The Real Robin Hood

Outlaw Robin Hood is one of Great Britain’s legendary heroes, the 14th
century tale almost as old as that of King Arthur and his knights, and every
bit as romantic. If Robin Hood ever really existed is a question to which
there is no concrete answer, but it seems hard to believe that such a wealth
of folklore has no basis in fact of some kind.

The popular view of many came to be that Robin Hood’s birthplace was
Locksley, and that he was the rightful Earl of Huntingdon during the reign
of Richard I, while others beleived him to be Robert Fitzooth, Lord of
Loxley in Warwickshire during the reign of Henry III, whose family tree
stretches back to one of William the Conqueror’s barons, but the common
thread was that he was from the Nottingham area.

The past century has seen serious historians searching thousands of
historical documents and finding many references to people with names like
‘Robert Hood’, ‘Robyn Hode’, or even ‘Robin Hood’ itself, and some of these
were indeed criminals, but nothing really conclusive came of these searches,
though they did perhaps fuel the speculation that surrounds this mystery
man.

Sherwood Forest is now a country park, but once it was reputed to be Robin’s
base of operations, and the Nottingham Castle often depicted in films no
longer exists, demolished in 1679 by the Duke of Newcastle to be replaced by
an elegant palace that now serves as a museum and art gallery. Only Edward’s
Tower, the Black Tower, the Gatehouse, and parts of the ancient curtain wall
and moat remain. Just outside the massive walls is a statue of Robin , bow
drawn and arrow fixed.

Folklore has it that, unlike the movies, in real life Robin and his men
rarely went near Nottingham, because it was too risky. Stories do abound,
though, of his exploits, such as his taking part in an archery match that
the Sheriff of Nottingham had staged just to catch him. Well enough
disguised, in tattered clothes, Robin Hood won and the sheriff handed him
the prize without knowing how close he was to capturing his tormentor.

Another time, Robin and his band swept into Nottingham just in time to
rescue Will Stutely, one of his ‘merry men’, from the hangman’s noose.
Nottingham is an old town, and Robin Hood is said have prayed at the
medieval church of St. Mary, and used Ye Olde Trip to Jerusalem Inn, which
dates from 1189 and is built directly into the Castle Rock. Subterranean
passages (now closed) lead from the inn to the Castle, and it seems certain
that the Sheriff will often have been at the inn himself.

In Robin’s day, Sherwood Forest was much bigger than it is now, and the
‘king’s verderers’, or forest wardens, were feared lawmen who had the
authority to enforce strict laws against poaching, felling trees, or even
possessing a bow and arrows. They served King John, whose Palace, which
again no longer exists, is said to have been located near the King’s royal
hunting lodge in Old Clipstone village, though today there is little of it
left to see.

The Sheriff of Nottingham is reputed to have spent much time there. Richard
the Lionheart came for a summit on returning from the Crusades, and Edward
II often stayed after a day of hunting in the nearby woods. Local people
say that Robin Hood even broke into it one night, to free a group of
villagers who were being held hostage, but the village of Edwinstowe is
really the centre of the Robin Hood legend, being the gateway to Sherwood
Forest.

This village is pure Robin Hood, with St. Mary’s Church, where Robin and
Maid Marian were married, at its very centre. Every tale of this
hero-worshipped outlaw involves Sherwood Forest, which was once. a huge
tract of dense woodland (supposedly the private domain Norman kings)
stretching along the entire western part of Nottinghamshire, and hundreds of
square miles in acreage., though only a small percentage of it survives
today.

The biggest attraction there is the Major Oak, a massive tree thought to be
anywhere from 400 to 1,500 years old, in which, legend has it, Robin and
his men hid from pursuers among the massive branches. It is difficult now to
picture how life might have been for this outlaw group, who famously ‘robbed
from the rich, to give to the poor’, but it can hardly have been as romantic
as the famous films in which Erroll Flynn and Kevin Costner played the part
of Robin.

Was Robin real or honourable, as the tales would have us believe? No one
person can tell you for certain, but if you were to visit the part of
England in which he supposedly lived, you would get a sense of certainty
about him that maybe just can’t exist anywhere else. If it is all truly
just a story of a small-time thief that got blown way of proportion, it
doesn’t really matter.

Children and adults alike will continue to enjoy the fantasy for generations
to come, just because nobody can disprove it. Sherwood Forest still contains
many ancient trees that hold their own impenetrable secrets, and there is
something indefinable about the atmosphere of the place. No folk tale ever
got started without some basis in real life, so there may well have been a
good-hearted robber around at that time. We may just never know, but who
cares? The real Robin Hood lives in our imaginations, and maybe it’s better
that way.