Welcome to You Ask Andy

Susan Canning, age 12, of Albany, New York.

Was Robin Hood a real person?

In England, the people of Yorkshire will assure you that their bold Robin was real. They will take you to Kirklees Priory and show you the stone above his gravel The inscription claims that the beloved hero of the greenwood was the best of all archers. It says that Robin Hood was really the Earl of Huntingdon who died in 1247,

Scholars will tell you that this stone is no older than 200 years. This does not worry the Englishmen one bit. The present stone, they say, is an exact copy of a former stone that crumbled away from old age, This could be true. For the spellings and lettering of the present stone have not been in use for many hundreds of years.

The wonderful tales of Robin Hood and his merry men have been told for some 600 years, Such a vivid character was most likely based on a real person. All our early reports of Robin are in old ballads and verses often set to music, A few stuffy people say that Robin was never real because the historians of his day did not mention him. Chances are the historians also forget to mention your great‑grandfather ‑ and he was certainly a real person.

Our first record of Robin goes back to 1377, He is mentioned in a ballad along with Randle Earl of Chester.  And this Randle, we know from other records, was a real person. If the historians forgot our Robin, the poets, songsters, and ballad writers certainly made up for the loss. To most people, Robin Hood represents an ideal, both in his character and his way of life. Andy for one is sure this ideal is based on the life of a real person, though he cannot prove it.

Late in the Middle Ages, people shared that ideal in stories and ballad so.  We share and enjoy the same adventures and ideals bought up to date on TV. The idea handed down through 600 years has often had to keep pace with the times.  New ballads were added long after Robin and his merry men had gone from Sherwood forest.

Rollicking Morris dances became popular in the sixteenth century. Surely Robin would have loved them. So new ballads were written to give him a part in the May Day Morris dance festivals. He needed a partner; So laughing Maid Marian was added to the legend at this time.

Originally his name may have been Robin Whode, from the Old English word for wood, As a yeoman hunter, he reached the hearts of the ordinary peoples He expressed their desires to rebel against the new forestry laws, their yearning for the free life under the greenwood tree. He was one of them. Not until 1615 do the ballads say that he was an outlawed nobleman. Years later, someone worked out a pedigree for him as the Earl of Huntingdon,

These and other facts may be out of step with his times. It does not mean that he never lived but only that his charm never died. His original character has not changed at all. He is still the brave, merry outlaw of old. He robs from the greedy to give to the needy. He steals the king's deer but the king who knows our Robin for a true loyal subject does not mind. He is still champion of women and children. He still rushes to defend those in trouble. And our brave sassy merry Robin Hood is still the greatest archer of them all.

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