After Dark: Myths, Misdeeds & the Paranormal - Did Robin Hood Exist?

Episode Date: September 28, 2026

It's a story that's been around for a good 800 years, but is there any evidence that Robin Hood actually existed?Find out what really went on inside Sherwood Forest, how medieval outlaws lived, and why the Sheriff of Nottingham was a hated figure in the time.Delving into the historical records with us is medieval expert and co-host of our sister podcast, Gone Medieval, Matt Lewis.This episode was edited by Hanna Feodorov. Produced by Stuart Beckwith and McKenna Fernandez. The senior producer was Freddy Chick.Sign up to History Hit for hundreds of hours of original documentaries, with a new release every week and ad-free podcasts. Sign up at https://www.historyhit.com/subscribe.You can take part in our listener survey here.All music from Epidemic Sounds.After Dark is a History Hit podcast.History Hit is part of Little Dot Studios, a Certified B Corp™Voting is now open for the Listener's Choice Award at this year's Podcast Awards. Click to place your vote on the Spotify mobile app: https://open.spotify.com/s/xhg6PJa Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Looking for more shady and sinister stories, sign up to History Hit. You can join us to explore the tragic life of the Bronties or discover the chilling story of Burke and Hair. Plus, with your History Hit subscription, you'll unlock hundreds of hours of exclusive documentaries with a brand new release every week exploring everything from the ancient world to World War II. Just visit historyhit.com forward slash subscribe to start exploring the past. the outlaw who stole from the rich and gave to the poor. It's one of the most famous stories from medieval England, but there's just one problem. We don't actually know if Robin Hood even existed.

Medieval records give tantalizing traces. Outlaws with his name appear in legal records. His story was sung in 14th century folk songs and his life documented in chronicles written beyond his own lifetime. His story and heroism still lives with us today. But was it all just that? A story or deep within the ancient oaks of Sherwood Forest, can we find traces of the real man they called Robin Hood?

Welcome to After Dark. Hello and welcome to After Dark, I'm Maddie. And I'm Anthony. In today's episode, we're going to be exploring whether the story of Robin Hood, which has been told for about 800 years, was based on any kind of real person. And joining us today is the co-host of our sister podcast here at History Hit Gone Medieval Matt Matt. Welcome to AfterDart Matt. Thank you very much for having me. It's very nice to have you here. I feel like it's a sleepover.

I know. Maybe that's because we're all so tired. You've got dressed before we started. Yeah. We should be in pajamas. Okay, before we get properly started into the history of this, because there is some history. There is proper solid history. Who's your favorite Robin Hood in popular culture, please? And why is it the Fox from Disney? It has to be. There's no other answer. That's yours, definitely, right? 100%.

Every millennial woman fancied him growing up. I don't know if it's just women. I mean, if ever there was a sexy fox. That was the one. It's the Disney Robin Hood. It really was. I don't know what it is about it. I think it's called,

caused everyone to ask questions about themselves over the years, but probably going to have to really unfashionably go for Kevin Kossi. Same. Despite the accent, despite all of the flaws in the film, in no small part because of Alan Rickman's performance. Oh, yeah. So, Camp. The campus Sheriff of Nottingham.

Yeah. But he's perfect. And I struggle to get past that. I mean, Carrie Elway's in Men in Tights also. Oh my God. Yeah. Oh my God. Silly Robin Hood.

What was going on around that time? Because they're relatively close by, right? Yeah. And I definitely watched those million times growing up as a kid. So I've never seen the Disney Fox thing. So it is Kevin Costner for me as well. We need to remedy that ASAP because you will prove. Do we need to pause?

Yeah. Yeah. Thank you for coming. Matt. We're off to watch. After we've watched this. Thoughts on the Russell Crow strange, not very Yorkshire-Yorkshire accent version?

I haven't seen that. I like the Russell Crow film to a point, and then I don't like it anymore. What's the cutoff point of view? The shifting accent is tricky to deal with. I think the grittiness of the story as it begins is really nice and actually reflects much more the historical Robin Hood.

But then when you start getting into early 13th century D-Day landings fighting on the beaches. The beaches. It gets a little bit crazy when they feel the need for Robin Hood to only be important because his dad wrote Magna Carta.

Oh! You've lost me. It's a wild ride. It's a wild ride. Okay, well, you've mentioned some real history there, Matt. So let's get into some. The idea of Robin Hood, we can trace it back to legal records, right?

there are some documentation relating to someone vaguely called Robin Hood. There's a few people that begin to crop up in the 13th century. And what's interesting to wonder is, so the first written stories that we have about Robin Hood don't come until the 15th century, so right at the end of the medieval period. But that's got to be tapping into some kind of oral tradition that's been around for some time. The question we don't know is how long that oral tradition has been going. So we begin to get early in the 13th century,

century, we get people using names that aren't dissimilar to Robin Hood. So in 1226, there's a guy in Yorkshire who was a fugitive named Robert Hodd. So Robert can become Robin. Hod could become Hood. Don't know. Maybe we're stretching it a little bit. I always think, and you might be able to speak to this a bit more, Matt, but I always think when you see sort of medieval names or medieval English written down sometimes, it makes you kind of think about the pronunciation, actually. and Robin Hodd could have been what we would now say as Robin Hood, right? I mean, I'm not an expert in medieval pronunciation, but in terms of, I don't know, I think, I was thinking like if you were time, if you try and travel back to the medieval period

and you had to have a conversation with someone, you would be able to tell what they were saying, kind of, but it would also sound very odd to our ears and like they were sort of doing a slightly odd voice or something or pronouncing things for. Yeah, and probably quite close to something like a Yorkshire accent. So we're before the great vowel shift, before all of those sounds have changed. They pronounce the word light, L-I-G-H-T as Lich. They still said those letters in the middle. That's why we have those letters there they did used to be pronounced.

So they would have perhaps pronounced that HOD as more like Hood. And it might have sounded something more like Robert Hood becomes Robin Hood. I can get on board with that. I think like, yeah, and this is a legal document, right? This isn't a literary flourish. This is not a fiction. This is a real person doing a real thing. Yeah, this is the aier roles of the Yorker sizes.

So court records, this guy has been proclaimed an outlaw, and he's going by the name Robert Hood. Sidebar to this, when I was reading this script in preparation for this episode, I saw the ayer rolls of the Yorker sizes. And I misread it as eye rolls. And I thought it was like some kind of quite sassy list of like, these people again. Okay, so we have Robert Hodd, potentially. in 1226. In Berkshire as well, there are court records. We've got a man called William, who's the son of Robert Smith, who is outlawed for robbery. And his kind of alias that he's

given is, is it Robe Hod, something like that? Rob Hood. Rob Hood. Rob Hood. So again, could be something like Rob Hood, Robert Hood. I mean, people aren't using hereditary surnames by this point necessarily. So he's just given a name that reflects his status. But if people are giving you a name something like that to reflect your status perhaps as an outlaw, it speaks to perhaps a memory already or an association of Robin Hood with the idea of being an outlaw living in the green forest. So, you know, he becomes William Robberhood. Yeah. Again, I'll buy it. I know you're doing the professional thing of couching it, but I'm fully sold on both of those, I'm afraid. Talk to me then about, God, the dire of my undergrad English life, that was Pierce Plowman.

We're in the 14th century now, and we're starting to get some literary allusions here. Yeah, so the first kind of written reference that we have to anything to do with Robin Hood, definitely as Robin Hood, The Outlaw. Comes in Pierce Plowman, so William Langland's famous poem that he writes about this Plowman out in the field kind of daydreaming his life away and all of the visions that he has. And there is a character in that called Sloth, who is a priest. and Sloth is such an awful lazy priest. He doesn't know how to say his paternoster. Can't recite the Lord's Prayer. Listen, we've all been there.

Yeah. But... Not great for a medieval priest, though. No. I mean, it should be basics for medieval priest. Can't recite his paternoster. Can't tell you a story about Robin Hood. Okay.

And so he's showing up there as someone who knows rhymes of Robin Hood. He knows stories of Robin Hood. So by the time we're in 1377 with Piers Plowman, Robin Hood is established as a folk story, a tale that people are telling to each other. They're not written down yet, but William Langland here is writing down the fact that people are telling stories about Robin Hood. And also that Robin Hood is already counterculture, right? The fact that he is positioned in the Pierce Plum and poem as being kind of the opposite

of like dutiful and religious and sort of moral that he is like this outsider. And it's the last thing that a priest should know about is. And the idea is there's something subversive about him. You know, he's off the curriculum, or at least should be, which the church has a really, really interesting relationship with Robin Hood throughout the medieval period, because he flips from being this example of everything that's bad. You know you're paid to Noster, you shouldn't tell stories about Robin Hood. And he is, in lots of the early stories, he's famous for robbing from rich priors in particular,

so attacking the wealth of the church. But the church is also very keen to adopt him when they want him. So in lots of the early stories, he's very, very devoted to the Virgin Mary. He's positioned as an incredibly pious man. He won't attack bands of women or bands in the forest that contain women because of his devotion to the Virgin Mary. And whenever churches are perhaps doing some building work or something like that, they'll put on some fares that include allusions to Robin Hood and stories about Robin Hood because they're popular.

And now they're generating wealth for the church, which is absolutely fine. So there's a kind of fluidity to him, right? He can be what people need him to be in that moment. There's a poem called, is it the friar, Friar Dawes reply, which is kind of written around 1402. And in that, there's a quotation that sort of becomes later a bit of a common proverb, I think, which says, many men speak of Robin Hood and never shot his bow. And I suppose the message of that is that plenty of people can kind of talk the talk,

but Robin lived that life and also was robbing from the rich to feed the point. poor. So is that what that message is that you can talk about doing good deeds or being heroic, but you actually need to have shot his bow. You need to have done what he did. I think that's it. I think it's talking about people who love to snipe at the government and the nobility and complain about the structures of society that are keeping everyone oppressed. By the time we're getting to the beginning of the 15th century here, you've had the peasants revolt, you've had the black death all through the earlier century. You've seen people develop opportunities that have then been snatched away from them by the government. You've seen them crushed in the Peasants' Revolt by the power,

the weight of the government. And I think what you develop is people who will talk about those who complain, but don't do anything. So the stories of Robin Hood are about taking on the establishment, about fighting back against wrongfully used power and authority, about standing up to corruption in a way that most people complain down the pub about it, but they don't actually do anything. I won't risk anything for it. Yeah. We see this. I iconic status start to come in as we push into the early modern period then. And I think we have some reference to Henry the 8th dressing us, Robinner, which talk about stealing from the church and perhaps not then passing it on to the poor.

But like, is this, is he seeing himself in that kind of a guise? I think he is. So, I mean, Henry the 8th is deluded in so many ways. It's hard to tell what's going on in his head. but he does put on one of his fond of these pageants, fond of dressing up and putting on shows for people. And so he and a bunch of his men burst into Catherine of Aragon's rooms. He's dressed as Robin Hood. He's bought a maid Marion with him.

Might have been a signal to the future for Catherine of Aragon. He's bought his own girlfriend into the room to see his wife. But yeah, so he positions himself as Robin Hood. This isn't a Robin Hood that's necessarily standing up to the establishment who isn't robbing from the rich to give to the poor. And it's during this period that we begin to see a real shift in the societal background, the position, the rank of Robin Hood. So in those really early stories, he is a gritty, tough yeoman. And a yeoman is someone who isn't necessarily a peasant working on the field, but definitely isn't nobility or gentry either.

They're somewhere in the middle. They're a respectable class. They have good manners. There's lots of talk about how courteous Robin Hood always is in the ballads. but he's definitely a very low-ranking yeoman. Once we get into the 16th century, we begin to see this change of him becoming a deprived, wronged member of the nobility.

And I think that's what appeals to Henry. Because in the earlier stories, you have this ordinary man who is noble by his deeds. By the time I think you're getting into the 16th century, there's a push from the establishment against that. Ordinary people can't be noble. We can't have any of that. He must be a deprived nobleman who is being forced to try and take back what he wants.

That's the only explanation for his noble spirit and his nature. He can't have learned that from anywhere else because peasants are horrible. I think we need the Russell Crow version to have like the, you know, I'm just a yeoman wronged and had my land taken off me. But that's where that does work, that he's just an archer who falls into this situation. There is nothing special about him until they ruin the film at the end by making something special about him. really bashing this film and right this say. Yeah, I mean, I think it's so interesting that he kind of, he creeps into, he becomes almost

like a sort of iconic figure in culture, doesn't he? He's sort of a, I don't know, a stereotype, I suppose, to be drawn out. Like, for example, he's mentioned in Shakespeare's The Two Gentlemen of Rona, which is performed first, I think, in 1598. And, you know, he's, is a kind of passing reference to him. So I suppose there's a sense that everyone in England, certainly at this time, it's a short hand for these ideas that you're saying that are shifting in that moment

and this idea of him being sort of wronged not quite an aristocrat I suppose but you know someone from the upper classes is kind of interesting also side note about Henry 8 what an exhausting man that he'd just turn up and be like I'm dressed up aren't I amusing and you'd be like

imagine turning up in the morning and be like I've got a really good idea you're all going to love it and everyone just being oh not another one yeah right and who's making these costumes Henry you're not doing that yeah no kind of valid let's talk a little bit then about let's let's wind the clock back to when these the story of Robinhood is supposed to have been set because we've talked about you know this idea of this

quite lowly ordinary man and with extraordinary deeds and that's what makes him noble and then by the time we get to the early modern period you know he's transformed into this kind of wronged nobleman but most typically when we tell this story and in Hollywood retellings of it. We were talking off Mike earlier, but I loved the Lady Bird book version, which was so good if anyone's got that out there. I need a copy.

Mostly, though, we set this story in the late 12th, early 13th century, and that context is really important in terms of the history that was actually happening, right? It is, but it's not where Robin Hood kind of begins his literary existence. He's sort of plonked into this moment because he fits with the, sort of political landscape, I guess. And again, I think it speaks to his malleability that he can move around socially,

but he can move around in time and space a little bit as well, because he's not always in Nottingham either. So he begins, we get these stories being written down from the middle of the 15th century, so 1450, we have the Robin Hood and the monk story first written down. We get the jest of Robin Hood a little bit later too. And these positioned him as being in the reign of a King Edward.

They don't tell us which Edward it is, but they definitely tell us the king at the time is Edward. So that means Edward the first, second or third, which gives us from 1272 to 1377. There's some suggestion it could even be Edward the 4th, who's kind of 1461 to 1483. That gives a really broad window and no concept of where he might be. Perhaps the most plausible location for him there

is during the reign of Edward II when there is lots of civil conflict, he's having civil wars with his cousin, the Duke of Lancaster. There is lots of disruption, people on opposing sides at various moments. If we go a little bit earlier to Edward I, we've got a king who's away on crusade when he comes to the throne.

So there is this idea of absent kingship and the corruption that can fill the void when the king isn't there to represent justice and the need to fight back against that. We also have other stories around this time that begin to place him as in the reign of Henry III. So when Simon DeMontfort's rebellion takes place, after Simon DeMontford is killed in 1265, we have a bunch of people who are known as the dispossessed, a load of nobleman who've had their lands taken away from them.

So there are some stories that position him as one of those dispossessed fighting to recover his lands too. So he can move around a little bit in time, but he seems to settle and has settled for a long time now. in the reign of Richard I, 189 to 1199, most clearly when Richard is away on crusade at the beginning of his reign. Again, the absent kingship. So again, you've got absent kingship. You've got the idea that the king is away doing something good. He's crusading, considered good at the time.

We can question whether it's good now. But he's away doing something that the kingdom is championing, and into that void, you've got the perfect grand villain in King John. who will later become king at least. The king's brother who is desperately trying to steal his authority, who is terribly corrupt, who is very, very badly behaved. And you need someone like Robin to stand up to that, to try and represent good rule.

Robin is frequently positioned as being very loyal to the king, whoever the king is. And so this idea that he is representing in most of those stories, Richard I, as a good king, fighting against the bad rule, the corruption that is, is seeping in with John. He is the dam that is preventing that from flooding the kingdom. I sort of, I suppose, people can get behind him because he's a good excuse to go against local

government and taxation, for example. And obviously that's a huge part of his story, right? But also that ultimately you can be like, well, I'm still on the side of the king. I don't think taxation's right and I'm pissed off at the local sheriff, but I'm not committing treason. And he is the sort of perfect short hand for that. You mentioned Matt that he's usually placed in or around Nottingham. why was Nottingham important in King John's regime? Because it's a significant place, isn't it?

And that's presumably why we position, why we sort of plunk down Robin Hood within that. There are a few reasons why he ends up in Nottingham, I think. There are early stories that place him in Barndale in Yorkshire, too. And that seems to be a recurring theme. Sometimes he's in forests in Yorkshire. Most often he's in Sherwood Forest. interestingly even when he's in Yorkshire

his enemy is the sheriff of Nottingham not the sheriff of Yorkshire Basically just hates the Midlands there's a reason to hate the sheriff of Nottingham that we can definitely talk about but Nottingham yes is important to John he bases himself there a fair bit

but Nottingham Castle during the medieval period is considered to be the centre of the kingdom geographically so kings will often position themselves there because I need to talk about Richard the third at some point when he's expecting Henry James in 1484 and 1485. He doesn't know where that invasion's coming from

so he bases himself in those summers at Nottingham because it's considered the geographic centre of the kingdom and you can get to everywhere as quickly as you possibly can. So Robin is right in the heart of the kingdom here. And John has connections there. So in 1212, towards the end of his kingship, he's associated with the hanging of 28 Welsh hostages at Nottingham, which is just another example of John being horrible.

You know, John is absolutely vile, but he's being vile in Nottingham. Some of those people that are executed are young boys, possibly between the age of 12 and 14. Wow. So there's John. Unusual even for the medical period? Yes. Yeah. I mean, this isn't great from John, who's not a great person. He spends Christmases at Nottingham.

He visits it fairly frequently as king. He will ultimately die not far from there at Newark Castle, as well. well, trying to get to that Midlands area to protect himself and his kingdom as everything is slipping away from him, including his health and ultimately his life. He's got a royal hunting lodge there that he likes as well. So he has lots of connections to Nottingham. Nottingham has a great forest, as there's lots of England at this point. But there's a perfect place there in Sherwood Forest to plonk Robin and oppose him. And the sheriff of Nottingham is particularly interesting because he is, the Sheriff of Nottingham in the early 13th century is a man named Philip Mark.

He is the only royal official named in the 1215 Magna Carta. So for all everyone is complaining about everything, all the things that John is doing, they're very general. But Philip Mark, the Sheriff of Nottingham, is singled out as someone that the barons want removed from his office. Him and his family are to be ejected from any form of authority in England. Wow. Okay, that's extreme. But he's clearly a hated, hated figure. And throughout the Robin Hood legends, the ones that we have written down, the Sheriff of Nottingham is always his enemy.

But it's never explained why. Because there must be this assumption that people know the story well enough. To either know why Robin hates the Sheriff of Nottingham or to understand that the Sheriff of Nottingham has this long history of being a terrible, evil person. He's the perfect foil for Robin Hood then. But the idea that, you know, sheriffs again represent royal authority, you have to have an absent king for this to work for Robin to still be loyal to the king. So it fits really well in Richard's reign when he's absent. John is trying his best takeover and you've got this terrible, terrible Sheriff of Nottingham emerging, who is collecting

all of the taxes. And sheriffs, I mean, the system of taxation via sheriffs is essentially sheriffs go to the exchequer at the start of the year and they're given a figure to raise from their county. They're then responsible at the end of the year for delivering that amount of money to the exchequer. If they happen to raise any more than that, they're allowed to keep it. So there is a built and incentive for them to be corrupt and grasping and avaricious. That's how they make themselves rich, but also how they make themselves horrendously unpopular. You mentioned there the forest, and this is going to become a key part of this story, and we're going to find out all about that when we come back after this short.

Right, Matt, the forest laws, I did not know they existed, that there were medieval laws that needed to govern the forest. How do they play a role in this particular legend? The forest law becomes a key way in which people are oppressed, firstly by the Norman government. So when the Norman kings arrive in 1066, they love a good hunt. Yes. And what do you want if you want a good hunt? You want some nice open space. Lots of prey that you can look for, deer, boar, anything like that.

What you don't want is a bunch of peasants getting in the way. And so the Norman kings begin to section off, more and more land. They call it Royal Forest. That doesn't mean it's full of trees. Royal forest can be open fields. So this surprised me when we were prepping for this episode, that it is trees, but then also villages, open land. Pasture, anything.

And the key problem here is, Norman conquest ends Anglo-Saxon England. In Angusaxon, England, you can use all of these forests to collect your firewood, to hunt for meat to feed your family with, to forage for berries and whatever else you might be able to find. And the Normans arrive and they're like, oh, that's nice, I'll keep that, I'll take that, get out of there, you can't go in there anymore. And the boundaries of this are constantly expanding,

and they make it a crime to take anything from the King's Royal Forest. You can't collect wood in there. Definitely can't hunt. No, you definitely can't hunt. You definitely can't take meat. You can be killed for killing one of the king's deer. And this is land that presumably people have been hunting on, have been, you know, taking the wood from for centuries at this point.

This is normal everyday life that's now suddenly illegal and could cost you your life. Absolutely. For generations, this is how people have found wood to burn through the winter to keep their families warm and alive. It's how they've got meat to supplement their diet. Yeah. And suddenly you can't do that. As an 18th centrist, it's interesting because we talk about the enclosure act all of the time.

Yeah, I'm literally thinking about it right now. And this is happening in the medieval period in a way that we don't really talk about in terms of the history of landscape in this country as much as we do the enclosures because it is closer in time, I suppose, and more sort of there's maybe just more sort of written response to it in terms of protest. But I mean, this must have been, this is a huge moment because of carving up of England and its resources and just. complete reallocation to the very wealthiest in society. Absolutely. And that separation would have become very, very clear. There are still places in this country where you can see the boundaries of royal forests that were built. And that's because they were built as literal big fences. You know, they were sectioned off from everybody else. Who do you think is building those fences?

The people who are no longer allowed in that land to collect their wood. So they're having to block themselves out of the ways that they have always fed their families and provided. So the resentment is growing. Can I ask about this? Sorry, this is a slight tangent, but I am very interested. Why and how did they make them do that? Because I was going to answer the Normans, but that's not the case. How did they convince these people?

Just brutality? Yeah, at the point of a sword, you know, if you want to keep your home, you know, very nice hut you have there. Be a shame if it burnt down in the night. Right. Or you can come and build this fence that keeps you out of the way you've always fed your family. So, you know, those scars in the landscape still exist today. there are places where you can still see where people were forced to do that.

And all of a sudden now, if you're so hungry that you need a bit of meat or so cold that you want some wood to burn, you're literally risking your life going in there. And over the couple of centuries that follow, those royal forests are just expanded and expanded and expanded, because no one can tell the king he can't have it. If he goes somewhere and he thinks, so this would be a nice place for a hunting lodge. I'll just build one and section a whole load of land off. off your go, this isn't yours anymore. Yeah.

And there's no one stopping. One of the big complaints around Magna Carta is this kind of behaviour because it's about bringing the king beneath the law rather than him allowing to be continuing above it. And one of the things that we don't talk about very often that's parallel to Magna Carta is the Charter of the Forests. And this is published sort of alongside it.

Eventually they've become amalgamated. They'll be pushed together. But it's only the Charter of the Forest around about 12, 17, that actually prevents corporal punishment for taking meat from the kings. You can no longer lose life or limb for killing the king's deal. So some good sense does prevail? But only under huge pressure. John is being chased around his kingdom.

He's been invaded by the French. Prince Louis of France is in control of half of England. Half of the barons of England are on the side of the French prince. It's only at this point that John is forced. to sit down and agree to this and then he will rip it up entirely afterwards. I suppose we have this, the political

and sort of practical context of the forest, as you've described Matt. But we also have the forest in literature, even in the medieval period and presumably for centuries, millennia before. This idea of the forest is a magical place, is a place where the rules don't apply and you see it in fairy tales,

in gothic novels. It's a trope that has, you know, just has this through line throughout human history because they are dangerous places. They're places where, you know, day is night, the light is blocked out, where wild animals can maul you to death in a way that you're safe from if you're not in the forest. All these things don't apply. And we have this idea of outlaws living in this space where the rule of society does not apply or has been upturned.

Do you think that comes into Robin Hood as well, thinking particularly about this idea of him as, you know, sort of counterculture as turning the world upside down, ruining that hierarchy, the distribution of wealth. Is that at play here? Definitely. I mean, he's, the idea that he literally robs from the rich

and gives to the poor comes later into the story. Okay. The first stories that we have talk about him helping a poor knight. So there is an idea that he's there to help the less well off. But the full development of the idea of literally robbing from the rich and giving it to the poor comes a little bit later. But I think if you've got someone who is fighting against royal authority, what represents Royal Authority better than the Royal Forest now?

So Plunk Robin in there, he's right on the inside of all of these things, everything that he's doing in that place he shouldn't be doing. And also that it's, even though these sites you talk about, you know, they're very geographically specific in that there are literal boundaries and yet they cover vast areas. And so there's something kind of fluid about that. And this idea that Robin is somewhere in our imagination, in this space. We don't quite know where

and that's how he survives and he's an outlaw, but that he can pop up and help someone at any time. He's almost a sort of spiritual creature as well as a practical man that he can literally, you almost call upon him

if you're in need and he will come to you. See, I also grew up watching the Robin of Sherwood series which go and look it out. I don't know how well it's aged. I don't know. Canceled.

Possibly. But that has Robin interacting with the idea of her and the hunter so this forest god that existed. So he's in this sort of liminal space on the edge of society, but also on the edge of religion. Is he part of an old world?

Or is he part of a new world? And I think I always found that series really, really fun and interesting. I hope I don't get cancelled. Now when you go back in watch it on YouTube, you're like, no, I do not find it fun or interesting. Yeah, so I distance myself from it entirely. Best depiction of Her and the Hunter,

and this is another sidebar. is 1980s as well, not to age myself because I was not born when this was on. You weren't born in the 80s at all? No, not at all, mate. Oh, Jesus. Okay, go on. Not only just, but sure. Was the Box of Delights?

Surely you guys have seen that. Okay, it's all on YouTube. If you watch it, go and find it now. Just stop what you're doing and go and watch it. It's absolutely phenomenal. Very Christmassy. Okay, we're going to go to a break, and afterwards we're going to be talking about another famous element of this story

for bow and arrow. All right, Matt, we've talked about stealing from the rich to give to the poor. We've talked about the forest. We've talked about the sheriff of Nottingham. There's a key element that we're missing here, and that is... Green tights.

Yeah, green tights. It's the bow and arrow. I'm looking at what we think might be the first, potentially, visual depiction of Robin Hood. And it's a woodcut from the late 15th century that seems to have been recycled in various...

text. So it's used in a late 1490s Canterbury Tales. It's used to illustrate specifically Robin Hood elsewhere. So it's like it's a little bit woolly. It's a little bit vague. But it is, I will describe it for listeners. It's a man on a completely insane horse, even by medieval standards. I mean, he's sort of a lion. He's got like lionesque feet crawling and this tiny, tiny head for what is quite a large-bodied horse. And there is a man on it who is just far too big for the horse who, I mean, he's essentially, he's got the tights on. He's dressed as Robin Hood, right? He's got a bow and arrow. He's got, I mean, it looks like a hat that is held onto his head by a bandage. It's not really the hood necessarily that we would associate with Hollywood versions.

is this an accurate photographic depiction of Robin Hood, the real historical figure? It is. Captured on a speed camera in Sherwood Forest. This is what people imagine Robin Hood looking like. So this is very much the yeoman on his horse, in his bow, in his functional clothes. He's not wearing the clothes of a nobleman who's sitting at table all day and doesn't have a real job. This is... He's out and about.

Yeah. This is what people imagine Robin Hood being. He's ready to fight. He's off in the forest. He's on some adventure. He's on a horse. He's going to get away quickly. You won't catch him.

You're going to lose him in the greenery of Sherwood Forest. I think, like you say, this image is used for several things. But it's a perfect one for Robin Hood in the medieval mind because it kind of gives us everything that he represents to a medieval person. One of the things that he also represents is this idea of romantic righteousness and just, just belonging to the romantic tradition more generally. Personally, I find nothing romantic in the least about an outlaw. It's just boring and dirty. But like, no, I don't have time.

Are you surprised? Disappointed, but not surprised. No, no. It's, it's, I just, I just don't have time. Dick Turpid. Absolutely not. Oh, my God. But here he is. Sleeping in the woods, not having a comfy bed that you don't like the idea of.

No. No one's asking you to be the outlaw there. I'm not good because that's a role I cannot fulfill. But he does fulfill that, doesn't he? And he has this. This is where he annoys me a little bit. Is that all right to say that? You can say whatever you like.

This is a safe space. Where I'm just a bit like, I don't know. This is where my frustration level starts to peak a little bit, where I'm just like, how romantic is this really, though? You know what I mean? But he is part of that tradition. But what do you think the outlawness of him is trying to tell, is it that counterculture thing that we've been talking about? Is that where this pinpoints itself? I think it is. I mean, outlawry is a real thing in the medieval world. By this point for centuries, by the time people are writing about it in the 15th century, it's been around for a long time. An outlaw is someone who literally lives outside the law. That means if you were to encounter an outlaw, perfectly legal to murder them, because they exist outside the law. There is no.

come back. You said that like you were about to change your mind and be like, oh no, I want to be an outlaw now. That sounds great. No, no, no. I just, I was like, I'm fine to my law. Legal murder. No, I was a little bit like, oh, okay, they're annoying me, but I don't need to kill them, was my thought there. But okay. So, but that's interesting because they've placed themselves outside the law. And then if you occupy a space that usually is within the law, you can transgress that and join their world for a little bit and then come back into your world and have no consequences. Because the point is they've removed themselves from normal, acceptable society. They're no longer like you and I.

They don't abide by the same rules as us, therefore we don't want them in our society and our community. They have removed themselves from the law of the land, so they don't pay tax, but they also can be killed. So there's kind of two sides to everything that's going on. So Robin being an outlaw becomes romanticised, definitely. But again, it returns us to this gritty idea of him as this yeoman who is living a life.

of desperation. We will later develop this idea of him and his band of merry men in their green tights flying through the forest swinging on ropes. But even that, right, is kind of, you can see the DNA of that in this idea of living outside the law, that the merry men, you think about medieval society is very strictly structured, right? You've got households, you've got villages, you've got, you know, sort of these hierarchies and your domestic life is so tightly organized. and everyone knows their role and the outlaws living not in that space and in this different environment

in this different world of their own creating set themselves up domestically as well as sort of politically in this chaosy way that they are you know it's a they're sort of they create their own families or their own sort of kinship I suppose within that for the medieval world

that's set around you know the sort of the spiritual and practical rigor of how to do life and society is even though, you know, we think of the merry men now in tights on screen, there's a sort of almost a threatening element to that right, that this band of outlaws don't operate or live by the ordinary norms of the medieval world. Yeah, yeah, they are outside of everything that is acceptable. And maybe that camaraderie is part of the reason that they become romanticised a little bit,

this idea of brotherhood that they're relying on each other, that they're forming their own little society that doesn't have the same rules and oppression as the one outside. Because for all societal rules are generally accepted and taken by the overwhelming majority. That doesn't mean they're a good thing. Who doesn't dream of living in a place with no taxation and all of that sort of stuff? So they're kind of living the life that nobody else can. But there are consequences for them when they do that. I mean, the first story that we have written down of Robin Hood, that one in 1450,

is a pretty brutal story of Robin getting captured by the authorities. and he's about to be killed. He falls out with Little John on his way there and Little John abandons him. He ends up getting captured. Little John and several of the other key characters, much Will Scarlet, people like that, they hear that Robin's been captured

and they attack the prison where he's being held and, you know, well, they kill a monk and his associate to steal their clothes to get into the... So not afraid of killing monks. They break in, they kill all. of the jailers, all of the people that are keeping Robin hostage. So they're just slaughtering their way to Robin here. It's not romantic.

It's not saving him by trickery and, you know, bashing guards over the head from behind. Yeah, this isn't the Disney version. They're killing everybody that gets between them and Robin. And Robin, when he realizes that having fallen out with Little John, little John has come and saved him, Robin offers to go into the service of Little John and to be his man. And Little John is like, no, no, we're not having any of that. That's not how we operate. Yeah, we don't have that hierarchy.

Yeah, we don't have that question. Then, despite the romanticisation that happens later, in real terms of historical living without laws in the medieval period, are they seen as an annoyance then? Are they seen as unsavory, as unwanted, and just really disruptive to everyone else's life? Yeah, I think so, because they don't apply by the rules, and they can be dangerous.

They don't have to worry about the consequences of the law because they're already living outside of it. So what's to stop them stealing from you or breaking into your home or attacking you in the street? They tend to rely on hospitality, so they might rely on sympathetic peasants who understand why they've chosen that life. They might rely on members of the church

who perhaps take pity on them. They might find networks of safety. houses that they're able to use. They're not necessarily all living out in the forest. They're not all necessarily completely outside of society, but they have to be very careful because if you come across someone who doesn't like you or, you know, it's like the purge. It's open season on outlaws all of the time.

Let's talk specifically about the bow and arrow for a second then, because you've talked to find certain versions of this history. There is extreme violence and they are just slaughtering people, left, right and center to maintain the outlaw lifestyle and sort of political stance that they're taking. The bow and arrow is obviously a weapon used against human beings in this period, but it's also a tool for hunting. What does it represent? Why is it significant that Robin Hood has a bow and arrow instead of, say, a sword?

Yeah. It speaks to a status slightly to begin with because swords are high-status weapons. They're expensive. They cost a lot of money. the carrying of swords is frequently regulated by law so that only those above a certain social rank. So Robin has a sword, it would distinguish him as a member of a higher social rank. In the early stories, he isn't.

Much more likely to have carried the book. Later on, when he is identified as being part of the nobility, is there any element of the story that creeps in where he has a sword or has been taken off him as part of the injustice against him? I think as the legends go on, he becomes much more of a swashbuckling hero, doesn't he? He is getting into those one-on-one sword fights with people, insinuating that he's someone who knows how to use a sword. You're in Kevin Kostner territory now. Yeah, you have to be trained to do that.

The bow, and again, it's significant that these stories are beginning to be written down in the middle of the 15th century, because by this point the bow is synonymous with English armies. Edward III in the Hundred Years' War has used it to all but conquer France. It seems like an unstoppable weapon on the continent. We're not that far after Agincourt in 1415, where the tiny number of English archers suffering from dysentery have beaten the flower of French chivalry and stood against a heavy cavalry charge.

There is a romanticisation of the use of the bow by that point. But also what's significant is that from, so from 1363, Edward III brings in that famous archery law that most people have probably heard of, that you have to practice archery in England every Sunday after church in the butts. If you're a fighting age male, because you have to go to church, legally required to go to church, unless you've got a really, really good excuse,

you're going to get fined for not going. And so everybody should be in church. Immediately after church, you have to go and practice with a bow and hour. There's a lot of admin on a Sunday, isn't it? You'd be quite annoyed if you'd already had to go to church, and now you've got to do archery as well. Exactly. This is Edward III trying to make sure he's got a constant supply of,

of archers to send over to France. The side effect of this is the militarisation of the entirety of English society. Everyone in England can use a bow. And so that becomes a part of Robin Hood that everyone can identify with. They're familiar with this. He's an every man. And I think a significant part of the threat of Robin Hood becomes the idea that he could be anyone.

He's almost representing the entire English nation in that we can be pushed so far. if feudalism requires us to put up with your boot on our neck but if you press a little bit too hard just be aware that any one of us could pick up a bow and turn on you and we know how to use it so it almost becomes this this idea that not that Robin Hood is out there somewhere that he's a secret that's lost in the woods and you might never find him

actually maybe we're all Robin Hood do you think that's why it's endured so long I think it I mean it's a great story you know, aside from Anthony, who doesn't love? No, I actually like the Robin Hood story. I just don't like Anlaws. You were going to regret saying this when your approach to play Dick Turpin in a film and you'll be like, no, sorry, I can't.

No, no, no, no. Yeah, no, it is a great story. And, like, we've all, we all have stakes in it. Like, we've just seen, not financial stakes, unfortunately. But, like, you know, Kevin Costner, the Fox in Disney, whatever it is, we all have a thing. And I'm really reminded, I think I've referenced her on this before in another Medieval. episode. My lovely

early English professor at undergrad professor Margaret Robson she talked about Arthurian legend and how everything becomes, everything is legitimate because it's all legendised and over the generations

what we, you know, she would reference the Simpsons saying that is just as legitimate as whatever's happening in the 1100s because it's all fabrication. Because it becomes canon as well. Yeah. And that's one of the things I think about this in a similar way, where it's everybody's, kind of as you're saying there in terms of this could be anyone. I'm also really intrigued. I know I would say this and there's

obviously a bias here on my side, but I love that message that you're saying there, Matt about, you know, this could be anyone in England, step on our next too much and blah, blah, blah. And I just think it's interesting how that disappears over the next three or four hundred years in terms of how the English interact with Ireland, for instance, because it's very much. that. It's very much foot on neck. And it's interesting that the same doesn't apply. And I wonder if he disappears a little bit in that kind of early modern 18th century, but he does a little bit. Like I'm thinking now, does he appear in any 18th century protest culture? I don't think I've ever come across him as a, no. This is what I'm thinking. In the 18th century, when does he reappear again? Is it the Victorians? And I bet it's a really tweet the tights version, right? Like I bet that's when we see him again. That's super interesting. Authorian legend, of course, full of magical forests as well. We need to do a forest episode. But there's also that element picking up on what you're saying, Anthony, is this why he becomes the wronged aristocrat and nobleman?

It's almost like taking him away when Henry VIII is interacting with Robin Hood. It's taking him away from the ordinary people. He's no longer that yeoman who knows how to use a bow. Right. That political bite has been removed. Yeah, he's coming from that elite. So he's being co-opted by the nobility to start to tell romantic stories about themselves, which requires taking him away and perhaps taking away the threat.

Which coincides, time-wise, right? Like, you start to see during the Tudors and then by the time we get to the 18th century or whatever, well, of course, it's going to be almost assimilated and then reemerged later again. Yeah, because I mean, you get Walter Scott's Ivanhoe and stuff like that, you know, stories of Robin Hood cropping up around those kinds of times. against this romanticised image. Yeah, literally a romantic figure. It'd be interesting to see if he comes back again.

I'm thinking about, you know, the forest. We've got environmental concerns now. Lots of billionaires wrecking the planet, taking everyone's money. I wonder if he'll crop back up. You can be him. I will be Robin Hood. Give me a bow and arrow. You haven't got time, actually.

I don't know what I'm saying. Why would I volunteer you for that? This was fascinating, Matt. And do you know what? It's when we, we... When we talked about doing a Robin Hood episode, I was like, I don't know if we should do that. Is there any history? You know, is it just one of those stories where we're going to be talking around it, but there's no material? Do you know what? There's been so much history in here. I feel like we've waded through so much of the medieval period and got such a flavour for it. And actually, I would say the answer to the question, did Robin Hood exist? Yes, in terms of he was an every man. He was there throughout the medieval period. He shape shifted. He. he was something new for every generation. But he is absolutely in the popular imagination.

You know, we talk so much on this podcast about it's difficult to access the mentalities of the past, the imaginations of the past, the minds of people who've lived before us because, you know, you have the written record, you have the archaeological record. You still can't get into the brains, the thought process, the imagination of these people. And I think a story like Robin Hood actually allows us to do that, that we can have a glimpse of what it was to be a medieval person, to be a medieval peasant,

to be a medieval yeoman, and to feel that you had the potential to embody someone who represented hope, who represented rebellion, a little bit of pushback, a little bit of creating space for yourself in an oppressive world. I think he absolutely did exist in those terms.

Do you know what my takeaway from this is? And it came from the very beginning of the episode and I was like, oh, I get it. My favorite character in all of the Robin Hood legend is Made Marion. Yes. and I'm gay if you didn't know and you said at the very very beginning

that there was an association with the cult of Mary the cult of Mary is a Marion cult Made Marion then obviously carries over into that and I was like I love when those things drop in I mean Made Marion doesn't appear in Robin Hood stories till the 16th century she's quite a late edition she seems to have come from an old French story

that's called Robin and Marion that's about two people on a farm who fall in love and everything else nothing to do with Outlaws. Right. But people know of a Robin and Marion. So if you're looking for a love interest for Robin, Marion just works.

People make that connection already. And it's also like their relationships kind of chivalric right as well, that she's a high status woman and he kind of wins her heart by doing these good deeds and things. We need to do a whole episode on Made Marion now. Yeah. Let's do that. Matt, we have lots more episodes coming up with you.

But for now, we're going to say goodbye to everyone. Thank you so much. If you've enjoyed this episode, we've got plenty more medieval. coming your way leave us a five-star review wherever you get your podcasts comment below if you're watching on YouTube and we will see you next time