "Rhymes of Robyn Hood", p. 209.</ref> She does not appear in extant versions of the ballad.

===Early modern stage===
In May 1585, [[James VI and I|James VI of Scotland]] was entertained by a Robin Hood play at [[Dirleton Castle]] produced by his favourite the [[James Stewart, Earl of Arran|Earl of Arran]], while there was plague in Edinburgh.<ref>David Masson, ''Register of the Privy Council of Scotland: 1578–1585'', vol. 3 (Edinburgh, 1880), p. 744.</ref> In 1598, [[Anthony Munday]] wrote a pair of plays on the Robin Hood legend, ''[[The Downfall and The Death of Robert Earl of Huntington]]'' (published 1601). These plays drew on a variety of sources, including apparently ''Gest'', and were influential in fixing the story of Robin Hood to the period of Richard I. [[Stephen Thomas Knight]] has suggested that Munday drew heavily on [[Fulk Fitz Warin]], a historical 12th century outlawed nobleman and enemy of King John, in creating his Robin Hood.<ref name="Robin Hood page 63">Robin Hood: A Mythic Biography p. 63.</ref> The play identifies Robin Hood as Robert, [[Earl of Huntingdon]], following in Richard Grafton's association of Robin Hood with the gentry,<ref name="Knight and Ohlgren, 1997" /> and identifies Maid Marian with "one of the semi-mythical Matildas persecuted by King John".<ref>Dobson and Taylor (1997), p. 44.</ref> The plays are complex in plot and form, the story of Robin Hood appearing as a play-within-a-play presented at the court of [[Henry VIII]] and written by the poet, priest and courtier [[John Skelton (poet)|John Skelton]], with Skelton playing Friar Tuck. Some scholars have conjectured that Skelton may have indeed written a lost Robin Hood play for Henry VIII's court, and that this play may have been one of Munday's sources.<ref>Dobson and Taylor (1997), "Rhymes of Robin Hood", pp. 43, 44, and 223.</ref> Henry VIII with eleven of his nobles had impersonated "Robyn Hodes men" as part of his "Maying" in 1510. Robin Hood is known to have appeared in a number of other lost and extant [[English Renaissance theatre|Elizabethan plays]]. In 1599, the play ''George a Green, the Pinner of Wakefield'' places Robin Hood in the reign of [[Edward IV]].<ref>Dobson and Taylor (1997), pp. 42–44.</ref> ''Edward I'', a play by [[George Peele]] first performed in 1590–91, incorporates a Robin Hood game played by the characters. [[Llywelyn the Great]], the last independent [[Prince of Wales]], is presented playing Robin Hood.<ref>Robin Hood: A Mythic Biography, p. 51.</ref>[[File:Richard The Lionheart - Robinhood.jpg|thumb|right|[[King Richard the Lionheart]] marrying Robin Hood and Maid Marian on a plaque outside [[Nottingham Castle]]]]
Fixing the Robin Hood story to the 1190s had been first proposed by [[John Major (philosopher)|John Major]] in his ''Historia Majoris Britanniæ'' (1521), (and he also may have been influenced in so doing by the story of FitzWarin);<ref name="Robin Hood page 63"/> this was the period in which King Richard was absent from the country, fighting in the Third Crusade.<ref name=Holt170>Holt, p. 170.</ref>

[[William Shakespeare]] makes reference to Robin Hood in his late-16th-century play ''[[The Two Gentlemen of Verona]]''. In it, the character Valentine is banished from [[Milan]] and driven out through the forest where he is approached by outlaws who, upon meeting him, desire him as their leader. They comment, "By the bare scalp of Robin Hood's fat friar, This fellow were a king for our wild faction!"<ref>Act IV, Scene 1, line 36–37.</ref> Robin Hood is also mentioned in ''[[As You Like It]]''. When asked about the exiled Duke Senior, the character of Charles says that he is "already in the forest of Arden, and a many merry men with him; and there they live like the old Robin Hood of England". Justice Silence sings a line from an unnamed Robin Hood ballad, the line is "Robin Hood, Scarlet, and John" in Act 5 scene 3 of [[Henry IV, part 2]]. In [[Henry IV part 1]] Act 3 scene 3, Falstaff refers to Maid Marian, implying she is a by-word for unwomanly or unchaste behaviour.

[[Ben Jonson]] produced the incomplete [[masque]] ''The Sad Shepherd, or a Tale of Robin Hood''<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.lib.rochester.edu/camelot/rh/jonsonss.htm |title=Johnson's "The Sad Shepherd" |publisher=Lib.rochester.edu |access-date=12 March 2010 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100404090503/http://www.lib.rochester.edu/Camelot/rh/jonsonss.htm |archive-date=4 April 2010 |url-status=live }}</ref> in part as a satire on [[Puritan]]ism. It is about half finished, and his death in 1637 may have interrupted writing. Jonson's only pastoral drama, it was written in sophisticated verse and included supernatural action and characters.<ref>Dobson and Taylor (1997), p. 231.</ref> It has had little impact on the Robin Hood tradition but earns mention as the work of a major dramatist.

The 1642 [[London theatre closure 1642|London theatre closure]] by the Puritans interrupted the portrayal of Robin Hood on the stage. The theatres would reopen with the [[Stuart Restoration|Restoration]] in 1660. Robin Hood did not appear on the Restoration stage, except for "Robin Hood and his Crew of Souldiers" acted in Nottingham on the day of the coronation of [[Charles II of England|Charles II]] in 1661. This short play adapts the story of the king's pardon of Robin Hood to refer to the Restoration.<ref>Dobson and Taylor, pp. 45, 247</ref> However, Robin Hood appeared on the 18th-century stage in various farces and comic operas.<ref>Dobson and Taylor, p. 45</ref> [[Alfred, Lord Tennyson]] would write a four-act Robin Hood play at the end of the 19th century, "The Forrestors". It is fundamentally based on ''Gest'' but follows the traditions of placing Robin Hood as the Earl of Huntingdon in the time of Richard I and making the Sheriff of Nottingham and Prince John rivals with Robin Hood for Maid Marian's hand.<ref>Dobson and Taylor, p. 243</ref> The return of King Richard brings a happy ending.

===Broadside ballads and garlands===
With the advent of printing came the Robin Hood [[broadside ballads]]. When they displaced the oral tradition of Robin Hood ballads is unknown but the process seems to have been completed by the end of the 16th century. Near the end of the 16th century an unpublished prose life of Robin Hood was written and included in the [[Sloane Manuscript]]. Largely a paraphrase of ''Gest'', it also contains material revealing that the author was familiar with early versions of a number of the Robin Hood broadside ballads.<ref>Dobson and Taylor, "Rhymes of Robyn Hood", p. 286.</ref> Not all of the medieval legend was preserved in the broadside ballads; there is no broadside version of "Robin Hood and Guy of Gisborne" or of ''Robin Hood and the Monk'', which did not appear in print until the 18th and 19th centuries respectively. However, ''Gest'' was reprinted from time to time throughout the 16th and 17th centuries.

No surviving broadside ballad can be dated with certainty before the 17th century, but during that century, the commercial broadside ballad became the main vehicle for the popular Robin Hood legend.<ref>Dobson and Taylor (1997), "Rhymes of Robin Hood", p.  47.</ref> These broadside ballads were in some cases newly fabricated but were mostly adaptations of the older verse narratives. The broadside ballads were fitted to a small repertoire of pre-existing tunes resulting in an increase of "stock formulaic phrases" making them "repetitive and verbose",<ref>Dobson and Taylor, "Rhymes of Robyn Hood", p. 49.</ref> they commonly feature Robin Hood's contests with artisans: tinkers, tanners, and butchers. Among these ballads is "[[Robin Hood and Little John]]," telling the famous story of the quarterstaff fight between the two outlaws.

Dobson and Taylor wrote, 'More generally the Robin of the broadsides is a much less tragic, less heroic and in the last resort less mature figure than his medieval predecessor'.<ref>"Rhymes of Robyn Hood" (1997), p. 50.</ref> In most of the broadside ballads Robin Hood remains a plebeian figure, a notable exception being [[Martin Parker]]'s attempt at an overall life of Robin Hood, "[[A True Tale of Robin Hood]]," which also emphasises the theme of Robin Hood's generosity to the poor more than the broadsheet ballads do in general. The 17th century introduced the [[minstrel]] [[Alan-a-Dale]]. He first appeared in a 17th-century broadside ballad and, unlike many of the characters thus associated, managed to adhere to the legend.<ref name="Holt165" /> The prose life of Robin Hood in Sloane Manuscript contains the substance of the Alan-a-Dale ballad but tells the story about Will Scarlet.

[[File:Robin Hood and Little John.jpg|thumb|"[[Little John]] and Robin Hood" by [[Louis Rhead]]]]
In the 18th century, the stories began to develop a slightly more farcical vein. From this period there are a number of ballads in which Robin is severely 'drubbed' by a succession of tradesmen including [[Robin Hood and the Tanner|a tanner]], [[Robin Hood and the Tinker|a tinker]], and [[Robin Hood and the Ranger|a ranger]].<ref name=Holt170/> In fact, the only character who does not get the better of Robin Hood is the luckless Sheriff. Yet even in these ballads Robin is more than a mere simpleton: on the contrary, he often acts with great shrewdness. The tinker, setting out to capture Robin, only manages to fight with him after he has been cheated out of his money and the [[arrest warrant]] he is carrying. In ''[[Robin Hood's Golden Prize]]'', Robin disguises himself as a friar and cheats two priests out of their cash. Even when Robin is defeated, he usually tricks his foe into letting him sound his horn, summoning the Merry Men to his aid. When his enemies do not fall for this ruse, he persuades them to drink with him instead (see [[Robin Hood's Delight]]).

In the 18th and 19th centuries, the Robin Hood ballads were mostly sold in "Garlands" of 16 to 24 Robin Hood ballads; these were crudely printed chap books aimed at the poor. The garlands added nothing to the substance of the legend but ensured that it continued after the decline of the single broadside ballad.<ref>Dobson and Taylor, "Rhymes of Robin Hood", pp. 51–52.</ref> In the 18th century also, Robin Hood frequently appeared in criminal biographies and histories of highwaymen compendia.<ref>{{cite journal|last=Basdeo|first=Stephen|year=2016|title=Robin Hood the Brute: Representations of the Outlaw in Eighteenth Century Criminal Biography|journal=Law, Crime and History|volume=6: 2|pages=54–70}}</ref>

===Rediscovery: Percy and Ritson===
In 1765, [[Thomas Percy (bishop of Dromore)]] published ''[[Reliques of Ancient English Poetry]]'', including ballads from the 17th-century [[Percy Folio]] manuscript which had not previously been printed, most notably Robin Hood and Guy of Gisborne which is generally regarded as in substance a genuine late medieval ballad.

In 1795, [[Joseph Ritson]] published an enormously influential edition of the Robin Hood ballads ''Robin Hood: A collection of all the Ancient Poems Songs and Ballads now extant, relative to that celebrated Outlaw''.<ref>Bewick, et al. Robin Hood : a Collection of All the Ancient Poems, Songs, and Ballads, Now Extant Relative to That Celebrated English Outlaw; to Which Are Prefixed Historical Anecdotes of His Life / by Joseph Ritson. 2nd ed., W. Pickering, 1832 via the State Library of New South Wales, [http://digital.sl.nsw.gov.au/delivery/DeliveryManagerServlet?embedded=true&toolbar=false&dps_pid=IE7094075&_ga=2.134573233.1966093815.1589692586-129856077.1543461593 DSM/821.04/R/v. 1]</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Ritson |first1=Joseph |last2=Bewick |first2=Thomas |last3=Tourrier |first3=A. H. |last4=Buckman |first4=E. |title=Robin Hood : a Collection of All the Ancient Poems, Songs, and Ballads, Now Extant Relative to That Celebrated English Outlaw; to Which Are Prefixed Historical Anecdotes of His Life |edition=2nd |volume=1 |location=London |publisher=John C. Nimmo |date=1887 |url=https://archive.org/details/robinhoodcollect01ritsrich |via=a digitized version on The Internet Archive of a book from the University of California Libraries |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160326201216/https://archive.org/details/robinhoodcollect01ritsrich |archive-date=26 March 2016}}</ref> 'By providing English poets and novelists with a convenient source book, Ritson gave them the opportunity to recreate Robin Hood in their own imagination,'<ref name="Dobson and Taylor 1997, p54">Dobson and Taylor (1997), p.  54.</ref> Ritson's collection includes ''Gest'' and put the Robin Hood and the Potter ballad in print for the first time. The only significant omission was Robin Hood and the Monk which would eventually be printed in 1806. In all, Ritson printed 33 Robin Hood ballads<ref>In his table of contents, he separated the longer ballads from the shorter ballads into two parts; Part 1 containing the longer ballads were numbered I-V while the shorter ballads in Part 2 were numbered I-XXVIII</ref> (and a 34th, now commonly known as [[Robin Hood and the Prince of Aragon]] that he included as the second part of [[Robin Hood Newly Revived]] which he had retitled "Robin Hood and the Stranger").<ref>Ritson, ''Robin Hood: A collection of all the Ancient Poems Songs and Ballads now extant, relative to that celebrated Outlaw''. p. 155, 1820 edition.</ref> Ritson's interpretation of Robin Hood was also influential, having influenced the modern concept of stealing from the rich and giving to the poor as it exists today.<ref>J.C. Holt, Robin Hood, 1982, pp. 184, 185</ref><ref>[https://books.google.com/books?id=VcqTBQAAQBAJ&pg=PR40 Robin Hood, Volume 1], Joseph Ritson</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=https://sixteenthcenturyscholars.wordpress.com/2016/05/11/robin-hood-doctor-who-and-the-emergence-of-the-a-modern-rogue/|title=Robin Hood, Doctor Who, and the emergence of the a modern rogue!|date=11 May 2016|access-date=7 April 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190330045123/https://sixteenthcenturyscholars.wordpress.com/2016/05/11/robin-hood-doctor-who-and-the-emergence-of-the-a-modern-rogue/|archive-date=30 March 2019|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ooqHNSvcXZYC&pg=PA42|title=Myth and National Identity in Nineteenth-Century Britain: The Legends of King Arthur and Robin Hood|first=Stephanie|last=Barczewski|date=2 March 2000|publisher=OUP Oxford|isbn=9780191542732|access-date=7 April 2020|via=Google Books}}</ref> Himself a supporter of the principles of the [[French Revolution]] and admirer of [[Thomas Paine]], Ritson held that Robin Hood was a genuinely historical and heroic character who had stood up against tyranny in the interests of the common people.<ref name="Dobson and Taylor 1997, p54"/> J.&nbsp;C. Holt has been quick to point out, however, that Ritson "began as a [[Jacobitism|Jacobite]] and ended as a [[Jacobins|Jacobin]]," and "certainly reconstructed him [Robin] in the image of a radical."<ref>{{cite book |last1=Holt |first1=J.&nbsp;C. |title=Robin Hood |date=1982 |publisher=Thames and Hudson |location=London |page=185}}</ref>

In his preface to the collection, Ritson assembled an account of Robin Hood's life from the various sources available to him and concludes that Robin Hood was born in around 1160, and thus had been active in the reign of Richard I. He thought that Robin was of aristocratic extraction, with at least 'some pretension' to the title of Earl of Huntingdon, that he was born in an unlocated Nottinghamshire village of Locksley and that his original name was [[Robert Fitzooth]]. Ritson gives the date of Robin Hood's death as 18 November 1247, when he would have been around 87 years old. In copious and informative notes Ritson defends every point of his version of Robin Hood's life.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://archive.org/stream/robinhoodcollect01ritsrich/robinhoodcollect01ritsrich_djvu.txt |title=Robin Hood: a collection of all the ancient poems, songs and ballads, now extant, relative to that celebrated English outlaw |year=1887 |access-date=11 January 2016 |archive-date=25 May 2015 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150525181059/http://archive.org/stream/robinhoodcollect01ritsrich/robinhoodcollect01ritsrich_djvu.txt |url-status=dead }} Retrieved 12 January 2016.</ref> In reaching his conclusion Ritson relies or gives weight to a number of unreliable sources, such as the Robin Hood plays of Anthony Munday and the Sloane Manuscript. Nevertheless, Dobson and Taylor credit Ritson with having 'an incalculable effect in promoting the still continuing quest for the man behind the myth', and note that his work remains an 'indispensable handbook to the outlaw legend even now'.<ref>Dobson and Taylor (1997), pp. 54–55.</ref> Ritson's friend [[Walter Scott]] used Ritson's anthology collection as a source for his picture of Robin Hood in ''[[Ivanhoe]]'', written in 1818, [[Ivanhoe#Lasting influence on the Robin Hood legend|which did much to shape the modern legend]].<ref>Dobson and Taylor (1997), p. 56.</ref>

===Child ballads===

In the decades following the publication of Ritson's book, other ballad collections would occasionally publish stray Robin Hood ballads Ritson had missed. In 1806, [[Robert Jamieson (antiquary)|Robert Jamieson]] published the earliest known Robin Hood ballad, ''[[Robin Hood and the Monk]]'' in Volume II of his ''Popular Ballads and Songs From Tradition''. In 1846, the [[Percy Society]] included [[The Bold Pedlar and Robin Hood]] in its collection, ''Ancient Poems, Ballads, and Songs of the Peasantry of England''. In 1850, [[John Mathew Gutch]] published his own collection of Robin Hood ballads, ''Robin Hood Garlands and Ballads, with the tale of the lytell Geste'', that in addition to all of Ritson's collection, also included [[Robin Hood and the Pedlars]] and [[Robin Hood and the Scotchman]].

In 1858, [[Francis James Child]] published his ''English and Scottish Ballads'' which includes a volume grouping all the Robin Hood ballads in one volume, including all the ballads published by Ritson, the four stray ballads published since then, as well as some ballads that either mentioned Robin Hood by name or featured characters named Robin Hood but were not traditional Robin Hood stories. For his more scholarly work, ''[[The English and Scottish Popular Ballads]]'', in his volume dedicated to the Robin Hood ballads, published in 1888, Child removed the ballads from his earlier work that were not traditional Robin Hood stories, gave the ballad Ritson titled ''Robin Hood and the Stranger'' back its original published title [[Robin Hood Newly Revived]], and separated what Ritson had printed as the second part of ''Robin Hood and the Stranger'' as its own separate ballad, Robin Hood and the Prince of Aragon. He also included alternate versions of ballads that had distinct, alternate versions. He numbered these 38 Robin Hood ballads among the 305 ballads in his collection as Child Ballads Nos. 117–154, which is how they are often referenced in scholarly works.

===19th century===
[[File:The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood, 1 Title page.png|thumb|The title page of an edition of [[Howard Pyle]]'s 1883 novel, ''The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood'']]

In the 19th century, the Robin Hood legend was first specifically adapted for children. Children's editions of the garlands were produced, and in 1820 a children's edition of Ritson's ''Robin Hood'' collection was published. Children's novels began to appear shortly thereafter. It is not that children did not read Robin Hood stories before, but this is the first appearance of a Robin Hood literature specifically aimed at them.<ref>Dobson and Taylor (1997), pp. 58ff.</ref> A very influential example of these children's novels was [[Pierce Egan the Younger]]'s ''Robin Hood and Little John'' (1840).<ref>Dobson and Taylor (1997), p. 47.</ref><ref name="Hood">Egan, Pierce the Younger (1846). ''Robin Hood and Little John or The Merry Men of Sherwood Forest.'' Pub. George Peirce, London.</ref> This was adapted into French by [[Alexandre Dumas fils|Alexandre Dumas]] in ''Le Prince des Voleurs'' (1872) and ''Robin Hood Le Proscrit'' (1873). Egan made Robin Hood of noble birth but raised by the forestor Gilbert Hood.

Another very popular version for children was [[Howard Pyle]]'s ''[[The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood]]'', which influenced accounts of Robin Hood through the 20th century.<ref name="development">[http://www.lib.rochester.edu/camelot/rh/RH%20Exhibit/Intro.htm "Robin Hood: Development of a Popular Hero] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081207053301/http://www.lib.rochester.edu/camelot/rh/RH%20Exhibit/Intro.htm|date=7 December 2008}}". From The [[Robin Hood Project]] at the [[University of Rochester]]. Retrieved 22 November 2008.</ref> Pyle's version firmly stamps Robin as a staunch philanthropist, a man who takes from the rich to give to the poor. Nevertheless, the adventures are still more local than national in scope: while King Richard's participation in the Crusades is mentioned in passing, Robin takes no stand against Prince John and plays no part in raising the ransom to free Richard. These developments are part of the 20th-century Robin Hood myth. Pyle's Robin Hood is a yeoman and not an aristocrat.

The idea of Robin Hood as a high-minded [[Anglo-Saxons|Saxon]] fighting [[Normans|Norman]] lords also originates in the 19th century. The most notable contributions to this idea of Robin are [[Jacques Nicolas Augustin Thierry]]'s ''{{lang|fr|Histoire de la [[Norman conquest of England|Conquête de l'Angleterre par les Normands]]}}'' (1825) and Sir [[Walter Scott]]'s ''Ivanhoe'' (1819). In this last work in particular, the modern Robin Hood—'King of Outlaws and prince of good fellows!' as Richard the Lionheart calls him—makes his debut.<ref name="boldoutlaw.com">Allen W. Wright, [http://www.boldoutlaw.com/robages/robages7.html "Wolfshead through the Ages Revolutions and Romanticism"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170623175842/http://www.boldoutlaw.com/robages/robages7.html |date=23 June 2017 }}</ref>

===Forresters Manuscript===
In 1993, a previously unknown manuscript of 21 Robin Hood ballads (including two versions of "[[The Jolly Pinder of Wakefield]]") turned up in an auction house and eventually wound up in the [[British Library]]. Called The [[Forresters Manuscript]], after the first and last ballads which are both titled Robin Hood and the Forresters, it was published in 1998 as ''Robin Hood: The Forresters Manuscript''. It appears to have been written in the 1670s.<ref>Robin Hood: The Forresters Manuscript, p. xxiii</ref> While all the ballads in the manuscript had already been known and published during the 17th and 18th centuries (although most of the ballads in the manuscript have different titles than ones they have listed under the Child Ballads), 13 of the ballads in Forresters are noticeably different from how they appear in the broadsides and garlands. Nine of these ballads are significantly longer and more elaborate than the versions of the same ballads found in the broadsides and garlands. For four of these ballads, the Forresters Manuscript versions are the earliest known versions.

===20th century onwards===
[[File:Robin Hood Memorial.jpg|thumb|Statue of Robin Hood near [[Nottingham Castle]] by [[James Woodford]], 1951]]{{See also|List of films and television series featuring Robin Hood}}
The 20th century grafted still further details on to the original legends. The 1938 film ''[[The Adventures of Robin Hood]]'', starring [[Errol Flynn]] and [[Olivia de Havilland]], portrays Robin as a hero on a national scale, leading the oppressed Saxons in revolt against their Norman overlords while Richard the Lionheart fought in the Crusades; this movie established itself so definitively that many studios resorted to movies about his son (invented for that purpose) rather than compete with the image of this one.<ref name="Wolfshead Ages">Allen W. Wright, "[http://www.boldoutlaw.com/robages/robages9.html Wolfshead through the Ages Films and Fantasy] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070202223443/http://www.boldoutlaw.com/robages/robages9.html |date=2 February 2007 }}"</ref>

[[File:Robin Hood - geograph.org.uk - 4166787.jpg|thumb|Statue of Robin Hood in [[Sherwood Forest]]]]

In 1953 a Republican member of the Indiana Textbook Commission called for a ban of Robin Hood from all Indiana school books for its alleged communist connotations.<ref>{{cite news |last1=Eschner |first1=Kat |title=Students Allied Themselves With Robin Hood During This Anti-McCarthyism Movement |url=https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/students-allied-themselves-robin-hood-during-1950s-anti-mccarthyism-movement-180967156/ |access-date=18 December 2019 |work=Smithsonian.com |date=13 November 2017 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191218063155/https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/students-allied-themselves-robin-hood-during-1950s-anti-mccarthyism-movement-180967156/ |archive-date=18 December 2019 |url-status=live }}</ref> This proposal prompted a short-lived college protest against [[McCarthyism]] and [[book censorship in the United States]] that was launched on the [[Indiana University Bloomington]] campus and within a course of weeks had grown into a nationwide campus movement, known as the [[Green Feather Movement]].<ref>{{cite web |url=https://indianahistory.org/wp-content/uploads/the-green-feather-movement-papers.pdf |title=The Green Feather Movement Papers, 1953–1954, 2005 |date=16 April 2014 |editor-last= Clark |editor-first=Kathleen&nbsp;S.|publisher=[[Indiana Historical Society]] |access-date=2 August 2023}}</ref>

In the 1973 animated [[Disney]] film ''[[Robin Hood (1973 film)|Robin Hood]]'', the title character is portrayed as an [[anthropomorphic]] fox voiced by [[Brian Bedford]]. Years before ''Robin Hood'' had even entered production, Disney had considered doing a project on [[Reynard the Fox]]; however, due to concerns that Reynard was unsuitable as a hero, animator [[Ken Anderson (animator)|Ken Anderson]] adapted some elements from Reynard into the Disney character [[Robin Hood (Disney character)|Robin Hood]], making him a fox.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://io9.gizmodo.com/the-inspiration-for-disneys-robin-hood-wasnt-actually-r-1637183737|title=The Inspiration For Disney's Robin Hood Wasn't Actually Robin Hood|first=Andrew&nbsp;E. |last=Larsen |date=20 September 2014 |access-date=13 August 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160810163605/http://io9.gizmodo.com/the-inspiration-for-disneys-robin-hood-wasnt-actually-r-1637183737|archive-date=10 August 2016|url-status=live}}</ref>

The 1976 British-American film ''[[Robin and Marian]]'', starring [[Sean Connery]] as Robin Hood and [[Audrey Hepburn]] as Maid Marian, portrays the figures in later years after Robin has returned from service with Richard the Lionheart in a foreign crusade and Marian has gone into seclusion in a nunnery. This is the first in popular culture to portray King Richard as less than perfect.

Since the 1980s, it has become commonplace to include a [[Saracen]] ([[Arab]]/[[Muslim]]) among the Merry Men, a trend that began with the character Nasir in the 1984 ITV ''[[Robin of Sherwood]]'' television series. Later versions of the story have followed suit: a version of Nasir appears in the 1991 movie ''[[Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves]]'' (Azeem) and the 2006 [[BBC]] TV series ''[[Robin Hood (2006 TV series)|Robin Hood]]'' (Djaq).<ref name="Wolfshead Ages"/> Spoofs have also followed this trend, with the 1990s BBC sitcom ''[[Maid Marian and her Merry Men]]'' parodying the Moorish character with Barrington, a [[Rastafarian]] [[hip-hop|rapper]] played by [[Danny John-Jules]],<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0096642/|title=Maid Marian and Her Merry Men|date=16 November 1989|publisher=IMDb|access-date=27 January 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180727033441/https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0096642/|archive-date=27 July 2018|url-status=live}}</ref> and [[Mel Brooks]] comedy ''[[Robin Hood: Men in Tights]]'' featuring [[Isaac Hayes]] as Asneeze and [[Dave Chappelle]] as his son Ahchoo. The 2018 adaptation ''[[Robin Hood (2018 film)|Robin Hood]]'' portrays the character of Little John as a Muslim named Yahya, played by [[Jamie Foxx]].

Between 1963 and 1966, [[Office de Radiodiffusion Télévision Française|French television]] broadcast a medievalist series entitled ''[[Thierry La Fronde]]'' (''Thierry the Sling''). This successful series, which was also shown in Canada, Poland (''Thierry Śmiałek''), Australia (''The King's Outlaw''), and the Netherlands (''Thierry de Slingeraar''), transposes the English Robin Hood narrative into [[France in the Middle Ages|late medieval France]] during the [[Hundred Years' War]].<ref>See Richard Utz, "Robin Hood, Frenched", in: Medieval Afterlives in Popular Culture, ed. by Gail Ashton and Daniel T. Kline (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012): 145–58.</ref> The original ballads and plays, including the early medieval poems and the latter broadside ballads and garlands have been edited and translated for the first time in French in 2017<ref>{{cite book|last=Fruoco|first=Jonathan|title=Les Faits et Gestes de Robin des Bois. Poèmes, ballades et saynètes|publisher=UGA Editions|year=2017|isbn=9782377470136}}</ref> by [[Jonathan Fruoco]]. Until then, the texts had been unavailable in France.

==Historicity==
The historicity of Robin Hood has been debated for centuries. A difficulty with any such historical research is that Robert was a very common [[given name]] in [[Britain in the Middle Ages|medieval England]], and 'Robin' (or Robyn) was its very common [[diminutive]], especially in the 13th century;<ref>''Oxford Dictionary of Christian Names'', EG Withycombe, 1950.</ref> it is a French [[hypocorism]],<ref>[[Albert Dauzat]], ''Dictionnaire étymologique des noms de familles et prénoms de France'', Librairie Larousse, Paris, 1980, Nouvelle édition revue et commentée par [[Marie-Thérèse Morlet]], p. 523b.</ref> already mentioned in the ''[[Roman de Renart]]'' in the 12th century. The surname Hood (by any spelling) was also fairly common because it referred either to a hooder, who was a maker of [[Hood (headgear)|hoods]], or alternatively to somebody who wore a hood as a head covering. It is therefore unsurprising that medieval records mention a number of people called "Robert Hood" or "Robin Hood", some of whom are known criminals.

Another view on the origin of the name is expressed in the [[Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition|1911 ''Encyclopædia Britannica'']] which remarks that "hood" was a common dialectical form of "wood" (compare [[Dutch language|Dutch]] {{Lang|nl|hout}}, {{IPA|hʌut}}, also meaning "wood"), and that the outlaw's name has been given as "Robin Wood".<ref name=LTK/> There are a number of references to Robin Hood as Robin Wood, or Whood, or Whod, from the 16th and 17th centuries. The earliest recorded example, in connection with May games in [[Somerset]], dates from 1518.<ref>Dobson and Taylor, p. 12, 39n, and chapter on place-names.</ref>

===Early references===
[[File:Robin shoots with sir Guy by Louis Rhead 1912.png|thumb|upright|"Robin shoots with Sir Guy" by [[Louis Rhead]]]]

The oldest references to Robin Hood are not historical records or even ballads recounting his exploits, but hints and allusions found in various works. From 1261 onward, the names "Robinhood", "Robehod", or "Robbehod" occur in the rolls of several English justices as nicknames or descriptions of malefactors. The majority of these references date from the late 13th century. Between 1261 and 1300, there are at least eight references to "Rabunhod" in various regions across England, from [[Berkshire]] in the south to [[York]] in the north.<ref name=Holt>Holt</ref>

Leaving aside the reference to the "rhymes" of Robin Hood in the poem ''[[Piers Plowman]]'' in the 1370s,<ref name="Stapleton1899">{{cite book|first=Alfred |last=Stapleton|title=Robin Hood: the Question of His Existence Discussed, More Particularly from a Nottinghamshire Point of View|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=1_EVAAAAYAAJ&pg=PT17|year=1899|publisher=Sissons and son|pages=17–}}</ref><ref name="Davis2016">{{cite book|first=John Paul |last=Davis|title=Robin Hood: The Unknown Templar|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=DebSDAAAQBAJ&pg=PT21|date=20 July 2016|publisher=Peter Owen Publishers|isbn=978-0-7206-1865-5|pages=21–}}</ref> and the scattered mentions of his "tales and songs" in various religious tracts dating to the early 15th century,<ref name="Dean 1991"/><ref name="Blackwood 2018, p.59"/><ref name="James 2019, p.204"/> the first mention of a quasi-historical Robin Hood is given in [[Andrew of Wyntoun]]'s ''Orygynale Chronicle'', written in about 1420. The following lines occur with little contextualisation under the year 1283:

{{Poem quote|Lytil Jhon and Robyne Hude
Wayth-men ware commendyd gude
In [[Inglewood Forest|Yngil-wode]] and Barnysdale
Thai oysyd all this tyme thare trawale.<ref>{{cite book|title=The Orygynale Cronykil Of Scotland. By Androw of Wyntoun|volume=2|page=263|first=Wyntown|last=Alexander|date=1872|editor1-last= Laing|editor1-first= David|publisher=Edmonston and Douglas|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=JKIpPL53Yy0C}}</ref>
}}

In a petition presented to [[Parliament of England|Parliament]] in 1439, the name is used to describe an itinerant felon. The petition cites one Piers Venables of Aston, Derbyshire,{{efn|There are three settlements in Derbyshire called Aston: [[Aston, Derbyshire Dales]], [[Aston, High Peak]] and [[Aston-on-Trent]]. It is unclear which one this was.}} "who having no liflode, ne sufficeante of goodes, gadered and assembled unto him many misdoers, beynge of his clothynge, and, in manere of insurrection, wente into the wodes in that countrie, like as it hadde be Robyn Hude and his meyne."<ref>''Rot. Parl.'' v. 16.</ref>

The next historical description of Robin Hood is a statement in the ''[[Scotichronicon]]'', composed by [[John of Fordun]] between 1377 and 1384 and revised by [[Walter Bower]] in about 1440. Among Bower's many interpolations is a passage that directly refers to Robin. It is inserted after Fordun's account of the defeat of [[Simon de Montfort, 6th Earl of Leicester|Simon de Montfort]] and the punishment of his adherents, and is entered under the year 1266 in Bower's account. Robin is represented as a fighter for de Montfort's cause.<ref>Dobson and Taylor, p. 5.</ref> This was in fact true of the historical outlaw of Sherwood Forest [[Roger Godberd]], whose points of similarity to the Robin Hood of the ballads have often been noted.<ref>J. R. Maddicott, "Sir Edward the First and the Lessons of Baronial Reform" in Coss and Loyd ed, ''Thirteenth century England:1 Proceedings of the Newcastle Upon Tyne Conference 1985'', Boydell and Brewer, p. 2.</ref><ref>Maurice Hugh Keen ''The Outlaws of Medieval England'' (1987), Routledge.</ref>

<blockquote>Then arose the famous murderer, Robert Hood, as well as Little John, together with their accomplices from among the disinherited, whom the foolish populace are so inordinately fond of celebrating both in tragedies and comedies, and about whom they are delighted to hear the jesters and minstrels sing above all other ballads.<ref>{{cite book|title=Scotichronicon|volume=III|page=41|translator-last=Jones|translator-first=A.&nbsp;I.|first=Walter|last=Bower|date=1440|editor1-last=Knight|editor1-first=Stephen|editor2-last=Ohlgren|editor2-first=Thomas&nbsp;H.|publisher=Medieval Institute Publications|publication-date=1997|url=https://d.lib.rochester.edu/teams/text/bower-continuation-of-scotichronicon|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190516110934/https://d.lib.rochester.edu/teams/text/bower-continuation-of-scotichronicon|archive-date=16 May 2019|access-date=May 5, 2020|url-status=live}}</ref></blockquote>

The word translated here as 'murderer' is the Latin ''sicarius'' (literally 'dagger-man' but actually meaning, in classical Latin, 'assassin' or 'murderer'), from the Latin ''sica'' for 'dagger', and descends from its use to describe the [[Sicarii]], assassins operating in [[Roman Judea]]. Bower goes on to relate an anecdote about Robin Hood in which he refuses to flee from his enemies while hearing [[Mass (liturgy)|Mass]] in the greenwood, and then gains a surprise victory over them, apparently as a reward for his piety; the mention of "tragedies" suggests that some form of the tale relating his death, as per ''A Gest of Robyn Hode'', might have been in currency already.<ref>Passage quoted and commented on in Stephen Knights, ''Robin Hood; A Mythic Biography'', Cornell University Press (2003), p. 5.</ref>

Another reference, discovered by Julian Luxford in 2009, appears in the margin of the "[[Polychronicon]]" in the [[Eton College]] library. Written around 1460 by a monk in Latin, it says:

<blockquote>Around this time [i.e., reign of Edward I], according to popular opinion, a certain outlaw named Robin Hood, with his accomplices, infested Sherwood and other law-abiding areas of England with continuous robberies.<ref>{{cite journal |last=Luxford |first=Julian&nbsp;M. |year=2009 |title=An English chronicle entry on Robin Hood |journal=[[Journal of Medieval History]] |volume=35 |issue=1 |pages=70–76 |doi=10.1016/j.jmedhist.2009.01.002 |s2cid=159481033  | issn=0304-4181 }}</ref></blockquote>

Following this, [[John Major (philosopher)|John Major]] mentions Robin Hood within his ''Historia Majoris Britanniæ'' (1521), casting him in a positive light by mentioning his and his followers' aversion to bloodshed and ethos of only robbing the wealthy; Major also fixed his ''[[floruit]]'' not to the mid-13th century but the reigns of Richard I and his brother John.<ref name="Robin Hood page 63"/> Richard Grafton in his ''Chronicle at Large'' (1569) goes further when discussing Major's description of "Robert Hood", identifying him for the first time as a member of the gentry, albeit possibly "being of a base stock and linaege, was for his manhood and chivalry advanced to the noble dignity of an Earl" and not the yeomanry, foreshadowing Anthony Munday's casting of him as the dispossessed Earl of Huntingdon.<ref name="Knight and Ohlgren, 1997"/> The name nevertheless still had a reputation of sedition and treachery in 1605, when [[Guy Fawkes]] and his associates were branded "Robin Hoods" by [[Robert Cecil, 1st Earl of Salisbury|Robert Cecil]]. In 1644, jurist [[Edward Coke]] described Robin Hood as a historical figure who had operated in the reign of King Richard I around Yorkshire; he interpreted the contemporary term "roberdsmen" (outlaws) as meaning followers of Robin Hood.<ref>{{cite book|title=The Third Part of the Institutes of the Laws of England|first=Edward|last=Coke|date=1644|chapter=90, Against Roberdsmen}}</ref>

===Robert Hod of York===
The earliest known legal records mentioning a person called Robin Hood (Robert Hod) are from 1226, found in the York [[Assizes]], when that person's goods, worth 32 shillings and 6 pence, were confiscated and he became an outlaw. Robert Hod owed the money to St. Peter's in York. The following year, he was called "Hobbehod", and also came to known as "Robert Hood". Robert Hod of York is the only early Robin Hood known to have been an outlaw. In 1936, L.V.D. Owen floated the idea that Robin Hood might be identified with an outlawed Robert Hood, or Hod, or Hobbehod, all apparently the same man, referred to in nine successive Yorkshire [[Pipe Rolls]] between 1226 and 1234.<ref>Crook, David "The Sheriff of Nottingham and Robin Hood: The Genesis of the Legend?" In Peter R. Coss, S.D. Lloyd, ed. ''Thirteenth Century England'' University of Newcastle (1999).</ref><ref>[http://aalt.law.uh.edu/AALT4/H3/E372no70/bE372no70dorses/IMG_7060.htm E372/70, rot. 1d] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110720084638/http://aalt.law.uh.edu/AALT4/H3/E372no70/bE372no70dorses/IMG_7060.htm |date=20 July 2011 }}, 12 lines from bottom.</ref> There is no evidence however that this Robert Hood, although an outlaw, was also a bandit.<ref>Dobson and Taylor, p. xvii.</ref>

===Robert and John Deyville===
Historian Oscar de Ville discusses the careers of John Deyville and his brother Robert, along with their kinsmen Jocelin and Adam, during the [[Second Barons' War]], specifically their activities after the [[Battle of Evesham]]. John Deyville was granted authority by the faction led by [[Simon de Montfort, 6th Earl of Leicester]] over [[York Castle]] and the Northern Forests during the war in which they sought refuge after Evesham. John, along with his relatives, led the remaining rebel faction on the [[Isle of Ely]] following the [[Dictum of Kenilworth]].<ref>{{cite journal |last=de Ville |first=Oscar |year=1998 |title=John Deyville: A Neglected Rebel |journal=Northern History|volume=34 |issue=1 |pages=17–40 |doi=10.1179/007817298790178420}}</ref> De Ville connects their presence there with Bower's mention of "Robert Hood" during the aftermath of Evesham in his annotations to the ''Scotichronicon''.

While John was eventually pardoned and continued his career until 1290, his kinsmen are no longer mentioned by historical records after the events surrounding their resistance at Ely, and de Ville speculates that Robert remained an outlaw. Other exploits forming the inspiration for Robin Hood include their properties in Barnsdale, John's settlement of a mortgage worth £400 paralleling Robin Hood's charity of identical value to Sir [[Richard at the Lee]], relationship with Sir Richard Foliot, a possible inspiration for the former figure, and ownership of a fortified home at Hood Hill, near [[Kilburn, North Yorkshire]]. The last of these is suggested to be the inspiration for Robin Hood's second name as opposed to the more common theory of a head covering.<ref>{{cite journal |last=de Ville |first=Oscar |year=1999 |title=The Deyvilles and the Genesis of the Robin Hood Legend |journal=Nottingham Medieval Studies|volume=43 |pages=90–109 |doi=10.1484/J.NMS.3.295}}</ref> Perhaps not coincidentally, a "Robertus Hod" is mentioned in records among the holdouts at Ely.<ref>Rennison, Nick. ''[https://books.google.com/books?id=5fWEAAAAQBAJ Robin Hood: Myth, History and Culture]'' (Oldcastle Books, 2012).</ref>

Although de Ville does not explicitly connect John and Robert Deyville to Robin Hood, he discusses these parallels in detail and suggests that they formed prototypes for this ideal of heroic outlawry during the tumultuous reign of Henry III's grandson and Edward I's son, [[Edward II of England]].<ref>de Ville 1999, pp. 108–09</ref>

===Roger Godberd===
[[David Baldwin (historian)|David Baldwin]] identifies Robin Hood with the historical outlaw [[Roger Godberd]], who was a die-hard supporter of Simon de Montfort, which would place Robin Hood around the 1260s.<ref name=BBC>See BBC website. Retrieved 19 August 2008 on the Godberd theory. "[http://www.bbc.co.uk/nottingham/content/articles/2008/04/30/real_robin_hood_feature.shtml The Real Robin Hood] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20151203172304/http://www.bbc.co.uk/nottingham/content/articles/2008/04/30/real_robin_hood_feature.shtml |date=3 December 2015 }}".</ref><ref name="ODNB">{{cite ODNB|first=J.&nbsp;C.|last=Holt|title=Hood, Robin|id=13676|volume=27|page=928}}</ref> There are certainly parallels between Godberd's career and that of Robin Hood as he appears in ''Gest''. [[John Maddicott]] has called Godberd "that prototype Robin Hood".<ref>J.R. Maddicott, "Edward the First and the Lessons of Baronial Reform" in Coss and Loyd ed, ''Thirteenth century England: 1 Proceedings of the Newcastle Upon Tyne Conference 1985'', Boydell and Brewer, p. 2.</ref> Some problems with this theory are that there is no evidence that Godberd was ever known as Robin Hood and no sign in the early Robin Hood ballads of the specific concerns of de Montfort's revolt.<ref name=DATI>Dobson and Taylor, introduction.</ref>

===Robin Hood of Wakefield===
The 19th century antiquarian [[Joseph Hunter (antiquarian)|Joseph Hunter]] believed that Robin Hood had inhabited the forests of Yorkshire during the early decades of the 14th century. Hunter points to two men whom, believing them to be the same person, he identified with the legendary outlaw:

# Robert Hood who is documented as having lived in [[Wakefield]] at the start of the 14th century.
# "Robyn Hode" who is recorded as being employed by Edward II during 1323.

Hunter developed a fairly detailed theory implying that Robert Hood had been an adherent of the rebel [[Thomas, 2nd Earl of Lancaster|Earl of Lancaster]], who was defeated by Edward II at the [[Battle of Boroughbridge]] in 1322. According to this theory, Robert Hood was thereafter pardoned and employed as a bodyguard by King Edward, and in consequence he appears in the 1323 court roll under the name of "Robyn Hode". Hunter's theory has long been recognised to have serious problems, one of the most serious being that recent research has shown that Hunter's Robyn Hood had been employed by the king before he appeared in the 1323 court roll, thus casting doubt on this Robyn Hood's supposed earlier career as outlaw and rebel.<ref>Hunter, Joseph, "Robin Hood", in ''Robin Hood: An Anthology of Scholarship and Criticism'', ed. by Stephen Knight (Cambridge: D.S. Brewer, 1999) pp. 187–96. Holt, pp.&nbsp;75–76, summarised in Dobson and Taylor, p. xvii.</ref>

===Alias===
It has long been suggested, notably by [[John Maddicott]], that "Robin Hood" was a [[Stock character|stock alias]] used by thieves.<ref>Dobson and Taylor, pp. xxi–xxii.</ref> What appears to be the first known example of "Robin Hood" as a stock name for an outlaw dates to 1262 in [[Berkshire]], where the surname "Robehod" was applied to a man apparently because he had been outlawed.<ref>D. Crook ''English Historical Review'' XCIX (1984) pp. 530–34; discussed in Dobson and Taylor, pp. xi–xxii.</ref> This could suggest two main possibilities: either that an early form of the Robin Hood legend was already well established in the mid-13th century; or that the name "Robin Hood" preceded the outlaw hero that we know; so that the "Robin Hood" of legend was so called because that was seen as an appropriate name for an outlaw.

==Mythology==
There is at present little or no scholarly support for the view that tales of Robin Hood have stemmed from mythology or folklore, from fairies or other mythological origins, any such associations being regarded as later development.<ref>Holt, p. 55.</ref><ref>Dobson and Taylor (1997), p. 63.</ref> It was once a popular view, however.<ref name=LTK>A number of such theories are mentioned at {{cite EB1911 |wstitle=Robin Hood |volume=23|page=420–21}}.</ref> The "mythological theory" dates back at least to 1584, when [[Reginald Scot]] identified Robin Hood with the Germanic goblin "Hudgin" or [[Hodekin]] and associated him with the fairy [[Puck (folklore)|Robin Goodfellow]].<ref>Reginald Scot "Discourse upon divels and spirits" Chapter 21, quoted in Charles P. G. Scott "The Devil and His Imps: An Etymological Investigation" p. 129 ''Transactions of the American Philological Association'' (1869–1896) Vol. 26, (1895), pp. 79–146 Published by: The Johns Hopkins University Press {{JSTOR|2935696}} 2004, ''Imagining Robin Hood: The Late-Medieval Stories in Historical Context'', Routledge {{ISBN|0-415-22308-3}}.</ref> 21st century historian [[Maurice Keen]]<ref>The Outlaws of Medieval England Appendix 1, 1987, Routledge, {{ISBN|0-7102-1203-8}}.</ref> provides a brief summary and useful critique of the evidence for the view Robin Hood had mythological origins. While the outlaw often shows great skill in archery, swordplay and disguise, his feats are no more exaggerated than those of characters in other ballads, such as ''[[Kinmont Willie Armstrong|Kinmont Willie]]'', which were based on historical events.<ref>Holt, p. 57.</ref>

Robin Hood has also been claimed for the pagan [[witch-cult]] supposed by [[Margaret Murray]] to have existed in medieval Europe, and his anti-clericalism and [[Veneration of Mary in the Catholic Church|Marianism]] interpreted in this light.<ref>Robert Graves ''English and Scottish Ballads''. London: William Heinemann, 1957; New York: Macmillan, 1957. See, in particular, Graves' notes to his reconstruction of [[Robin Hood's Death]].</ref> The existence of the witch cult as proposed by Murray is now generally discredited.

==Associated locations==

===Sherwood Forest===
[[File:Major Oak (9492).jpg|thumb|The [[Major Oak]] in [[Sherwood Forest]]]]
The early ballads link Robin Hood to identifiable real places. In popular culture, Robin Hood and his band of Merry Men are portrayed as living in [[Sherwood Forest]], in [[Nottinghamshire]].<ref>{{cite web|url=http://sherwoodforest.org.uk/|title=Home – The Sherwood Forest Trust Nottinghamshire|work=The Sherwood Forest Trust Nottinghamshire|access-date=11 February 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190824035538/http://sherwoodforest.org.uk/|archive-date=24 August 2019|url-status=live}}</ref> Notably, the ''Lincoln Cathedral Manuscript'', which is the first officially recorded Robin Hood song (dating from approximately 1420), makes an explicit reference to the outlaw that states that "Robyn hode in scherewode stod".<ref>Thomas H. Ohlgren, ''Robin Hood: The Early Poems, 1465–1560, Texts, Contexts and Ideology'' (Newark: The University of Delaware Press, 2007) p. 18.</ref> In a similar fashion, a monk of [[Witham Priory]] (1460) suggested that the archer had 'infested shirwode'. His chronicle entry reads: {{blockquote|Around this time, according to popular opinion, a certain outlaw named Robin Hood, with his accomplices, infested Sherwood and other law-abiding areas of England with continuous robberies'.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Luxford |first1=Julian&nbsp;M. |title=An English Chronicle Entry on Robin Hood |journal=Journal of Medieval History |year=2009 |volume=35 |issue=1 |pages=70–76 |doi=10.1016/j.jmedhist.2009.01.002 |s2cid=159481033 }}</ref>}}

===Nottinghamshire===
[[File:County Flag of Nottinghamshire.svg|thumb|Robin Hood has been depicted on Nottinghamshire's [[Flag of Nottinghamshire|county flag]] since 2011.<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-nottinghamshire-13337196|title=Nottinghamshire flag design unveiled|date=9 May 2011|accessdate=1 November 2023|work=BBC News}}</ref>]]

Specific sites in the county of Nottinghamshire directly linked to the Robin Hood legend include [[Robin Hood's Well]], near Newstead Abbey (within the boundaries of Sherwood Forest), the Church of St. Mary in the village of [[Edwinstowe]] and most famously of all, the [[Major Oak]] also in the village of Edwinstowe.<ref name=EDC>{{cite web |url=http://www.edwinstowe.co.uk/robin_hood/index.htm |publisher=Edwinstowe Parish Council |title=Edwinstowe |access-date=2 August 2009 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090724193855/http://www.edwinstowe.co.uk/robin_hood/index.htm |archive-date=24 July 2009 }}</ref> The Major Oak, which resides in the heart of Sherwood Forest, is popularly believed to have been used by the Merry Men as a hide-out. Dendrologists have contradicted this claim by estimating the tree's true age at around 800 years; it would have been relatively a sapling in Robin's time, at best.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.bbc.co.uk/nottingham/360/where_to_go/sherwood_forest/major_oak_interior.shtml|title=BBC – Nottingham 360 Images – Where to go : Inside the Major Oak|publisher=BBC|access-date=21 July 2014|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140814054925/http://www.bbc.co.uk/nottingham/360/where_to_go/sherwood_forest/major_oak_interior.shtml|archive-date=14 August 2014|url-status=live}}</ref>

===Yorkshire===
Nottinghamshire's claim to Robin Hood's heritage is disputed, with Yorkists staking a claim to the outlaw. In demonstrating Yorkshire's Robin Hood heritage, historian [[J. C. Holt]] drew attention to the fact that although Sherwood Forest is mentioned in ''Robin Hood and the Monk'', there is little information about the topography of the region, and thus suggested that Robin Hood was drawn to Nottinghamshire through his interactions with the city's sheriff.<ref>Holt, ''Robin Hood'' pp. 90–91.</ref> Moreover, linguist Lister Matheson has observed that the language of ''A'' ''Gest of Robyn Hode'' is written in a definite northern dialect, probably that of Yorkshire.<ref>Matheson, Lister, "The Dialects and Language of Selected Robin Hood Poems", in ''Robin Hood: The Early Poems, 1465–1560 Texts, Contexts and Ideology'' ed. by Thomas Ohlgren (Delaware: University of Delaware Press, 2007 pp. 189–210).</ref> In consequence, it seems probable that the Robin Hood legend actually originates from the county of Yorkshire. Robin Hood's Yorkshire origins are generally accepted by historians.<ref>Bellamy, John, ''Robin Hood: An Historical Enquiry'' (London: Croom Helm, 1985). Bradbury, Jim, ''Robin Hood'' (Stroud: Amberley Publishing: 2010). Dobson, R.B., "The Genesis of a Popular Hero" in ''Robin Hood in Popular Culture: Violence, Transgression and Justice'', ed. by [[Thomas Hahn]] (Woodbridge: D.S. Brewer, 2000) pp. 61–77. Keen, Maurice, ''The Outlaws of Medieval Legend'', 2nd edn (London and Henley: Routledge and Kegan Paul; Toronto and Buffalo: University of Toronto Press, 1977). Maddicot, J.R., Simon De Montfort (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994).</ref> The backdrop of [[St Mary's Abbey, York]] plays a central role in ''Gest'' as the poor knight whom Robin aids owes money to the abbot.

===Barnsdale===
[[File:Wentbridge Robin Hood blue plaque (cropped).jpg|thumb|left|[[Blue Plaque]] commemorating Wentbridge's Robin Hood connections]]
A tradition dating back at least to the end of the 16th century gives Robin Hood's birthplace as [[Loxley, South Yorkshire|Loxley]], [[Sheffield]], in South Yorkshire. The original ballads set events in the medieval forest of [[Barnsdale]]. Barnsdale was a wooded area covering an expanse of no more than 30 square miles, ranging six miles from north to south, with the [[River Went]] at [[Wentbridge]] near [[Pontefract]] forming its northern boundary and the villages of [[Skelbrooke]] and [[Hampole]] forming the southernmost region. From east to west the forest extended about five miles, from [[Askern]] on the east to [[Badsworth]] in the west.<ref>Bradbury, p. 180.</ref> During the medieval age Wentbridge was sometimes locally referred to by the name of Barnsdale because it was the predominant settlement in the forest.<ref>Dr Eric Houlder, PontArch Archaeological Society.</ref> Wentbridge is mentioned in ''Robin Hood and the Potter'', which reads, "Y mete hem bot at Went breg,' syde Lyttyl John". And, while Wentbridge is not directly named in ''A Gest of Robyn Hode'', the poem does appear to make a cryptic reference to the locality by depicting a poor knight explaining to Robin Hood that he 'went at a bridge' where there was wrestling'.<ref>''The Gest'', stanza 135, p. 88.</ref> A commemorative [[blue plaque]] has been placed on the bridge that crosses the River Went by Wakefield City Council. 

===Saylis===
[[File:The site of the Saylis at Wentbridge.jpg|thumb|The site of the Saylis at [[Wentbridge]]]]

The ''Gest'' makes a specific reference to the Saylis at Wentbridge. Credit is due to Joseph Hunter, who correctly identified the site of the Saylis.<ref>Joseph Hunter, "The Great Hero of the Ancient Minstrelsy of England", ''Critical and Historical Tracts'', 4 (1852) (pp. 15–16).</ref> From this location it was once possible to look out over the Went Valley and the [[Great North Road (Great Britain)|Great North Road]]. The Saylis is recorded as having contributed towards the aid that was granted to [[Edward III]] in 1346–47 for the knighting of the [[Edward the Black Prince|Black Prince]]. An acre of landholding is listed within a [[glebe terrier]] of 1688 relating to [[Kirk Smeaton]], which later came to be called "Sailes Close".<ref>Borthowick Institute of Historical Research, St Anthony's Hall, York: R.III. F I xlvi b; R. III. F.16 xlvi (Kirk Smeaton Glebe Terriers of 7 June 1688 and 10 June 1857).</ref> Dobson and Taylor indicate that such evidence of continuity makes it virtually certain that the Saylis that was so well known to Robin Hood is preserved today as "Sayles Plantation".<ref>Dobson, Dobson and Taylor, p. 22.</ref> It is this location that provides a vital clue to Robin Hood's Yorkshire heritage. 

===Church of Saint Mary Magdalene at Campsall===
[[File:StMaryMagdalenesChurchCampsall(RichardCroft)May2006.jpg|thumb|St Mary Magdalene's church, [[Campsall]], [[South Yorkshire]]]]

Historian John Paul Davis wrote of Robin's connection to the [[St Mary Magdalene, Campsall|Church of Saint Mary Magdalene at Campsall]] in South Yorkshire.<ref name=Davis>Davis, John Paul, ''Robin Hood: The Unknown Templar'' (London: Peter Owen Publishers, 2009) See locations associated with Robin Hood below for further details.</ref> ''A Gest of Robyn Hode'' states that the outlaw built a chapel in Barnsdale that he dedicated to Mary Magdalene:
 
{{Poem quote|I made a chapel in Bernysdale,
That seemly is to se,
It is of Mary Magdaleyne,
And thereto wolde I be.<ref>''The Gest'', Stanza 440 p. 111.</ref>}}

Davis indicates that there is only one church dedicated to Mary Magdalene within what one might reasonably consider to have been the medieval forest of Barnsdale, and that is the church at Campsall. The church was built in the early 12th century by Robert de Lacy, the 2nd Baron of Pontefract.<ref>{{NHLE|num=1151464|desc=Church of St Mary Magdalene|access-date=2 October 2015}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.heritageinspired.org.uk/partner?partner_ID=97|title=Campsall St Mary Magdalene|website=Heritage Inspired|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140530054755/http://www.heritageinspired.org.uk/partner.php?partner_ID=97|archive-date=30 May 2014}}</ref> Local legend suggests that Robin Hood and Maid Marion were married at the church.

===Grave at Kirklees===
[[File:Robin Hood's Grave - geograph.org.uk - 271586.jpg|thumbnail|'Robin Hood's Grave' in the woods near [[Kirklees Priory]] in [[West Yorkshire]]]]

At [[Kirklees Priory]] in West Yorkshire stands an alleged grave with a spurious inscription, which relates to Robin Hood. The ballads relate that before he died, Robin told Little John where to bury him. He shot an arrow from the priory window, and where the arrow landed was to be the site of his grave. ''Gest'' states that the prioress was a relative of Robin's. Robin was ill and staying at the priory where the prioress was supposedly caring for him. However, she betrayed him, his health worsened, and he eventually died there. The inscription on the grave reads,

{{Poem quote|Hear underneath dis laitl stean
Laz robert earl of Huntingtun
Ne'er arcir ver as hie sa geud
An pipl kauld im robin heud
Sick [such] utlawz as he an iz men
Vil england nivr si agen
Obiit 24 kal: Dekembris, 1247
}}

Despite the unconventional spelling, the verse is in [[Modern English]], not the [[Middle English]] of the 13th century. The date is also incorrectly formatted – using the [[Roman calendar]], "24 kal Decembris" would be the 23rd day ''before'' the beginning of December, that is, 8 November.  The tomb probably dates from the late 18th century.<ref name="Roberts">{{cite web
|url=https://lowercalderlegends.wordpress.com/2010/03/20/robin-hoods-grave-kirklees-park-part-one/
|title=Robin Hood's Grave, Kirklees Park
|last=Roberts
|first=Kai
|date=20 March 2010
|website=Ghosts and Legends of the Lower Calder Valley
|access-date=13 June 2016
|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160401041916/https://lowercalderlegends.wordpress.com/2010/03/20/robin-hoods-grave-kirklees-park-part-one/
|archive-date=1 April 2016
|url-status=live
}}</ref> The grave with the inscription is within sight of the ruins of the Kirklees Priory, behind the Three Nuns pub in [[Mirfield]], West Yorkshire. Though local folklore suggests that Robin is buried in the grounds of Kirklees Priory, this theory has now largely been abandoned by historians.

===All Saints' Church at Pontefract===
[[File:The New Church within the Old, All Saints, Bondgate, Pontefract. - geograph.org.uk - 239265.jpg|thumb|The new church within the old. After [[All Saints' Church, Pontefract]] was damaged during the [[English Civil War]], a new brick chapel was built within its ruins in 1967]]

Another theory is that Robin Hood died at Kirkby, Pontefract. [[Michael Drayton]]'s ''[[Poly-Olbion]]'' Song 28 (67–70), published in 1622, speaks of Robin Hood's death and clearly states that the outlaw died at 'Kirkby'.<ref>David Hepworth, "A Grave Tale", in ''Robin Hood: Medieval and Post-Medieval'', ed. by Helen Phillips (Dublin: Four Courts Press, 2005) pp. 91–112 (p. 94.)</ref> This is consistent with the view that Robin Hood operated in the Went Valley, located three miles to the southeast of the town of Pontefract. The location is approximately three miles from the site of Robin's robberies at Saylis. In the Anglo-Saxon period, Kirkby was home to [[All Saints' Church, Pontefract]]. All Saints' Church had a priory hospital attached to it. Historian Richard Grafton states that the prioress who murdered Robin Hood buried the outlaw beside the road,

<blockquote>Where he had used to rob and spoyle those that passed that way ... and the cause why she buryed him there was, for that common strangers and travailers, knowing and seeing him there buryed, might more safely and without feare take their journeys that way, which they durst not do in the life of the sayd outlaes.<ref>Grafton, Richard, ''A Chronicle at Large'' (London: 1569) p. 84 in Early English Books Online.</ref></blockquote>

All Saints' Church is consistent with Grafton's description because a road ran from Wentbridge to the hospital at Kirkby.<ref>La' Chance, A, "The Origins and Development of Robin Hood". Kapelle, William E., ''The Norman Conquest of the North: The Region and Its Transformation, 1000–1135'' (London: Croom Helm, 1979).</ref>

===Place-name locations===
Within close proximity of Wentbridge reside several notable landmarks relating to Robin Hood. One such place-name location occurred in a cartulary deed of 1422 from Monkbretton Priory, which makes direct reference to a landmark named Robin Hood's Stone, which resided upon the eastern side of the Great North Road, a mile south of Barnsdale Bar.<ref>Monkbretton Priory, ''Abstracts of the Chartularies of the Priory of Monkbretton'', Vol. LXVI, ed. by J.W. Walker (Leeds: The Yorkshire Archaeological Society, 1924) p. 105.</ref> Dobson and Taylor suggest that on the opposite side of the road once stood Robin Hood's Well, which has since been relocated six miles north-west of Doncaster, on the south-bound side of the Great North Road. Over the next three centuries, the name popped up all over the place, such as at [[Robin Hood's Bay]] near Whitby in Yorkshire, Robin Hood's Butts in Cumbria, and Robin Hood's Walk at Richmond, Surrey.

Robin Hood type place-names occurred particularly everywhere except Sherwood. The first place-name in Sherwood does not appear until 1700.<ref>Dobson and Taylor, p. 18.</ref> The fact that the earliest Robin Hood type place-names originated in West Yorkshire is deemed to be historically significant because, generally, place-name evidence originates from the locality where legends begin.<ref>Dobson and Taylor, p. 22.</ref> The overall picture from the surviving early ballads and other early references<ref name = "DAT18">Dobson and Taylor, p. 18: "On balance therefore these 15th-century references to the Robin Hood legend seem to suggest that during the later Middle Ages the outlaw hero was more closely related to Barnsdale than Sherwood."</ref> indicate that Robin Hood was based in the Barnsdale area of what is now South Yorkshire, which borders Nottinghamshire.

====Other place-names and references====
[[File:2018-06-07 02 Sycamore Gap Tree (Acer pseudoplatanus), next to Hadrian’s Wall UK.jpg|thumb|The [[Robin Hood Tree]], also known as ''Sycamore Gap Tree'', near [[Hadrian's Wall]] at Haltwhistle, England. This location was used in the 1991 film ''[[Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves]]''.]]

The Sheriff of Nottingham also had jurisdiction in Derbyshire that was known as the "Shire of the Deer", and this is where the Royal Forest of the Peak is found, which roughly corresponds to today's [[Peak District]] National Park. The Royal Forest included [[Bakewell]], [[Tideswell]], [[Castleton, Derbyshire|Castleton]], [[Ladybower]] and the [[River Derwent, Derbyshire|Derwent Valley]] near Loxley. The Sheriff of Nottingham possessed property near Loxley, among other places both far and wide including Hazlebadge Hall, [[Peveril Castle]] and [[Haddon Hall]]. [[Mercia]], to which Nottingham belonged, came to within three miles of [[Sheffield City Centre]]. But before the Law of the Normans was the Law of the Danes, The [[Danelaw]] had a similar boundary to that of Mercia but had a population of free peasantry that were known to have resisted the Norman occupation. Many outlaws could have been created by the refusal to recognise Norman Forest Law.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://issuu.com/piro.co.uk/docs/according_to_ancient_custom_-_thynghowe?mode=window&backgroundColor=%23222222 |title=According to Ancient Custom: Research on the possible Origins and Purpose of Thynghowe Sherwood Forest |publisher=Issuu.com |date=9 March 2012 |access-date=23 March 2012}}</ref> The supposed grave of Little John can be found in [[Hathersage]], also in the Peak District.

Further indications of the legend's connection with West Yorkshire (and particularly Calderdale) are noted in the fact that there are pubs called the Robin Hood in both nearby [[Brighouse]] and at [[Cragg Vale]]; higher up in the Pennines beyond [[Halifax, West Yorkshire|Halifax]], where Robin Hood Rocks can also be found. Robin Hood Hill is near [[Outwood, West Yorkshire]], not far from [[Lofthouse, West Yorkshire|Lofthouse]]. There is a village in West Yorkshire called [[Robin Hood, West Yorkshire|Robin Hood]], on the [[A61 road|A61]] between [[Leeds]] and [[Wakefield]] and close to [[Rothwell, West Yorkshire|Rothwell]] and Lofthouse. Considering these references to Robin Hood, it is not surprising that the people of both South and West Yorkshire lay some claim to Robin Hood, who, if he existed, could easily have roamed between Nottingham, [[Lincoln, Lincolnshire|Lincoln]], [[Doncaster]] and West Yorkshire.

A [[British Army]] [[Territorial Army (United Kingdom)|Territorial]] (reserves) battalion formed in Nottingham in 1859 was known as [[The Robin Hood Battalion]] through various reorganisations until the "Robin Hood" name finally disappeared in 1992. With the 1881 [[Childers Reforms]] that linked regular and reserve units into regimental families, the Robin Hood Battalion became part of [[The Sherwood Foresters (Nottinghamshire and Derbyshire Regiment)]].

A [[Neolithic]] [[causewayed enclosure]] on [[Salisbury Plain]] has acquired the name [[Robin Hood's Ball]], although had Robin Hood existed it is doubtful that he would have travelled so far south.

==List of traditional ballads==
[[File:Since Robin Hood by Weelkes.png|thumb|Elizabethan song of Robin Hood]]
[[Ballad]]s dating back to the 15th century are the oldest existing form of the Robin Hood legends, although none of them were recorded at the time of the first allusions to him, and many are from much later. They share many common features, often opening with praise of the greenwood and relying heavily on disguise as a [[plot device]], but include a wide variation in tone and plot.<ref>Holt, pp. 34–35.</ref> The ballads are sorted into four groups, very roughly according to date of first known free-standing copy. Ballads whose first recorded version appears (usually incomplete) in the Percy Folio may appear in later versions<ref>Dobson and Taylor, Appendix 1.</ref> and may be much older than the mid-17th century when the Folio was compiled. Any ballad may be older than the oldest copy that happens to survive, or descended from a lost older ballad. For example, the plot of ''[[Robin Hood's Death]]'', found in the Percy Folio, is summarised in ''A Gest of Robyn Hode'', and it also appears in an 18th-century version.<ref>Dobson and Taylor, p.  133.</ref>

===In 15th- or early 16th-century copies===
*[[A Gest of Robyn Hode]] (Child Ballad 117)
*[[Robin Hood and the Monk]] (Child Ballad 119)
*[[Robin Hood and the Potter]] (Child Ballad 121)

===In 17th-century Percy Folio===
NB. The first two ballads listed here (the "Death" and "Gisborne"), although preserved in 17th-century copies, are generally agreed to preserve the substance of late medieval ballads. The third (the "Curtal Friar") and the fourth (the "Butcher"), also probably have late medieval origins.<ref>Dobson & Taylor, see introduction to each individual ballad.</ref> An * before a ballad's title indicates there is also a version of this ballad in the [[Forresters Manuscript]].
*[[Robin Hood's Death]] (Child Ballad 120)
*[[Robin Hood and Guy of Gisborne]] (Child Ballad 118)
* *[[Robin Hood and the Curtal Friar]] (Child Ballad 123,in Forresters titled ''Robin Hood and the Fryer'')
* *[[Robin Hood and the Butcher]] (Child Ballad 122)
* *[[Little John a Begging]] (Child Ballad 142, in Forresters titled ''Little Johns Begging'')
*[[Robin Hood Rescuing Three Squires]] (Child Ballad 140)
* *[[The Jolly Pinder of Wakefield]] (Child Ballad 124, two versions in Forresters, titled there ''Robin Hood and the Pinder of Wakefield'')
* *[[Robin Hood and Queen Katherine]] (Child Ballad 145)

===In 17th-century Forresters Manuscript===

NB: An * before a ballad's title indicates that the Forresters version of this ballad is the earliest known version.

*[[Robin Hood and the Tinker]] (Child Ballad 127)
*[[Robin Hood and the Beggar, I]] (Child Ballad 133)
*[[Robin Hood's Progress to Nottingham]] (Child Ballad 139,in Forresters titled ''Robin Hood and the Forresters I'')
*[[Robin Hood Rescuing Will Stutly]] (Child Ballad 141, in Forresters titled ''Robin Hood and Will Scathlock'')
*[[Robin Hood and the Bishop]] (Child Ballad 143, in Forresters titled ''Robin Hood and the Old Wife'')
*[[Robin Hood's Chase]] (Child Ballad 146)
*[[The Noble Fisherman]] (Child Ballad 148, in Forresters titled ''Robin Hood's Fishing'')
*[[Robin Hood and the Tanner]] (Child Ballad 126)
*[[Robin Hood and the Shepherd]] (Child Ballad 135)
*[[Robin Hood's Delight]] (Child Ballad 136, in Forresters titled ''Robin Hood and the Forresters II'')
*[[Robin Hood's Golden Prize]] (Child Ballad 147, in Forresters titled ''Robin Hood and the Preists'')
*[[Robin Hood Newly Revived]] (Child Ballad 128, in Forresters titled ''Robin Hood and the Stranger'')
* *[[Robin Hood and Allan-a-Dale]] (Child Ballad 138, in Forresters titled ''Robin Hood and the Bride'')
* *[[Robin Hood and the Bishop of Hereford]] (Child Ballad 144, in Forresters titled ''Robin Hood and the Bishopp'')
* *[[Robin Hood and the Golden Arrow]] (Child Ballad 152, in Forresters titled ''Robin Hood and the Sheriffe'')
* *[[The King's Disguise, and Friendship with Robin Hood]] (Child Ballad 151, in Forresters titled ''Robin Hood and the King'')

===Other ballads===
*[[A True Tale of Robin Hood]] (Child Ballad 154)
*[[Robin Hood and the Scotchman]] (Child Ballad 130)
*[[Robin Hood and Maid Marian]] (Child Ballad 150)
*[[Robin Hood and Little John]] (Child Ballad 125)
*[[Robin Hood and the Prince of Aragon]] (Child Ballad 129)
*[[Robin Hood's Birth, Breeding, Valor, and Marriage]] (Child Ballad 149)
*[[Robin Hood and the Ranger]] (Child Ballad 131)
*[[Robin Hood and the Valiant Knight]] (Child Ballad 153)
*[[The Bold Pedlar and Robin Hood]] (Child Ballad 132)
*[[Robin Hood and the Beggar, II]] (Child Ballad 134)
*[[Robin Hood and the Pedlars]] (Child Ballad 137)

Some ballads, such as ''[[Erlinton]]'', feature Robin Hood in some variants, where the [[folk hero]] appears to be added to a ballad pre-existing him and in which he does not fit very well.<ref>Child, v.&nbsp;1, p.&nbsp;178</ref> He was added to one variant of ''[[Rose Red and the White Lily]]'', apparently on no more connection than that one hero of the other variants is named "Brown Robin".<ref>Child, v.&nbsp;2, p.&nbsp;416</ref> [[Francis James Child]] indeed retitled [[Child ballad]] 102; though it was titled ''The Birth of Robin Hood'', its clear lack of connection with the Robin Hood cycle (and connection with other, unrelated ballads) led him to title it ''[[Willie and Earl Richard's Daughter]]'' in his collection.<ref>Child, vol. 2, p. 412.</ref>

==Main characters==
* Robin Hood ([[Pseudonym|a.k.a.]] Robin of Loxley or Locksley)
* The band of "[[Merry Men]]"
** [[Little John]]
** [[Friar Tuck]]
** [[Will Scarlet]]
** [[Alan-a-Dale]]
** [[Much the Miller's Son]]
* [[Maid Marian]]
* [[King Richard the Lionheart]]
* [[John, King of England|Prince John]]
* [[Sir Guy of Gisbourne]]
* The [[Sheriff of Nottingham]]

==See also==

* [[Cultural depictions of Robin Hood]]
{{Div col|colwidth=20em}}
* [[First Barons' War|Barons' Revolt]]
* [[Ishikawa Goemon]]
* [[Ivanhoe]]
* [[Jesús Malverde]]
* [[Joaquin Murrieta]]
* [[Juraj Jánošík]]
* [[Kayamkulam Kochunni]]
* [[Kobus van der Schlossen]]
* [[Liao Tianding]]
* [[Redistribution of wealth]]
* [[Redmond O'Hanlon (outlaw)|Redmond O'Hanlon]]
* [[Robin Hood tax]]
* [[Salvatore Giuliano]]
* [[Schinderhannes]]
* [[Twm Siôn Cati]]
* [[Wat Tyler]]
* [[William Tell]]
* [[Jagga Jatt]]
{{Div col end}}

== Notes ==
{{notelist}}

== References  ==
{{Reflist}}

== Bibliography ==
{{Refbegin}}
*{{cite book | last = Baldwin | first = David | title = Robin Hood: The English Outlaw Unmasked | year = 2010 | publisher = Amberley Publishing | isbn = 978-1-84868-378-5 }}
*{{cite book | last = Barry | first = Edward| title = Sur les vicissitudes et les transformations du cycle populaire de Robin Hood| year = 1832 | publisher = Rignoux }}
*{{cite book |chapter= By Words and by Deeds: The Role of Performance in Shaping the "Canon" of Robin Hood| last = Blackwood | first = Alice | title = Robin Hood and the Outlaw/ed Literary Canon |editor1-last=Coote |editor1-first=Lesley |editor2-last=Kaufman |editor2-first=Alexander&nbsp;L. |  year = 2018 | publisher = Routledge | isbn = 978-0429810053 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=FQtpDwAAQBAJ }}
*{{cite book | last = Blamires | first = David | title = Robin Hood: A Hero for All Times | year = 1998 | publisher = J. Rylands Univ. Lib. of Manchester | isbn = 0-86373-136-8 | url-access = registration | url = https://archive.org/details/robinhoodherofor0000blam }}
*{{cite journal |last1= Brockman|first1= B.&nbsp;A.|year=1983 |title=Children and the Audiences of Robin Hood |journal=South Atlantic Review |volume=48 |issue=2 |pages=67–83 |doi=10.2307/3199732 |jstor= 3199732}}
*{{cite book | last = Child | first = Francis James | author-link = Francis James Child | title = The English and Scottish Popular Ballads | volume = 1–5 | year = 1997 | publisher = Dover Publications | isbn = 978-0-486-43150-5 }}
*{{cite book | last = Coghlan | first = Ronan | title = The Robin Hood Companion | year = 2003 | publisher = Xiphos Books | isbn = 0-9544936-0-5 }}
*{{cite book | last1 = Deitweiler |first1 = Laurie | last2 = Coleman | first2 = Diane | title = Robin Hood Comprehension Guide | year = 2004 | publisher = Veritas Pr Inc | isbn = 1-930710-77-1 }}
*{{cite book | last = Dixon-Kennedy | first = Mike | title = The Robin Hood Handbook | year = 2006 | publisher = Sutton Publishing | isbn = 0-7509-3977-X }}
*{{cite book |last1=Dobson |first1=R.&nbsp;B.|last2=Taylor |first2=John|title=The Rymes of Robin Hood: An Introduction to the English Outlaw|year=1977|publisher=Sutton Publishing | isbn = 0-7509-1661-3 }}
*{{cite book | last1 = Doel | first1 = Fran | last2 = Doel | first2 = Geoff | title = Robin Hood: Outlaw and Greenwood Myth | year = 2000 | publisher = Tempus Publishing Ltd | isbn = 0-7524-1479-8 }}
*{{cite book | last = Green | first = Barbara | title = Secrets of the Grave | year = 2001 | publisher = Palmyra Press | isbn = 0-9540164-0-8 }}
*{{cite book | last = Hahn | first = Thomas | title = Robin Hood in Popular Culture: Violence, Transgression and Justice | year = 2000 | publisher = D.S. Brewer | isbn = 0-85991-564-6 }}
*{{cite book | last = Hanna | first = Ralph | title = London Literature, 1300-1380 | year = 2005 | publisher = Cambridge University Press | url = https://archive.org/details/londonliterature0000hann | url-access = registration | isbn = 0521848350  }}
*{{cite book | last = Harris | first = P.&nbsp;V. | title = Truth About Robin Hood | year = 1978 | publisher = Linney | isbn = 0-900525-16-9 }}
* Hilton, R. H., The Origins of Robin Hood, ''Past and Present'', No. 14. (Nov. 1958), pp.&nbsp;30–44. {{JSTOR|650091}}
*{{cite book | last = Holt | first = J.&nbsp;C. | author-link = J. C. Holt | title = Robin Hood | year = 1982 | publisher = Thames & Hudson | isbn = 0-500-27541-6 }}
* [http://libx.bsu.edu/cdm4/document.php?CISOROOT=/BSUPrvstLec&CISOPTR=998&REC=24 Holt, J. C. (1989). "Robin Hood", ''Perspectives on culture and society'', vol. 2, 127–144]
*{{cite book | last = Hutton | first = Ronald | author-link = Ronald Hutton | title = The Stations of the Sun: A History of the Ritual Year in Britain | year = 1997 | publisher = Oxford University Press | isbn = 0-19-288045-4 }}
*{{cite book|last=Hutton|first=Ronald|title=The Rise and Fall of Merry England: The Ritual Year 1400–1700|year=1996|publisher=Oxford University Press|isbn=0-19-285327-9|url-access=registration|url=https://archive.org/details/risefallofmerrye0000hutt}}
*{{cite book |chapter= Unclean Priests and the Body of Christ: The ''Elucidarium'' and pastoral care in fifteenth-century England | last = James| first = Sarah | title =  Pastoral Care in Medieval England: Interdisciplinary Approaches |editor1-last=Clarke |editor1-first=Peter|editor2-last=James|editor2-first=Sarah |  url = https://books.google.com/books?id=a5WnDwAAQBAJ | year = 2019 | publisher = Routledge | isbn = 978-1317083405 }}
*{{cite book | last = Knight | first = Stephen Thomas | title = Robin Hood: A Complete Study of the English Outlaw | year = 1994 | publisher = Blackwell Publishers | isbn = 0-631-19486-X }}
*{{cite book | last = Knight | first = Stephen Thomas | title = Robin Hood: A Mythic Biography | year = 2003 | publisher = Cornell University Press | isbn = 0-8014-3885-3 | url = https://archive.org/details/robinhoodmythicb00knig }}
*{{cite book | last1 = Knight | first1 = Stephen Thomas | last2 = Ohlgren| first2 = Thomas&nbsp;H. | title = Robin Hood and Other Outlaw Tales | year = 1997 | publisher = Medieval Institute Publications | isbn = 978-1-58044-067-7 | url = https://d.lib.rochester.edu/teams/publication/knight-and-ohlgren-robin-hood-and-other-outlaw-tales }}
*{{cite book | last = Phillips | first = Helen | title = Robin Hood: Medieval and Post-medieval | year = 2005 | publisher = Four Courts Press | isbn = 1-85182-931-8 }}
*{{cite book | last = Pollard | first = A.&nbsp;J. | author-link = A. J. Pollard | title = Imagining Robin Hood: The Late Medieval Stories in Historical Context | year = 2004 | publisher = Routledge, an imprint of Taylor & Francis Books Ltd | isbn = 0-415-22308-3 | url = https://archive.org/details/imaginingrobinho00poll }}
*{{cite book | last = Potter | first = Lewis|title=Playing Robin Hood: The Legend as Performance in Five Centuries | year = 1998 | publisher = University of Delaware Press | isbn = 0-87413-663-6}}
*{{cite book | last = Pringle | first = Patrick | title = Stand and Deliver: Highway Men from Robin Hood to Dick Turpin | year = 1991 | publisher = Dorset Press | isbn = 0-88029-698-4 }}
*{{cite book | last = Ritson | first = Joseph | author-link = Joseph Ritson | title = Robin Hood: A Collection of All the Ancient Poems, Songs, and Ballads, Now Extant Relative to That Celebrated English Outlaw: To Which are Prefixed Historical Anecdotes of His Life | url = https://archive.org/details/robinhoodcollect01rits | year = 1832 | publisher = William Pickering }} {{ isbn|1-4212-6209-6 }}.
*{{cite book | last = Rutherford-Moore | first = Richard | title = The Legend of Robin Hood | year = 1999 | publisher = Capall Bann Publishing | isbn = 1-86163-069-7 }}
*{{cite book | last = Rutherford-Moore | first = Richard | title = Robin Hood: On the Outlaw Trail | year = 2002 | publisher = Capall Bann Publishing | isbn = 1-86163-177-4 }}
*{{cite book | last = Vahimagi | first = Tise | title = British Television: An Illustrated Guide | year = 1994 | publisher = Oxford University Press | isbn = 0-19-818336-4 }}
*{{cite book | last = Wright | first = Thomas | author-link = Thomas Wright (antiquarian) | title = Songs and Carols, now first imprinted | year = 1847 | publisher = Percy Society }}
{{Refend}}

==External links==
{{sister project links|commons=category:Robin Hood|d=Q122634|voy=Robin Hood|s=Portal:Robin Hood|m=no|mw=no|species=no|b=Mythology/English Mythology|v=no|n=no}}
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* [https://www.irhb.org International Robin Hood Bibliography]
* [https://archive.org/search.php?query=title%3Arobin%20hood%20AND%20mediatype%3Atexts&sort=-downloads Robin Hood]&nbsp;– from the [[Internet Archive]], [[Project Gutenberg]] and [[Google Books]] (scanned books, original editions, colour illustrated)
* {{librivox book | title=Robin Hood}} (multiple works)
* [http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p005492h "Robin Hood"], BBC Radio 4 discussion with Stephen Knight, [[Thomas Hahn]] & Juliette Wood (''In Our Time'', 30 October 2003)

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[[Category:Robin Hood| ]]
[[Category:Fictional characters from the 12th century]]
[[Category:Robin Hood characters| ]]
[[Category:Adventure film characters]]
[[Category:English folklore]]
[[Category:Fictional archers]]
[[Category:Fictional earls]]
[[Category:Fictional gentleman thieves]]
[[Category:Fictional outlaws]]
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[[Category:Fictional vigilantes]]
[[Category:Legendary English people]]
[[Category:Tall tales]]
[[Category:Literary archetypes]]
[[Category:Late Middle Ages]]
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[[Category:Yorkshire folklore]]
[[Category:Heroes in mythology and legend]]