Robin Hood Timeline – A Journey Through History
1. c.1377 The lazy priest Sloth is ignorant of his Paternoster, but knows ‘rymes of Robyn Hood,’ the earliest certain mention of England’s greatest outlaw hero, in William Langland’s Piers Plowman. Its full title is — The Vision of William concerning Piers the Plowman, together with Vita de Do-wel, Do-bet, et Do-best, secundum Wit et Resoun; usually given in Latin as Visio Willelmi de Petro Plowman, &c.; the whole work being sometimes briefly described as Liber de Petro Plowman. Described as a Middle English allegorical narrative poem, the work was written in unrhymed alliterative verse, divided into sections called passus. It is now recognized that there are three existing versions: A, the poem’s short early form, dating from the 1360s; B, a major revision and extension of A made in the late 1370s; and C, a less ‘literary’ version of B dating from the 1380s (Robin appears in B and C), and apparently intended to focus the work’s doctrinal issues. Some scholars think that version C may not be entirely attributable to Langland. Multiple manuscripts of each of these versions survive, although none appear to be in the author’s own hand. Each manuscript is unique, making the textual tradition of Piers Plowman one of the most complex and interesting in medieval English literature. There is also another text known as Z. The poem takes the form of a series of dream visions dealing with the social and spiritual predicament of late 14th-century England. His bitter attacks on political and ecclesiastical corruption (especially among the friars) quickly struck a chord with his contemporaries – a theme that was to continue through the centuries. In the 16th century Piers Plowman was issued as a printed book and was used for apologetic purposes by the early Protestants.
Langland’s authorship is asserted by Walter W. Skeat (1886) who informs us that the work contains several references to the Christian name William: First, the titles and colophons frequently call him Willelmus; Secondly, the author repeatedly calls himself Wille; and in one passage (B. xv. 148) he says ‘I haue lyued in londe, quod I, my name is longe wille,’ which seems to suggests he was tall. Thirdly an old note in MS. Dublin D. 4. I (of the C-text, now MS. 212), in handwriting of the 15th century, records: Memorandum, quod Stacy de Rokayle, pater Willielmi de Langlond, qui Stacius fuit generosus, et morabatur in Schiptone under Whicwode, tenens domini le Spenser in comitatu Oxon., qui predictus Willielmus fecit librum qui vocatur Perys ploughman – ‘It should be noted that Stacy de Rokayle was the father of William de Langlond; this Stacy was of noble birth and dwelt in Shipton-under-Wychwood, a tenant of the Lord Spenser in the county of Oxfordshire. The aforesaid William made the book which is called Piers Plowman’. There is also an old note in one of the Ashburnham MSS. to the effect that ‘Robert or william langland made pers ploughman’ (in a handwriting of the 15th century, on the fly-leaf of a MS. copy [of the B-text] formerly belonging to Lord Ashburnham, and now in the British Museum). In three MSS. (of the C-text; one not later than 1427) occurs the following colophon: ‘Explicit visio Willelmi W. de Petro le Plowman.’ The meaning of W. is unclear; it may mean of Wychwood, or Wigornensis, i.e. of Worcester. John Bale gave him the name Robertus Langlande, as appears from a MS. note in his handwriting in the same Ashburnham MS. Bale in his Scriptorum illustrium majoris Britanniae catalogus (1557–59, reprinted 1977), records that ‘Robertus [?] Langelande, a priest, as it seems [?], was born in the county of Shropshire, at a place commonly known as Mortymers Clibery [i.e. Cleobury Mortimer], in a poor district eight miles from the Malvern hills. I cannot say with certainty whether he was educated until his maturity in that remote and rural locality, or whether he studied at Oxford or Cambridge, though it was a time when learning notably flourished among the masters in those places. This is at all events certain, that he was one of the first followers [?] of John Wiclif; and further, that in his spiritual fervour in opposition to the open blasphemies of the papists against God and his Christ he put forth a pious work worthy the reading of good men, written in the English tongue, and adorned by pleading fashions and figures, which he called ‘The Vision of Peter the Ploughman.’ There is no other work by him. In this learned book he introduced, besides varied and attractive imagery, many predictions which in our time we have seen fulfilled. He finished his work A.D. 1369, when John of Chichester was mayor of London’.
Little is known of Langland’s life, he was born around 1332 and died in about 1400, although there is some belief that he died in 1385 or 1386. Skeat (1886) in his notes on the authors life, reinforces the belief that he was born in Cleobury Mortimer in Shropshire and that his father was Stacy de Rokayle who afterwards held a farm under one of the Despensers in the parish of Shipton-under-Wychwood in Oxfordshire. There is another possibility, the author describes the A version as having been partly composed in May (A. prol. 5) whilst wondering on the Malvern Hills. Skeat thought that he may have attended school at the priory at Great Malvern, or at the lesser one at Little Malvern, which has led to the possibility that his place of birth was in Worcestershire or Herefordshire. He moved to London and lived in Cornhill with his wife Kitte and his daughter Calote ( Skeat; C. vi. 1, 2; xvii. 286; viii. 304 (and note); xxi. 473; B. xviii. 426), and tells us that he lived like a loller or idler. He records that he made his living by going from house to house singing for men’s souls, and was a tonsured clerk; he also has many allusions to his poverty.
Reference is made to Piers Plowman in the uprising of 1381 (see The Many Robin Hoods 3). The first recorded owner of a copy of Piers Plowman was Walter de Brugge, an English-born clergyman and judge in fourteenth-century Ireland, who died in 1396. Robert Crowley (see no. 208 below) may have been the author of a book entitled Pyers plowmans exhortation . . . . of c. 1550. First published by Crowley in 1550, The Vision of Pierce Plowman was an edition so popular, that it was reprinted twice in the same year (following John Bale, Crowley named the author as ‘Robert Langland’ in a prefatory note). The three impressions vary textually, and Crowley may have known of at least four different MSS: two (or possibly three) B versions, on which his edition was largely based, and one MS. each of A and C (Kane and Donaldson 7, King 328-29). In 1560-61 there appeared Owen Rogers’s edition of both The Vision of Pierce Plowman (badly reprinted from Crowley’s third edition) and Pierce the Ploughman’s Crede, an anonymous alliterative verse satire (written between 1393 and 1401) influenced by Langland’s Piers Plowman and by Wycliffite writings (reprinted from Reyner Wolfe’s 1553 edition). In 1813 the best MS. of the C-text appeared in an edition by Dr. Whitaker. In 1842 Mr Thomas Wright printed an edition from an excellent MS. of the B-text in the library of Trinity College, Cambridge (2nd ed., 1856, new ed., 1895). Dr. Morris printed a considerable portion of the A text for the first time in 1867 (Specimens of Early English, Oxford; pp. 249-290). A complete edition of all three texts was printed for the Early English Text Society as edited by the Rev. W. W. Skeat, with the addition of Richard the Redeless, and containing full notes to all three texts, with a glossary and indexes, in 1867-1885. The Clarendon Press edition, by the same editor, appeared in 1886, re-issued in 1954, reprinted as recently as 1979, and was used as a model by one of the two modern scholarly editions of the poem, that of A. V. C. Schmidt (1995). There is a good translation of the B Text by Jonathan F. Goodridge (1959; rev. ed. 1966). A convenient series of selections from the C Text is provided by Elizabeth Salter and Derek Pearsall, eds., in Piers Plowman (1967). George Kane edited the A text in 1960; the B text, edited with E Talbot Donaldson, appeared in 1975; the C text, with George Russell, in 1997. Numerous interpretations of the poem have been undertaken. Representative selections from some of these are provided in Edward Vasta, Interpretations of Piers Plowman, 1968. A good introduction to the poem appears in Raymond W. Chambers, Man’s Unconquerable Mind: Studies of English Writers from Bede to A. E. Housman and W. P. Ker, 1939 (see also, Derek Pearsall, Piers Plowman: the C-text Corrected, Exeter medieval English texts and studies (University of Exeter Press, 1994); Charlotte Brewer, Editing Piers Plowman: the evolution of the text, Cambridge studies in medieval literature 28 (Cambridge University Press, 1996); A. V. C. Schmidt (ed.), Piers Plowman: a new translation of the B-text, Oxford world’s classics (Oxford University Press, 2000); J. A. Burrow, ‘The structure of Piers Plowman B XV-XX: evidence from the rubrics’, Medium Ævum 77 306-12, 2008; Linne Mooney, Estelle Stubbs and Simon Horobin, Late Medieval English Scribes: CUL MS Gg.4.31, 2011). The so called Z-text of Piers Plowman, discovered in the 1980s, was found in MS. Bodley 851, and is of greatly contested authorship. Within the text there is an inscription which identifies the manuscript as the property of Brother John Wells, a Monk of Ramsey, who was possibly an Oxford scholar and opponent of Wyclif (see also: A. G. Rigg and C. Brewer (eds), Piers Plowman; the Z version, Toronto, 1983; A. V. C. Schmidt, (ed.), Piers Plowman / a parallel-text edition of the A, B, C and Z versions, London, Longman, 1995). There is (possibly) a record of Robin Hood that is earlier than Piers Plowman, in the correspondence that records ‘Robin Oed’s Bay‘.
2. 1390? A Robin Hood quotation in Cambridge University Library.
3. 1400? A date for the composition of the Gest, suggested by scholars such as F. J. Child and J. C. Holt. More recently, a later date has been suggested (see Robin Hood: A Complete Study of the English Outlaw, Stephen Knight, Oxford, 1994, pp. 46-8; Robin Hood: The Early Poems, 1465-1560: Texts, Contexts, and Ideology, Thomas H. Ohlgren and Lister M. Matheson,Newark: University of Delaware Press, 2007; Early Rymes of Robyn Hood: An Edition of the Texts, ca. 1425 to ca. 1600, Thomas H. Ohlgren and Lister M. Matheson, Medieval and Renaissance Texts and Studies, 2013).
4. c.1400-25 ‘Robyn hod in scherewod stod’ written in a Lincoln Cathedral manuscript, the first of many similar phrases (see no. 13 below).
5. c.1405-10 The author of the religious work Dives and Pauper, castigates those who would rather go to the tavern to hear a tale or song of Robyn Hood, than hear Mass. This long prose treatise which explores the meaning of the Ten Commandments, was written in Middle English, in dialogue form, by an unknown author. The only comparable work may be John Wyclif’s De mandatis divinis. Dives and Pauper opens with a fairly short dialogue, ‘Holy Poverty’, in which the speakers are, as in the body of the treatise, Dives, a rich layman, and Pauper, a well read poor preacher. Dives sets out to prove that Pauper, a learned man, is a fool because he fails to make use of his intellect to gain wealth for himself. In reply, Pauper rebukes the arguments of Dives and tries to prove that Dives is a fool because, in pursuing worldly gain, he risks his chance of ‘heuene blysse’ in the life after death. The work survives in eight manuscripts and several manuscript fragments, all dating within the first two thirds of the fifteenth century. The only other printed texts were by Richard Pynson (ed., at Temple Bar, London, 1493) which was based on Bodleian MS. Eng. th. d. 36,5 and simply reset by Wynken de Worde (ed., Westminster, London, 1496), and again by Thomas Berthelet (ed., Fletestreet, London, 1536 (see, Dives and Pauper, ed., Priscilla Heath Barnum (Volume 1, Part 1) published for The Early English Text Society, Oxford University Press, 1976; Dives and Pauper, ed., Priscilla Heath Barnum (Volume 1, Part 2) published for The Early English Text Society, Oxford University Press, 1980; Dives and Pauper, ed., Priscilla Heath Barnum (Volume 2) published for The Early English Text Society, Oxford University Press, 2004).
6. c.1405-10 Hugh Legat (fl. 1400) a Benedictine monk of St Albans Abbey, composed a vernacular sermon in which he quoted: ‘for mani, manime seith, spekith of Robyn Hood that schotte never in his bowe’ (Three Middle English Sermons from the Worcester Chapter MS. F. 10, ed. D. M. Grisdale, Leeds, 1939, p.8). Little is known of Legat’s life, he was probably a native of Hertfordshire, and may have been a member of the family which held a manor at Abbots Walden in that county, belonging to the monks of St. Albans. According to John Bale (Scriptorum illustrium majoris Britanniae catalogus (1557–59, reprinted 1977), he was brought up in the monastery school at St. Albans, where he displayed a strong love for learning, and went with the abbots leave to pursue his studies at Oxford. Legat’s first appearance in the St. Alban’s records occurs in 1401, in the list of the electors of William Heyworth as abbot. He probably went to Oxford no later than 1405, as he had completed his bachelor degree in theology by 1412. There he remained for several years, not to complete another degree, but by his own account, to take advantage of the favourable conditions to devote himself to the study of the classics. He was the author of at least one model letter of rhetorical style, commentaries on the Architrenius of Jean de Hauteville and Boethius’ Consolatio (now lost), together with several Latin and English sermons. A contemporary of Thomas Walsingham the historian (precentor of the abbey), Legat may have fallen foul of abbot Heyworth’s successor John Wheathampstead. Legat was removed from St. Albans to serve the neighbouring dependent cell of Redbourne, then in 1427 he was sent to the cell of the abbey at Tynemouth. Legat’s sermons were circulated amongst monasteries in the south-west and survive in collections compiled at St. Peter’s, Gloucester, and Worcester (see A Monastic Renaissance at St Albans: Thomas Walsingham and His Circle C.1350-1440, James, G. Clark, Oxford (2004); Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Volume 32, by Robin Hood was almost certainly known to Geoffrey Chaucer, as a variant of Legat’s proverb appears in his Troilus and Criseyde of the 1380s.
7. 1417 Two royal writs of 1417 and a further letter of 1429 refer to a renegade chaplain of Linfield in Sussex. Robert Stafford assumed the name of ‘Frere Tuk’ and committed several crimes in Surrey and Sussex with his retinue.
8. 1419-20 A similar version of Legate’s proverb (see no. 6 above) appears in Reply of Friar Daw Topias to Jack Upland.
9. c.1420 Andrew of Wyntoun (c.1350 – c.1423) a Scotsman, was the first chronicler/historian to mention Robin Hood. In his Orygynale Cronykil of Scotland, he locates Robin Hood and Little John in Barnsdale and Inglewood in c. 1283. There is also a mysterious entry concerning Hude of Edname (an unknown place) who helped Alexander Ramsay take Roxburgh in 1342. This is regarded as a reference to Robin Hood in David Laing’s edition, as can be seen in his index (vol. 3, p. 415). Wyntoun himself tells us that he was a canon at St. Andrews, and then became prior of St. Sers Inch at Loch Leven. The exact period during which he held the office of Prior is uncertain, but it appears that from 1395 to 1413, he publicly acted in that capacity. The first to place Robin in an historical context, his metrical history was written at the request of his patron Sir John Wemyss of Leuchars, Fife. The latter part of his Chronicle at least, was written when he approached old age. His first intention was apparently to limit his work to seven books, but afterwards changed to nine books. The last lines of Book Nine suggest that the work was finished after the death of Robert Duke of Albany, and before the return of James I from his captivity in England, or between the third of September 1420 and April 1424. In reference to the title of his work, Wyntoun explains that it is called ‘Orygynale’ not because it was his own composition, but because it is a history from the beginning, or as he saw it, from the creation of angles. One of the few long examples of Middle Scots writing, and written in eight-syllabled couplets, the Chronicle is a prime historical source for the later 14th and early 15th centuries. It contains a valued account of the death of the Scottish hero Robert Bruce, and is the original source for the encounter between Macbeth and the weird sisters that appears in Shakespeare’s Macbeth. David Laing lists eleven surviving manuscripts, although not all are complete: The Royal Manuscript (British Museum); The Lansdowne Manuscript (British Museum); The Cottonian Manuscript (British Museum); The St. Andrews Manuscript (University Library of St. Andrews); First Edinburgh Manuscript (Advocates Library Edinburgh); Second Edinburgh Manuscript (Advocates Library Edinburgh); The Wemyss Manuscript (Wemyss Castle, Fife); The Auchinleck Manuscript (The library of Sir Alexander Boswell of Auchinleck, Bart., now the property of Mr. John Ferguson, Duns, Berwickshire); The Harleian Manuscript; The Panmure Manuscript (belonging to the Earl of Dalhousie); and the Seton Manuscript (bought by Laing from Mr. T. Rodd, who purchased it at the sale of Mr. George Chalmers’s library in 1842). The first edition of the Chronicle (based on the Royal manuscript) was published by David Macpherson (London, 2 vols., 1795); the second edition was produced by David Laing (‘The Historians of Scotland’, Edinburgh, 3 vols., 1872-79); the current standard edition was edited by F. J. Amours for the Scottish Text Society as The Original Chronicle of Andrew of Wyntoun: Printed on Parallel Pages from the Cottonian and Wemyss MSS., with the Variants of the Other Texts (Edinburgh, 6 vols., 1903-14).
10. 1422 A cartulary of Monkbretton Priory mentions a stone of Robert Hode in the fields of Slephill in Barnsdale.
11. c.1425 A manuscript of Troilus and Criseyde with a reference to the proverb of Robyn Hood (see no. 8 above, and no. 19 below).
12. 1426-27 Exeter, Devon: The first know occurrence of Robin Hood plays or games in the Municipal Records that mention twenty pence being paid lusoribus ludentibus lusum Robyn Hode – ‘for the players playing the play (or game) of Robin Hood’ (in the presence of the Mayor); Exeter Receivers Rolls – cited in C. Radford, ‘Early Drama in Exeter’, Transactions of the Devonshire Assoc. 67 (1935) 367. This section contains information found in The Early Plays of Robin Hood, David Wiles, Cambridge, (1981), pp. 43 and 64, and Robin Hood a Mythic Biography, Stephen Knight, Cornell University Press, (2003), Chapter 1, p. 8. See also [The Records of Early English Drama Project, University of Toronto (REED), Devon, 89].
13. 1429 ‘Robin Hode in Barnesdale stode’ is quoted by a judge in the Court of Common Pleas, the first of many similar phrases to appear in English courts. (see W. C. Bolland and J. Ritson). This is a later variant of no. 4 above.
14. 1432 In the return of members of parliament for Wiltshire, a humorous clerk included ‘Adam, Belle, Clyme, Ocluw, Willyam, Cloudesle, Robyn, hode, Inne, Grenewode, Stode, Godeman, was, hee, lytel, Joon, Muchette, Millersson, Scathelok, Reynoldyn’ (Public Record Office, C219/14/3, part 2, no, 101). As well as an early mention of Robin Hood, this clerk gives us the first known reference to the outlaws in the tale of Adam Bell, Clim of the Clough and William of Cloudesley. His mention of Little John, Much the Miller’s son, Scatheloke and Reynolde, suggest he may also have know of a version of the Gest –Little John calls himself ‘Reynolde Grenelef’ in his encounter with the sheriff (stanza 149) and ‘Reynolde’ appears as a character distinct from Little John in stanza 293. Also ‘Robyn, hode, Inne, Grenewode, Stode’ is a variant of the earlier phrase (see no. 13 above).
15. 1438 The Aberdeen M S. Council Register in 1438 has a case in which a ship called ‘Robyne hude’ or ‘ly Robert hude’ figures, Vol. IV pp. 133, 134. (Mediaeval Plays in Scotland, A. J. Mill, Edinburgh, 1927, p. 23). The naming of this ship is probably due to the legend.
16. 1439 Piers Venables assembled many misdoers and ‘in manere of insurrection, wente into the wodes in that contre, like as it hadde be Robyn hode and his meyne’.
17. 1440s The Scotsman Walter Bower (1385-1449) was the second chronicler/historian to mention Robin Hood (see no. 9 above), in his Scotichronicon, a long history of Scotland written in Latin, in which Robin and Little John are placed among the disinherited of the 1260s. His recitation of Robin’s exploits, such as hearing mass in a secluded woodland spot, gives us the only record of a play/song/tale that has not survived. He also mentions ‘comedies and tragedies,’ a revelation about the diversity of the legend at this time. The most elaborate work of literature to survive from before the Reformation of 1560 in Scotland, the Scotichronicon is a national treasure for the information it provides.
Bower himself tells us that he was born in Haddington in East Lothian in 1385. Nothing is known of his parentage, though he was possibly related to John Bowmaker rector of Monyabroch, and Alexander Bowmaker, an Augustinian canon of St. Andrews and teacher of law in the university there. The Scotichronicon (probably meaning ‘A History Book for Scots’) was composed while Bower was serving as abbot of the Augustinian abbey on Inchcolm, an island in the Firth of Forth. A law and theology graduate of the new university of St. Andrews in East Fife (founded 1410), he played a prominent part in the royal administration of the country under King James I until that king’s murder in 1437. By the early 1440s he appears to have been involved in the affairs of the minority government of the young James II. In the 1440s, he must have undertaken his first known literary task, the compilation on Inchcolm of the Scotichronicon. Bower first had his scribe copy out the works written in the 1360s by the earlier Scottish chronicler John of Fordun. In his Prologue Bower tells us that his initial aim was to transcribe a copy of Fordun’s Chronicle in five booksand to continue it (in fact for a total of eleven more Books), making use of what are now called Fordun’s Annals. With the help of a single scribe throughout, he produced and revised his vast book in the years up to his death in 1449, making additions to Fordun’s work. Bower contributed more and more as Fordun’s work became more scrappy after the mid-twelfth century, until he ended with contemporary history of his own period down to 1437.
Bower must have known of the Original Chronicle of Andrew of Wyntoun, as both had been canons of St Andrews; their respective dating for Robin’s activities is not far apart (see no. 9 above). Although there is a close similarity in the selection of topics for inclusion in the two chronicles, Bower is scarcely if ever dependent of Wyntoun for his information or interpretation. Of the six surviving manuscripts, the Cambridge, Corpus Christi College MS. 171, is apparently Bowers own. The first part of the Fordun-Bower corpus of manuscripts to be printed was published in Oxford in 1691 by Thomas Gale (1635/6-1702). Included in his Historiae Britannicae, Saxonicae, Anglo-Danicae Scriptores, is a text of Fordun’s Chronicle from book I to book V Chapter 11 inclusive. In 1722 Thomas Hearne published the Chronica Gentis Scotorum of John of Fordun (most of which had been incorporated by Bower in his book) which Hearne wrongly and confusingly called the Scotichronicon. It was not until 1759 that the whole work of Scotichronicon was printed in two folio volumes in Edinburgh under the editorship of Walter Goodall, titled Joannis de Fordun Scotichronicon cum Supplementis et Continuatione Walteri Boweri. There were plans for a new edition and important groundwork on some of the manuscripts was published in 1885 by David Murray in The Black Book of Paisley and Other Manuscripts of the Scotichronicon. Goodall’s edition remained the only full version of Bower’s work with no English translation until the 1980s, with the publication of the first of several volumes under the general editorship of D E R Watt. There is also a shortened version of the full text which by 1444 was being prepared by Bower for readers who wanted a less lengthy work. This survives in its fullest form as copied (before 1480) in the Coupar Angus MS. (Edinburgh, National Library of Scotland, Adv. MS. 35. 1. 7), also known as the Book of Cupar. Another work, the Liber Pluscardensis by an unknown author, is founded mainly on Bower’s Scotichronicon, but in some passages is a first hand narrative by the chronicler as an eye-witness of the events he describes. Here we see the entry for Robin Hood, but no mention of Little John. This work survives in six manuscripts, and was possibly compiled as early as 1461. It was first printed in part (the eleventh book) for the Maitland Club by Mr. Joseph Stevenson (The Life and Death of King James the First of Scotland, 1837), and first edited as a complete work by Felix J. H. Skene (Vol. 1, Edinburgh, William Paterson, 1877). Another version of the Scotichronicon is the Extracta e Variis Cronicis Scocie probably written in the early sixteenth century. It was published by the Abbotsford Club in 1842, and edited by W. B. D. D. Turnbull, from a manuscript that was in the possession of the Sinclair family of Roslyn, and now in the Advocates Library. In the introduction Turnbull notes that on the flyleaf at the beginning of the manuscript volume, and in other places, is written ‘W. Sanctclair of Roislin, knecht,’ Furthermore Turnbull also mentions annotations made throughout the manuscript by William Sinclair (x-xiii). The Robin Hood passage in Extracta only consists of Bower’s story of Robin’s veneration of the Mass, and links Robin and other outlaws with Simon de Montfort’s rebellion. Against this passage Sinclair has written ‘1255. Robert Hwd and Lytell Jhon ves alywe in Bernesdall and Plwmden Park. Anno Domini 1265. Robert Hwyd wes forfaltit for fechten in batell aganes the Kyng of Ingland at Heweshame’.
18. 1441 A group of labourers in Norfolk blocked the highway threatening to murder a certain Sir Geoffrey Harsyk and were fiercely singing: ‘We are Robynhodesmen, war, war, war’ (King’s Bench Roll, 1441).
19. c.1450 A manuscript of Troilus and Criseyde which reads ‘Thei spekyn of Robynhod but thei bente never his bowe’, another reference to the proverb (see no. 11 above).
20. 1450 The nickname Robin Hood used by one of the captains involved in an abortive rising in eastern Kent (Lordship and Learning: studies in memory of Trevor Aston, edited by Ralph Evans, Boydell Press, 2004, p. 175).
21. c.1450 A probable date for the ballad Robin Hood and the Monk (see The Rhymes of Robin Hood 10).
22. c.1450 The tale of Robyn and Gandeleyn, possibly an illusion to Robin Hood and Gamelyn (see The Tale of Gamelyn).
23. c.1452 A poem of sixteen lines refers to Robin Hood and Geoffrey Coke in an account of the royal household. Part of a document sold at Sotheby’s in 1980, it was bought by Bernard Quaritch Ltd for Professor T. Takamiya. In an article published in 1989, Holt and Takamiya suggest that the poem was a ‘Rhyme of Robin Hood,’ a hitherto unrecorded manuscript version of an unrhymed nonsense carol. The document also contains the names of royal yeomen or other household officials, and information about these men establishes that the account was drawn up before August 1457, and probably before May 1452. The poem is written in a fifteenth century hand, possibly not much later than the hand of the account. Part of the poem appears later in John Rastell’s Interlude of the Four Elements (see no. 121 below). Holt and Takamiya suggest that the two opening lines were taken from A Gest of Robyn Hode: The equivalent lines in Rastell’s text are indicated as R 1-20.
| R1 Robyn Hudde in Bernsdale stode* |
| 2 He leynyd hym tyll a maple thystyll |
| 3 Then came owre lady and swete seynt Andrew |
| 4 Slepes thow wakes thow Geffrey Coke |
| 5 A hundreth wynter the water was brawde |
| 6 I cannot tell yow how depe |
| 7 He toke a gose neck in hys hond |
| 8 And ouer the water he went |
| 13 Jack boy ys thy boo i-broke |
| 14 Or hase any man done the wryugulde wrage |
| 19 He toke a bend boo in hys hond |
| 20 And set hym down by Þe fyre |
| — My dame began to spyn a threde |
| — Hyr nose stode all acrokyd into the sowth |
| — Who dar be so harde darde |
| — As to cack under the walles of Dover |
*Here again is the well known phrase (see no. 14 above). Holt and Takamiya see the poem as a ‘manifestation of a varying tradition, and that tradition had some literary quality’. On the other hand Thomas Ohlgren states that it ‘bares (other than the first two verses) absolutely no resemblance to any known Robin Hood poem. Lacking a rhyme scheme and coherence, it can hardly be called a poem at all’ (see English Manuscript Studies 1100-1700, Vol 1, Peter Beal and Jeremy Griffiths, ‘A New Version of A Rhyme of Robin Hood’, J. C. Holt and Toshiyuki Takamiya, Oxford, 1989, pp. 213-221; Robin Hood: The Early Poems, 1465-1560 : Texts, Contexts, and Ideology, Thomas H. Ohlgren and Lister M. Matheson, Newark: University of Delaware Press, 2007, p. 20.
24. 15th century Robin Hood mentioned in Burlesques; the reference to ‘Combur’ (p. 84) must be Cumberland, the setting for Adam Bell (see no. 14 above) and Inglewood (in Cumberland) is a setting for Robin Hood (see no. 9 above). The reference to Robin Hood in MS Porkington, No. 10. f. 152 (p. 85) also appears in A Lytell Geste of Robin Hode: With Other Ancient & Modern Ballads …, vol. 1, p. 55, John Mathew Gutch, London, 1847; the manuscript is available on the National Library of Wales website, where it is now called Brogyntyn ii. 1; the reference to Robin Hood is on f. 153 r. (see ‘Robin Hood in Outlaw/ed Spaces: Media, Performance, and Other New Directions’, edited by Lesley Coote and Valerie B. Johnson, with an article by Stephen Knight, pp. 192-3: Routledge, 2017.
25. 15th century A Gest of Robin Hood referred to in How the Plowman learned his Pater Noster, obviously influenced by Piers Plowman (see no. 1 above), printed by Wynkyn de Worde in 1510 (see also ‘How the Plowman Learned His Paternoster’, in The Oxford Book of Medieval English Verse, ed. C. Sisam and K. Sisam (Oxford, 1970), pp. 514-21).
26. 15th century Robin Hood mentioned in Song on Women.
27. 15th century A manuscript of Robin Hood and Guy of Gisborne rescued from destruction in a Shropshire house by Thomas Percy, bishop of Dromore, Ireland (see also The Dramatic Fragment and no. 104 below).
28. c.1460’s In 2009 Julian Luxford ( University of St Andrews) announced the discovery of the following note in a copy of Ranulf Higden’s Polychronicon: Circa h[ec] temp[or]a vulg[us] opinat[ur] que[n]da[m] exlegatu[m] dict[um] Robyn hode cu[m] suis co[m]plicib[us] assiduis latrocinijs apud shirwode & alibi regios fideles Anglie infestasse (Eton College MS 213, f. 234r). Luxford’s translation reads: ‘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’ (for the full article see J.M. Luxford / Journal of Medieval History 35 (2009) 70–76). As Luxford points out, the note was written (possibly by a monastic in the 1460s) in the margin of that part of Higden’s history that referred to the reign of Edward I, placing Robin between the years 1294 and 1299. Furthermore he suggested that the note showed a wholly negative opinion about Robin, but another translation (Paul Booth, 2013) may suggest otherwise: ‘Around this time, according to popular opinion, a certain outlaw named Robin Hood, with his accomplices, constantly attacked and stole from the faithful (servants) of the king of England at Sherwood and elsewhere’.
29. 1460-80 Robin Hood is substituted for Bevis of Hampton in a manuscript of The Canterbury Tales.
30. 1471 The Compound of Alchymie; or, the Twelve Gates leading to the Discovery of the Philosopher’s Stone,dedicated to Edward IV, is the best known work of the Yorkshireman Sir George Ripley (c. 1415 – 1490), an Augustinian canon and influential alchemist, who gives us yet another variant of the Robin Hood proverb (see no. 19 above). Ripley apparently travelled to Italy and Germany where he acquired the necessary alchemical knowledge to compose his works, which were undertaken upon his return to England. The Compound, composed in Middle English verse dated 1471, was translated into Latin as the Liber duodecim portarum. Latin translations of Ripleian works were already circulating in manuscript in France and Italy by the early 1570s. There was an English print edition by Ralph Rabbards (George Ripley, the Compound of Alchymy … Divided into twelue gates … Set foorth by Raph Rabbards Gentleman, studious and expert in archemicall artes (London, 1591), and Elias Ashmole (Teatrum Chemicum Britannicum. Containing severall poeticall pieces of our famous English philosophers, who have written the hermetique mysteries in their owne ancient language …, London, 1652). Rabbards’ text is reproduced with some spelling emendations in a more recent edition (George Ripley’s Compound of Alchemy (1591) ed. Stanton J. Linden, Aldershot, 2001). Over the period 1595–1649, the Liber duodecim portarum was published in three Latin editions. Two of these, edited by the Frenchmen Bernard Gilles Penot (c . 1522–1620) and Nicolas Barnaud (c. 1539–1604?), were subsequently reprinted in the monumental Theatrum chemicum, ensuring wide diffusion throughout the seventeenth century.
Other works by Ripley include: The Marrow of Alchemy, or Medulla philosophiae chemicae, published in 1614, and Liber Secretissimus, which has the subtitle, ‘The Whole Work of the Composition of the Philosophical Stone and Grand Elixir, and of the First Solution of the Grosse Bodies.’ The ‘Ripley scrolls’ were copied for the most part in the 16th and early 17th centuries by various artists from a now lost original version (or versions). Although they are named after George Ripley, there is no evidence that Ripley designed the scrolls himself. The dense imagery of the alchemical emblems derives from Ripley’s poetry and illustrates the various processes involved in the preparation of the philosopher’s stone. Twenty-three of these scrolls are now known to exist. The Bodleian houses five of them; others are held in various institutions in Britain, America and France. His Alchemical writings were studied by many notable people, including Robert Boyle (considered to be the first modern chemist), John Dee, and Isaac Newton (see Jennifer M. Rampling, Early Science and Medicine 17, Brill (2012), pp, 477-499; Jennifer M. Rampling, ‘Establishing the Canon: George Ripley and His Alchemical Sources,’ Ambix, 55 (2008), 189-208; eadem, ‘Catalogue of the Ripley Corpus: Alchemical Writings Attributed to George Ripley (d. c. 1490),’ Ambix, 57 (2010), 125-201; Lawrence M. Principe, ‘Ripley, George,’ in Claus Priesner and Karin Figala, eds., Alchimie. Lexicon einer hermetischen Wissenschaft (Munich, 1998), 305-6; Joachim Telle, ‘Ripley, George,” in Lexikon des Mittelalters, vol. 7 (Munich, 1995), 861.
31. 1473 ‘Seynt Jorge and Robyn Hod and the Shryff off Notyngham’ appears in a letter written by Sir John Paston to his brother. The famous Paston letters give us an invaluable insight into life at the time. They consist of a large quantity of correspondence between the Paston family, members of the gentry of Norfolk, and others connect with them, as well as some state paters and other important documents. Written between the years 1422 and 1509, they were first published by John Fenn across some 5 volumes, beginning in 1787. A more accurate edition in three volumes by James Gairdner (London, 1872-1875) contained over four hundred letters for the first time. A new and complete edition of six volumes, containing 1088 letters and papers, edited by Gairdner in 1904, is considered an authority. Subsequent works include those of Norman Davis (Clarendon Press 1971-1976) and Richard Beadle and Colin Richmond (Oxford, 2005).
32. 1474-75 Thame, Oxfordshire: 26s. 9d. received of Robin Hood’s Ale at Whitsun [W. P. Ellis, ‘The Churchwardens Accounts of the Parish of St. Mary Thame, Commencing in the Year 1442,’ Berkshire Buckinghamshire, and Oxfordshire Archaeological Journal 19 (1913), 22].
33. c. 1475 The only surviving text of an authentic medieval play, which records the first known instance of Friar Tuck in the Robin Hood saga; commonly known as The Dramatic Fragment.
34. 1476-77 Croscombe, Somerset: St. Mary’s churchwarden’s accounts record 40s. of ‘Roben Hod’s recones’ from Thomas Blower and John Hill; Hill was churchwarden that year [The Records of Early English Drama Project, University of Toronto (REED), Somerset, 86]. One of the earliest known references to the impersonation of Robin Hood in village plays.
35. 1480s John Rous (c.1411-1491), or Rows as he called himself, was an antiquarian born in Warwick. He placed Robin Hood and Little John in the reign of Edward I or Edward II, which he recorded in his history of the Earls of Warwick known as The Rous Roll or the ‘Warwick Rolls’. They exists in two parallel versions. The English version was in the library of the Duke of Manchester, but is now in the British Library (B. L., Add. MS. 48976; see C. E. Wright, ‘The Rous Roll: The English Version’, British Museum Quarterly, xx (1955-6), 77-80), and the Latin version has been in the possession of the College of Arms since 1786 (A. G. B. Russell, ‘The Rous Roll’, Burlington Magazine xxx (1917), 23-31, with illustrations). The two versions appear to have been written during the reign of Richard III, and the last portion between September 1483 and April 1484 (Rous mentions Richard’s son, Edward, created Prince of Wales on 9th September 1483, but did not know of his death in the following April). Both were written on rolls of parchment, and are elaborately illustrated with the portraits and heraldic badges not only of the earls of Warwick, but of many British and English kings before the time of Henry VII. An imperfect copy of the English version is in Lansdowne MS. 882, from which Thomas Hearne printed extracts in an appendix to his Historia Ricardi II (1729). A better transcript by Robert Glover is among the Ashmolean MSS. 839, No. 8. The English version (in the possession of the Duke of Manchester) was first printed by William Pickering (London, 1845), with the title ‘This rol was laburd & finished by Master John Rows of Warrewyk.’ It was published with an introduction by William Courthope in 1859; this was published again in 1980 as ‘The Rous Roll’ with an introduction by Charles Ross. As for the Latin version, some of the drawings have been reproduced from it by James Dallaway (Inquiries Into the Origin and Progress of the Science of Heraldry in England … (London, 1793). Two appear in Charles William Spicer’s History of Warwick Castle (Westminster, 1844) and in Caroline Halsted’s Richard III as Duke of Gloucester and King of England (2 vols., London, 1844). A transcript, made in 1636, by William Dugdale (who freely used all Rous’s extant collections in his Antiquities of Warwickshire) is in the Bodleian Library (Ashmol. MS. G. 2). Some portions are printed in the notes to Courthope’s ‘Rows Rol.’
Rous was educated at Oxford, and in about 1445 he was appointed a priest or chaplain of the chantry or chapel at Guy’s Cliffe, formerly called Gibcliff, near Warwick, which Richard Beauchamp, earl of Warwick (d. 1439), built in 1423. He was appointed either by Earl Richard or his son, Duke Henry, last male of the Beauchamp line (d. 1446). During his forty or more years at Guy’s Cliffe, Rous devoted much of his energy to antiquarian studies, and in writing the ‘Warwick Rolls’, he derived his information from a variety of sources. He made a number of journeys to consult chronicles, and occasionally records. Places he visited include London (where he saw an elephant), North Wales and Anglesey, and Glastonbury Abbey. Among the other surviving works of John Rous is Historia Regum Angliæ, a history of the kings of England, which is extant in manuscript in the British Museum (Cotton. MS. Vesp. A. xii). A transcript supposed to have been made for Archbishop Parker, is in the library of Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, and another transcript, made by Ralph Jennings, is now in the Bodleian Library. The latter was printed by Hearne in 1716 (2nd edit. 1745). Apparently Rous also wrote a life of Richard Beauchamp, earl of Warwick, which is now in Cotton. MS. Jul. E. iv. It is adorned by fifty-three drawings of the earl’s adventures, followed by two pages of pedigree ornamented with half-length figures of the persons mentioned. All the designs, with Rous’s text, are engraved in Joseph Strutt’s A Compleat View of the Manners, Customs, Arms, Habits . . . . (2 vols., London, 1775). The text alone figures in Hearne’s ‘Historia Ricardi,’ 1729, ii. 359–71. Unfortunately all of Rous’s other works, together with his library, housed in a room above the north porch of St. Mary’s Church, Warwick, were destroyed in the disastrous fire which devastated most of Warwick in 1691 (see The Itinerary of John Leland . . . . 1535-43, ed. Lucy Toulmin Smith (5 vols., 1907-10), ii, 157, 165-6; T. D. Kendrick, British Antiquity (1930), 19; Victoria County History, Warwickshire, viii, 513, 534). Rous also wrote a treatise, ‘De Episcopis Wigorniæ,’ a few extracts from which are in Ashmolean MS. 770, f. 33. The work is lost; but a quotation from it is preserved in Robert Plot’s ‘Natural History of Staffordshire’ (Oxford, 1686, p. 407). John Leland also ascribes to him works on the antiquity of the town of Warwick, on the antiquity of Guy’s Cliffe, against a false history of the university of Cambridge, an unfinished account of the antiquities of the English universities, a chronicle which he entitled ‘Verovicum,’ and a tract on giants, especially of those who lived after the flood (Leland, Collectanea, iv. 110, 211, 221). Information on Rous was found in The Rous Roll with an introductionby Charles Ross, Alan Sutton Publishing Limited, 1980; Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Volume 49.
36. 1481-82 Croscombe, Somerset: 40s. 4d. collected from John Halse and Roger Morris ‘for Robin Hod’s revel.’ Morris was a churchwarden that year [The Records of Early English Drama Project (REED), University of Toronto, Somerset, 87]. This money is designated ‘Roben Hode money’ [REED: Somerset, 87].
37. 1482-83 Croscombe, Somerset: 33s. 4d. received of Robin Hood [REED: Somerset, 87].
38. 1483-84 Croscombe, Somerset: 23s. received of Richard Wills who ‘was Robin Hood’ [REED: Somerset, 87].
39. 1484-85 Croscombe, Somerset: 23s. 8d. received of Robin Hood [REED: Somerset, 88].
40. 1485 + A pasture described as ‘Robynhode Closse’ occurs in the Nottingham civic Chamberlains accounts.
41. 1486 Henry VII was met by the earl of Northumberland and a right great and noble company on Barnsdale, ‘ a litill beyonde Robyn Haddez-ston ’
42. 1486-87 Croscombe, Somerset: £3 6s. 8½d. received of William Windsor as Robin Hood. Windsor was a former churchwarden [REED: Somerset, 88].
43. 1487-88 Exeter, Devon: St. Johns Bow churchwardens accounts include 5s. received from a play called ‘Robyn Hode’ [REED: Devon, 108].
44. 1488-89 Croscombe, Somerset: £3 7s. 8d, received of Robin Hood [REED: Somerset, 88].
45. 1490-91 Croscombe, Somerset: 50s. received for Robin Hood [REED: Somerset, 88].
46. 1492 The date Wynkyn de Worde took control of William Caxton’s printing business in London. Wynkyn is perceived as being the first to print an edition of the Gest, but this has been disputed (see Early Editions of the Gest and The Rhymes of Robin Hood 9).
47. 1492 Edinburgh, Lothian: Robert Coupland is made a citizen by George Martin as Robin Hood [Anna Jean Mill, Medieval Plays in Scotland (Edinburgh and London: W. Blackwood and Sons, 1927), 219].
48. 1494 Edinburgh, Lothian: John Smollet and John Seton are made citizens by George Martin as Robin Hood; John Carmure is made a citizen by Andrew Bertram as Robin Hood; [Mill, Medieval Plays, 219].
49. 149? Edinburgh, Lothian: William Dixon is made a citizen by Andrew Bertram as Robin Hood; James Thompson is made a citizen by Alexander Crawford as Robin Hood [Mill, Medieval Plays, 219].
50. 1494-95 Croscombe, Somerset: 46s. 8d. received of Robin Hood [REED: Somerset, 88].
51. c. 1495-1500 Possibly the first printed version of the Gest by Richard Pynson (see no. 46 above).
52. 1496-97 Thame, Oxfordshire: 14s. profits gathered by Robin Hood at the May Ale at Whitsun [References courtesy of Alexandra F. Johnston].
53. 1497-98 Roger Marshall of Wednesbury, Staffordshire, defended himself in the Court of the Star Chamber, on a charge of leading a riotous assembly to Willenhall under the name of Robin Hood.
54. c. 1497-98 Wells, Somerset: Money derived from a ‘tempus de Robynhode’ [Henry T. Riley, ‘The Corporation of Wells, Somerset,’ 1st Report, HMC(1874), p. 107]. This probably refers to plays or games of Robin Hood.
55. 1498 Wells, Somerset: Corporation Act Book records inquiry to be made into the whereabouts of money coming from Robin Hood, the dancing girls, the church’s public ale, and such like [REED: Somerset, 252].
56. c. 1498-99 Reading, Berkshire: In the receipts of the parish of St. Laurence: ‘item receyued of the gaderyng of Robyn Hod’. [St Laurence’s Churchwarden’s Accounts edited by Alexandra F. Johnston, with the permission of the Berkshire County Record Office, corrected in 2015].
57. 1499 Henley-on-Thames, Oxfordshire: Money in the hands of gatherers of the Robin Hood play is to be spent to buy a silver thurible for the church [P. M. Briers, ‘Henley Borough Records. Assembly Books i-iv, 1395-1543,’ Oxfordshire Record Society 41 (1960), 125].
58 c. 1500 Robin Hwd ai kant, ‘Robin Hood sang it’ appears as a tag at the end of Welsh songs put together by the end of the fifteenth century. [Peniarth 53, Prifysgol Cymru, v (Caerdydd, 1927), pp. 51-2]. The Peniarth Manuscripts, also known as the Hengwrt-Peniarth Manuscripts, are a collection of medieval Welsh manuscripts originally collected by Robert Vaughan (c.1592–1667), of Hengwrt, Merionethshire. Now in the National Library of Wales, the collection contains some of the oldest and most important Welsh manuscripts in existence.
59. c. 1500 A manuscript of the ballad Robin Hood and the Potter (see The Rhymes of Robin Hood 10).
60. 1500+ A ‘Robynhode Well’ near Nottingham is mentioned in a presentment at the civic sessions of 20 July 1500, also known as St. Anne’s Well (see Robin Hood Place Names).
61. 1500 Edinburgh, Lothian: Andrew Ross is made a citizen by Robin Hood; James Dun is made a citizen by William Halkston as Little John [Mill, Medieval Plays, 219].
62. 1500 Glastonbury, Somerset: St. John Baptist churchwardens accounts include 40s. received for Robin Hood and the parishioners. 14s. is also paid for a coat for Robin Hood, and 8d. for a pair of lined hose for Robin Hood [REED: Somerset, 126].
63. 1500-1 Croscombe, Somerset: 15s. received of Robin Hood and Little John [REED: Somerset, 89].
64. 1501 The dreamer sees Robin Hood and ‘Gilbert with the quhite hand’ (one of Robin’s men in the Gest) in Venus’s mirror, along with Rauf Coilyear, John the Reeve, Piers Plowman and Finn MacCool, in a rather silly stanza of the poem The Palice of Honour. This poem, in Older Scots, is the earliest work of the Scottish poet, translator, and bishop, Gavin Douglas (c. 1474 – 1522), which was dedicated to King James IV. It has been described as a dream vision, on the theme ‘where does true honour lie.’ A member of a powerful family, he was a younger son of Archibald Douglas, fifth Earl of Angus. It is likely that he was born at Tantallon Castle in East Lothian, that being the chief residence of the Earl of Angus. Douglas matriculated at St. Andrews University in 1490, and completed his master’s degree there in 1494, probably living mainly in Edinburgh in the later 1490s. He was installed as Provost of the collegiate church of St. Giles, in Edinburgh by March 1503, where apparently all his literary work was composed.
Other surviving works attributed to Douglas are: Conscience, King Hart (uncertainly attributed to Douglas), and his major work Eneados, a Scots verse translation of Virgil’s Aeneid, the first direct translation of the whole Aeneidto be made in Britain,his final literary achievement, completed in July 1513. Douglas also played an important part in a troubled period in Scottish history. He abandoned his literary career for political activities after the Battle of Flodden (September, 1513) in which James IV of Scotland was killed, creating a struggle for power between rival Scottish factions. The marriage of the king’s widow, Margaret Tudor, sister of Henry VIII, to Douglas’s nephew, gave the Douglas family almost royal status, and aligned them with the pro-English faction in Scotland. Douglas became bishop of Dunkeld in 1516, and the queen’s chief adviser, becoming involved in a series of intrigues to advance her cause and the power of his family, which led ultimately to his downfall. In 1521 he was forced by political enemies to flee to England, where he remained in exile until his death in London from the plague. In his last years he found comfort in his friendship with an Italian humanist, Polidoro Vergilio. No contemporary manuscripts of The Palis of Honoure are known to exist, but there are complete copies of two sixteenth-century editions entitled: THE / PALIS OF / Honoure Compyled by / Gawyne dowglas Bys- / shope of Dunkyll. / Imprinted at London in / fletstret, at the sygne of / the Rose garland by / wyllyam / Copland. / God saue Quene / Marye. Copland’s edition is dated to c. 1553 (STC 7073), nine copies survive, and are housed at the British Library and the Henry E. Huntington Library; and Heir beginnis / ane Treatise callit the PALICE / of HONOVR, Compylit / be M. GAWINE / DOWGLAS / Bischop of /Dunkeld. / Imprentit at Edin- / burgh be Iohne Ros, / for Henrie Charteris. Anno. 1579. / CUM PRIVILEGIO REGALI. Two copies of Charteris’s edition survive, one at the National Library of Scotland in Edinburgh, and the other at Edinburgh University Library. There is also fragments of an edition printed by Thomas Davidson at Edinburgh, dated to c. 1535 (STC 7072.8), which is housed at Edinburgh University Library (see also The Palice of Honour . . . , presented to the Bannatyne Club by John Gardiner Kinnear, Edinburgh, 1827; The Poetical Works of Gavin Douglas . . . , John Small, vol. 1, Edinburgh and London, 1874; The Shorter Poems of Gavin Douglas, edited by Priscilla J. Bawcutt, Edinburgh, Blackwood for The Scottish Text Society, 1967 (reprint 2003); Gavin Douglas: The Palis of Honoure, ed. David J. Parkinson,
65. 1501-2 Thame, Oxfordshire: 20s. gathered by Robin Hood at the May Ale at Whitsun [References courtesy of Alexandra F. Johnston].
66. 1501-2 Reading, Berkshire: The parish receives 6s. ‘of the May play callyd Robyn Hod on the fayre day’; also 6d. are paid to minstrels ‘at the chosyng of Robyn Hod,’ and 200 liveries and 100 pins are purchased for Mayday [Kerry, History of the Municipal Church, 227; Cox, Churchwardens Accounts, 282].
67. 1502 Robin Hood pageants and ‘Greneleef’ (probably a reference to Reynolde Grenelef in the Gest, see no. 14 above) mentioned in the Chronicle of Robert Fabyan, a London Draper, Sheriff, and Alderman who died on the 28th of February 1513 (Inquisitiones post mortem for London, p. 29, edited by G. S. Fry, 1896). Fabyan belonged to an Essex family, members of which had been connected with trade in London. He was a member of the Drapers company, alderman of Farringdon Without, and served as sheriff in 1493-94. In 1496 he was one of those appointed to make representations to the king on the new impositions on English cloth in Flanders. Next year he was one of the aldermen employed in keeping watch at the time of the Cornish rebellion. He resigned his aldermanry in 1502, on the pretext of poverty, apparently in order to avoid the expense of mayoralty. He had, however, acquired considerable wealth with his wife Elizabeth Pake, by whom he had a large family. He spent his latter years on his estate of Halstedys at Theydon Garnon in Essex. Two manuscripts survive (Holkham Hall, MS 671, and BL, Cotton MS Nero C.xi), and although they are not in Fabyan’s own hand, it is believed that the text is his.
Fabyan’s chronicle was first published by Richard Pynson in 1516, as The New Chronicles of England and of France. This edition ends with the reign of Richard III., and may represent the work as Fabyan left it, but with the omission of an autobiographical note and some religious verses, which form the concluding remarks of his history. The note and verses are first found in the second edition, printed by John Rastell in 1533 with continuations down to 1509. A third edition appeared in 1542, and a fourth in 1559 with additions to that year. The only modern edition is that of Henry Ellis (1811). In the note that is mentioned above, Fabyan himself says: “and here I make an ende of the vii. parte and hole werke, the vii. day of November in the yere of our Lord Jesu Christes Incarnacion M.vc. and iiij.” This seems to prove that in 1504 he did not plan any extension of his chronicles beyond 1485. The continuations printed by Rastell are certainly not Fabyan’s work. But Stow in his Collections (ap. Survey of London, ii. 305-306, ed. C. L. Kingsford) states that Fabyan wrote ‘a Chronicle of London, England and of France, beginning at the creation and endynge in the third year of Henry VIII., which both I have in written hand.’ In his Survey of London (i. r9r, 209, ii. 55, 116) Stow several times quotes Fabyan as his authority for statements which are not to be found in the printed continuations of Rastell. Some further evidence may be found in other notes of Stow’s (ap. Survey of London, ii. 280, 283, 365-366). Richard Hakluyt also prints an extract from Fabyan’s chronicle, given to him by John Stow, which was presumably in manuscript form, as it is not contained in any printed edition of Fabian. In the heading Hakluyt says it is ‘a note of Sebastian Gabote’s voyage of discovery.’ It therefore seems certain that Fabyan had continued his Chronicle to 1511, but no trace of the manuscript can now be found. John Bale claimed that the 1516 edition was burned by Cardinal Wolsey (see also The New Chronicles of England and France in Two Parts by Robert Fabyan, Henry Ellis, London (1811); Encyclopedia Britannica, vol 10, (1911); Narrative and Critical History of America: English Explorations and Settlements in North America 1497-1689, Vol. III, Chapter I, Charles Deane, Library of Alexandria, USA).
68. 1502-3 Croscombe, Somerset: 40s. received of Robin Hood [REED: Somerset, 89].
69. 1503 Robin Hood pageants and ‘Greneleef’ recorded again in the Great Chronicle of London (London, Guildhall Library, MS. 3313), which has been ascribed to Robert Fabyan (see no. 67 above). The ‘Great Chronicle’ owes its name to C. L. Kingsford, the author of English Historical Literature in the Fifteenth Century, published in 1913. He wrote (pp. 90-1), ‘But most important of all, the work quoted by John Stow as ‘Fabian’s MS.’ has recently come to light and proved to be the fullest and most valuable copy of the London Chronicles we possess,’ and he declared (p. 77) that it might ‘fitly be described as The Great Chronicle.‘ John Stow had the manuscript of the ‘Great Chronicle’ in his possession, adding marginal notes, and he borrowed largely from it for his Survey of London of 1598, and for his Chronicles of 1580, as well as for the successive editions of his Annales of 1592, 1601 and 1605 (see no. 262 below). Another owner of the manuscript was John Foxe (see no. 197 below) into whose possession it came between 1563 and 1570. Another probable owner was Edward Hall (see no. 95 below). Fabian’s Chronicle, the Great Chronicle, and another document Vitellius A XVI, appear to be indebted to a lost London Chronicle, which Kingsford named ‘the main City Chronicle’. See The Great Chronicle of London, A. H. Thomas and I. D. Thornley (London, 1938); Imagining Robin Hood: The Late Medieval Stories in Historical Context, A. J. Pollard, Oxfordshire and New York, 2004, p. 175.
70. 1503 Perth, North Sea Coast: The King pays four French crowns to Robin Hood of Perth [Accounts of the Lord High Treasurer of Scotland, 2.377; Mill, Medieval plays, 319].
71. 1503-4 Reading, Berkshire: Robin Hood gathers ten bushels of malt, one bushel of wheat, and 49s. in money. Also 4d. paid for bread and ale ‘to Robyn Hod and hys company,’ 5s. 4d. for a coat for Robin Hood, and another 16d. for meat and drink for Robin Hood and his company [Kerry, History of the Municipal Church, 227; Cox, Churchwardens Accounts, 282].
72. 1503-8 William Dunbar (born 1460/65 – died before 1530) the Middle Scots poet attached to the court of James IV, includes ‘Robeine’, along with ‘Gy of Gysburne’, ‘Allane Bell’, and others, in his poem Of Sir Thomas Norray. The poem relates to Thomas Nornee or Norny, who for many years seems to have performed as one of the King’s favourite fools; in the Treasurer’s Accounts for 1505 he is called ‘Sir Thomas Nornee’. The date and place of Dunbar’s birth is not known, but he was probably a Lowland Scot whose origins were in the Lothian area of southeastern Scotland. He may have grown up in or near the town of Dunbar, which is located on the North Sea midway between Berwick-upon-Tweed and Edinburgh. Dunbar belongs to a significant group of late-medieval Scottish poets who are generally known as the Middle Scots Poets or the Scottish Makars. This group includes the author of The Kingis Quair (possibly James I of Scotland), Richard Holland, Robert Henryson, Gavin Douglas, and Sir David Lindsay. Dunbar may have received an M.A. degree from St. Andrews in 1479. It is believed that he was a Franciscan novice and travelled to England and France in the King’s service. In 1501 he was certainly in England, probably in connection with the arrangements for the marriage of James IV and Margaret Tudor, which took place in 1503. By 1504 he had been ordained as a priest. In the years 1501 to 1513, when Dunbar served in the court of James IV, there are many entries in the Treasurer’s Accounts that refer to him. Most of these entries record payments made to him such as his pensioun (his annual pay), his livery (a clothing allowance he periodically received), and other minor gifts and remuneration. Dunbar’s petition poems, such as ‘To the King [In hansill of this guid New Yeir]’ were almost certainly written between 1501 and 1510, and offer some of the best internal evidence for Dunbar’s activities during this period. These poems reflect very clearly the poet’s desire to be granted a benefice, an endowed church office that provided its holder with a secure, and sometimes substantial, annual income. The final mention of Dunbar in the historical records occurs in May of 1513. In the following September the reign of James IV came to an end at the Battle of Flodden, where the Scottish king and thousands of his fellow Scots, including many earls, bishops, and abbots, died at the hands of the English army. It is possible that Dunbar was one of those who died at Flodden Field, but most scholars hold the view that he survived into the reign of James V. After the battle he may have received the benefice for which he had so often asked in verse, however the Treasurer’s Accounts for the period from August of 1513 until June of 1515 no longer exist.
Of the more than eighty poems attributed to Dunbar, most are short and occasional, written out of personal moods or events at court. They range from vulgar satire to religious hymns. Of his longer works, some are courtly Chaucerian pieces like the dream allegory The Goldyn Targe, while The Thrissill and the Rois is a nuptial song celebrating the marriage of James IV and Margaret Tudor. Manuscripts containing Of Sir Thomas Norray (not in Dunbar’s own hand) are found in The Reidpeth Manuscript (Cambridge University Library MS Ll.v.10) and The Maitland Folio (Cambridge, Pepys Library, Magdalene College MS 2553). Editions containing Of Sir Thomas Norray include: Ancient Scottish Poems Never Before in Print, 2 vols., John Pinkerton, London and Edinburgh, 1786: 2.359-61; The Poems of William Dunbar, 2 vols., David Laing, Edinburgh: Laing and Forbes, 1834; Supplement, 1865: 1.124; The Works of William Dunbar, James Paterson, Edinburgh: Stillie, 1863: 170; The Poems of William Dunbar, 5 pts, Scottish Text Society 2, 4, 16, 21, 29, John Small, Ae., James George Mackay, George Powell McNeill, and Walter Gregor, Edinburgh, 1884-93: 2.192; The Poems of William Dunbar, Henry Bellyse Baildon,Cambridge: University Press, 1907: 96-7; The Poems of William Dunbar, William Mackay MacKenzie, Edinburgh, 1932: 63-4; William Dunbar, Poems, James Kinsley, Oxford: Clarendon, 1958; re-printed 1979: 85-7; Selected Poems of Henryson and Dunbar, Priscilla J Bawcutt and Felicity Riddy, Edinburgh: 1992: 158-60; William Dunbar: The Complete Works, John Conlee, Michigan,
73. 1504-5 Reading, Berkshire: 18s. 11½d. received from the gathering of Robin Hood [Reference courtesy of A. F. Johnston]. Also 6s. 7d. paid for Robin Hood’s coat and hose, and 6s. for wine for ‘Robyn Hod of Handley (presumably Henley-on-Thames) and his company’ [Kerry, History of the Municipal Church, 228; Cox, Churchwardens Accounts, 283].
74. 1505-6 Reading, Berkshire: £5 10s. 5d. received from Robin Hood’s gathering at Whitsun; 3d. paid for ale for Robin Hood and his company [Reference courtesy of A. F. Johnston]. Also 18d. ‘payed for a supper to Robyn Hod and his company when he cam from ffynchamsted’ (Finchamstead, Berkshire) [Kerry, History of the Municipal Church, 228; Wiles, Early Plays, 64].
75. 1505-6 Croscombe, Somerset: 53s. 4d. received for ‘the sport of Robart Hode and hys company’ [REED: Somerset, 89].
76. 1505-17? The possible date for the multi-coloured enamelled window, which belonged to George Tollet, Esq. at Betley Hall in Staffordshire. It shows a possible Robin Hood, Maid Marion, and Friar Tuck (see Early Images of the Morris Dance).
77. 1506 Kingston-upon-Thames, Surrey: 39s. gathered by Robin Hood from Whitsun to Fair Day; also 3d. paid for painting a banner for Robin Hood and 17s. paid for borrowing coats for Robin Hood and Little John [Wiles, Early Plays, 68-69; Daniel Lysons, Environs of London. 1. Surrey (London: T. Cadell and W. Davies, 1810), 166].
78. 1506? Possible date for the printed edition of the Gest by Hugo Goes (see The Rhymes of Robin Hood 9).
79. 1506-7 Croscombe, Somerset: 43s. 4d. received for ‘the sport of Robart hode’ [REED: Somerset, 89].
80. 1506-10? Possible date for the printed edition of the Gest by Wynkyn de Worde (see no. 46 above).
81. 1507-8 Croscombe, Somerset: 9s. 7d. presented by the churchwardens for the sport of Robin Hood [REED: Somerset, 90].
82. 1507-8 Reading, Berkshire: 17s. and odd pence received ‘of the gaderyng of Robyn Hod pley’ [Kerry, History of the Municipal Church, 228; Cox, 283].
83. 1508 Aberdeen, North Sea Coast: The alderman, baillies, and council ordain that all able citizens are to be prepared ‘with þar arrayment maid in grene and 3alow bowis Arrowis brass And all vþer conuenient thingis according þarto’ to process with Robin Hood and Little John ‘all tymes convenient þarto quhen þai be Requirit be þe saidez Robyne and litile Iohne,’ on pain of a 40s. fine and loss of certain privileges [Mill, Medieval Plays, 137].
84. 1508 Aberdeen, North Sea Coast: The town authorities decree that ‘all personis burges nichbouris and inhabitaris burges sonnys’ are to be prepared to ride with Robin Hod and Little John, ‘quhilk was callit in 3eris bipast Abbot and priour of Bonacord,’ on Saint Nicholas Day upon pain of loss of pensions and profits under the town’s jurisdiction [Mill, Medieval Plays, 137].
85. 1508-9 Kingston-upon-Thames, Surrey: Expenses for the King-Game and Robin Hood include money for a kilderkin (18 gallons) of strong beer and a kilderkin of single beer, 7 bushels of wheat, 2½ bushels of rye, 3 sheep, a lamb, 2 calves, 6 pigs, 3 bushels of coals and wages for the cooks; also 16d. for making a coat for Robin Hood, 18d. for food and drink for Robin Hood and his men, 4d. for the Friar’s coat, 8s. for Little John’s coat, and 7d. for 5 broad arrows; the income from the King-Game and Robin Hood’s gathering is 4 marks (£2 13s. 8d.) [W. E. St. L. Finny, ‘Medieval Games and Gaderyings at Kingston-upon-Thames,’ Surrey Archaeological Collections 44 (1936), 122-23; Lysons, Environs of London, 169].
86. 1508-9 Poole, Dorset: Money gathered by Robin Hood is said to be in the town box. [Reference courtesy of R. C. Hays and C. E. McGee].
87. 1508-9 Exeter, Devon: St. Johns Bow churchwardens accounts include 4d. paid for repair of the arrow of Saint Edmund the Martyr for Robin Hood [REED: Devon, 118].
88. 1508-9 The poet Alexander Barclay (c. 1476-1552) possibly born in Scotland, was a chaplain at the College of St. Mary Ottery in Devonshire where he wrote in 1508-9, a loose English translation of The Ship of Fools, or Das Narrenschiff in German (see no. 105 below). Printed by Richard Pynson in 1509, it contains three mentions of Robin Hood. Originally written by the German poet Sebastian Brant, it was first published in Basel in 1494. This work was very popular in it’s day and described as one of the most famous books ever written. A layman who held municipal positions in Strasburg from 1501, Brant’s work forms an instructive document for the intellectual and moral history of the period, giving us a satire of the follies and weaknesses of man, including the clergy. There are countless editions and numerous translations such as: A latin translation by Jacob Locher (on which Barclay’s version is primarily based) published in Basel in 1497; A French verse adaptation of Locher by Pierre Riviere also in 1497; A French prose adaptation by Jehan Drouyn of Riviere’s adaptation of Locher in 1498; Another English version by Henry Watson (at times a liberal prose translation of Jehan Drouyn’s adaptation of Riviere’s adaption of Locher) in an edition printed by Wynkyn de Worde in 1509 (the same year as Barclay’s edition by Pynson); Barclay’s text of The Ship of Fools reprinted by the English printer John Cawood in 1570; Barclay’s Ship of Fools edited,with an introduction by T. H. Jamieson, 2 vols, Edinburgh, 1874, reprinted in New York, AMS Press, 1966; FR. Aurelius Pompen, O.F.M, The English Versions of The Ship of Fools, Longmans, Green and Co, 1925, reprinted by Octagon Books Inc., New York, 1967; Edwin H. Zeydel, The Ship of Fools, with an introduction, New York, Columbia University Press, 1944; William Gillis, The Ship of Fools, with an introduction by Patricia Ingle Gillis, London, Folio Society, 1971. Robin Hood is mentioned again by Barclay in his Fourth Eclogue, which also includes the first literary mention of Maid Marian (see no. 105 below).
89. 1509-10 Exeter, Devon: City Council bans Robin Hood games except on the church holy day and holidays close to it [REED: Devon, 119].
90. 1509-10 Poole, Dorset: Money gathered by Robin Hood and his company again in the town box. [Reference courtesy of R. C. Hays and C. E. McGee].
91. 1509-10 Croscombe, Somerset: £3 received of John Honythorne as Robin Hood[REED: Somerset, 90].
92. 1509-10 Kingston-upon-Thames, Surrey: 3 marks (£2) received ‘for Robyn Hodes gaderyng’ [Finny, ‘Medieval Games,’ 121].
93. 1509-10 Kingston-upon-Thames, Surrey: Maid Marian named for the first time. Churchwarden’s Accounts list the following ‘Costes of ye Kyngham and Robyn Hode’:
| ‘First paid for a pece of Kendall for Roben Hode and litell Johns cote 12s. 10d. |
| ‘Item paid for III yerdes of white for the freres cote 3s. |
| ‘Item paid for III yerds of Kendall for mayde marion is huke 2s. 4d. |
| ‘Item paid for saten of sypers for ye same huke 5d. |
| ‘Item paid to mayde marion for her labor for II yere 2s. . . . . |
| ‘Item paid for II payre of glovys for Robyn Hode and Mayde maryon 4½d. |
| ‘Item for VI brode arovys 6d. |
| ‘Item paid for mete and drynke for Robyn Hode and his compeny 2s. 2d. |
| ‘Item paid to Alis Toth for mete and drynke for Robyn Hode and his company 5d. |
| ‘Item paid for II Kylderkenys of III halpeny bere for Robyn Hode and his compeny 2s. 8d. . . . . |
| ‘The Recettes of ye Same Yere’. |
| ‘Item receuid for gadering of ye King and Whitsontyde 19s. |
| ‘Item rec. at ye Kyngham and for ye gaderyng of Roben Hode 4 marks 20d.’ [Finny, ‘Medieval Games,’ 123-25]. |
94. 1509-10 Kingston-upon-Thames, Surrey: 7s. 6d. paid ‘for half Robyn Hodes cote’; also 3s. paid for the friar’s coat, 8s. 3d. for Little John’s coat, and 15d. for Kendal for Robin Hood’s coat [Finny, ‘Medieval Games,’ 105].
95. 1510 Henry VIII and a number of other nobles dress for a Robin Hood game and visit the Queen and her ladies, the first of two royal Robin Hood activities recorded by Edward Hall in The Union of the Two Noble and Illustre Famelies of Lancastre and Yorke (see no. 107 below). Edward Hall (1497-1547) was the son of John Hall, a successful London grocer, merchant of the staple, and warden of his company in 1512-13. Edward Hall was educated at Eton and at King’s College, Cambridge, where he obtained his BA in 1518. At about the time of his graduation from university, the second son of Robert Fabyan (see no. 67 above) became apprentice to Hall’s father. It is possible that through this connection Hall developed his lifelong interest in chronicling the events of English history. He entered Gray’s Inn (his name appears as a student there in 1521) and became a lawyer. Hall became common sergeant of London in 1533 and undersheriff in 1535. He was also a member of Parliament for Wenlock (1529) and Bridgnorth (1542) in Shropshire, and a friend of Thomas Cromwell. However Hall was hostile towards Wolsey, especially to the cardinal’s financial demands upon the city, which turned him into a critic of the Church. Hall’s chronicle is also an important source for the reign of Henry VIII, especially the beginning of the break with Rome in the early 1530s, which Hall witnessed as a member of Parliament. He also recorded ceremonial events such a processions, tournaments, and lavish occasions like the Field of Cloth of Gold in 1520. Hall made his will during the year 1546-47 and was buried in the church of St. Benet Sherhog. See Peter C. Herman, Edward Hall: Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (2004-2014); The History of Parliament: the House of Commons 1509-1558, ed. S.T. Bindoff, 1982; Graham Pollard, ‘The Bibliographical History of Hall’s Chronicle’. Bulletin of the Institute of Historical Research 10 (1932-1933): 12–17; A. F. Pollard, ‘Edward Hall’s Will and Chronicle’. Bulletin of the Institute of Historical Research 9 (1931-1932): 171-177; Encyclopedia of Tudor England, Vol. 2, John A. Wagner and Susan Walters Schmid, California, 2012. In 1940 an antiquarian bookseller named Alan Keen was examining a recent purchase of old books from a library, when he stumbled upon a copy of Hall’s Chronicle. The explanatory notes in some of the margins were believed by Keen to be the work of William Shakespeare. Keen published his findings in two journal articles and a book with co-author Alan Lubbock (The Annotator; The Pursuit of an Elizabethan Reader of Halle’s Chronicle Involving Some Surmises about the Early Life of William Shakespeare, London, 1954). Keen’s discovery is now in the British Library (Loan MS 61).
96. 1510-11 Poole, Dorset: Robin Hood’s money in the town box. [References courtesy of R. C. Hays and C. E. McGee].
97. 1510-11 Kingston-upon-Thames, Surrey: 4 marks received from Robin Hood’s gathering; also 25s. 6d. paid ‘for Robyn Hodes cote and for litell Jhons cote and for ye frères cote’ [Finny, ‘Medieval Games,’ 121].
98. 1510-11 Croscombe, Somerset: £3 6s. 8d. received of Robin Hood [REED: Somerset, 90].
99. 1510-11 Reading, Berkshire: £8 2s. 5d. received from the gathering of Robin Hood [References courtesy of A. F. Johnston].
100. 1510-15 The probable date for the Lettersnijder edition of the Gest.
101. 1511-12 Croscombe, Somerset: 35s. 10d. received of J. Honythorn and J. Steven for Robin Hood [REED: Somerset, 90].
102. 1512-13 Tintinhull, Somerset: 11s. received from ‘Robine Hoods all’ [REED: Somerset, 231].
103. c. 1512-15 The Asloan Manuscript of c. 1515-25, contains among others, The Crying of ane Playe, which is the only surviving dramatic text, in Older Scots, to include Robin Hood and Maying traditions in sixteenth century Scotland. The only other surviving text is in the Bannatyne Manuscript of c. 1565-68; Ane Littill Interlud of the Droichis Part of the Play, in which all references to Robin Hood and Maying have been left out, probably due to the fact that Robin Hood games, along with all misrule, had been banned in Scotland since the Parliamentary act of 1555 see no. 222 below). The Asloan Manuscript on ff. 240r – 242vis in The National Library of Scotland, Edinburgh, MS 16500, and the later Bannatyne Manuscript on ff. 118v – 120r is in the NLS, Advocates’ MS 1.1.6. Internal evidence has suggested that this anonymous comic monologue was originally composed between 1512 and 1515; the dwarf ‘Wealth’ calls upon Edinburgh’s citizens to assemble in their ‘greenwood’ livery, equipped with bows and arrows, to parade alongside Robin Hood, in honour of the burgh. This seems to refer to a similar occasion in Aberdeen in 1508 (see no. 83 above). The Asloan version of the ‘play’ was printed in Select Remains of the Ancient Popular Poetry of Scotland, ed., David Laing (Edinburgh, 1822, reprinted in Edinburgh in 1884, with new editions in 2014 and 2015). Both the Asloan and Bannatyne versions are printed in Medieval and Renaissance Drama in England, Vol. 12, (Keely Fisher, 1999). There is a fascimile edition of the Bannatyne Manuscript (D. Fox and W. A. Ringler (eds.), The Bannatyne Manuscript-NLS Advocates’ MS 1.1.6 (1980); but there is no facsimile of the Asloan Manuscript yet available. There are transcriptions of both manuscripts in print: W. A. Craigie (ed.), The Asloan Manuscript, 2 vols., S.T.S New Series 14 and 16 (Edinburgh and London, 1923-5); and W. Tod Ritchie, The Bannatyne Manuscript, 4 vols., S.T.S. New Series 5, 22, 23 and 26 (Edinburgh and London, 1928-34). See also, I. C. Cunningham, ‘The Asloan Manuscript,’ in A. A. MacDonald, M. Lynch and I. B. Cowan (eds.), The Renaissance in Scotland (Leiden, New York and Koln, 1994), pp. 107-35; J.T.T. Brown, ‘The Bannatyne Manuscript: a sixteenth- century poetical miscellany,’ Scottish Historical Review 1 (1904), 136-58. For a more detailed account see Medieval and Renaissance Drama in England, Vol. 12, ed., John Pitcher: The Crying of ane Playe: Robin Hood and Maying in Sixteenth-Century Scotland, Keely Fisher, Associated University Presses, Inc., 1999.
104. 1512-25 In the household records concerning two Yorkshire castles of Henry Percy, the fifth earl of Northumberland , there is money put aside to buy livery for Robin Hood (Robin Hood: A Complete Study of the English Outlaw, Stephen Knight, Oxford, 1994, p. 270). I have not found this record in The Earl of Northumberland’s Household Book: The regulations and establishment of the household of Henry Algernon Percy, the fifth earl of Northumberland: at his castles of Wressle and Leckonfield in Yorkshire: begun anno domini MDXII: A New Edition, Edited, with Additional Notes, London, A. Brown and Sons, 1905 [microform]. This is a faithful reprint of the first edition of 1768-70, from the press of John Nichols – the ‘Northumberland Household Book’ edited and annotated by Bishop Thomas Percy* – there is a copy in the British Library. Percy had used the manuscript that was in the possession of the Duke and Duchess of Northumberland – it is now in the Lambeth Palace Library (MS 1146). There was a second edition in 1827, which is a reprint of the first, issued by William Pickering. See also, The Rhymes of Robin Hood 2 and no. 27 above.
*However, obscure allusions on which Percy made no comment, have been explained, and his annotations on several points have been greatly expanded (in the 1905 edition).
105. 1513-14 Alexander Barclay mentions Robin Hood for the fourth time (and also the first literary mention of Maid Marian) in his Fourth Eclogue or Egloge (pastoral poem) undertaken at the monastery of Ely, where he was now a Benedictine monk (see no. 88 above). Barclay’s first three Eclogues were largely borrowed from the ‘Miseriae Curialium’ of Pope Pius II, and the last two, a free rendering of the Eclogues of Baptista Mantuanus or Mantuan (1447-1516) an Italian Carmelite reformer, humanist, and poet. Barclay’s Eclogues form, with the exception of Henryson’s Robin and Makyn, the earliest examples of the English pastoral. First published in collected form by the English printer John Cawood in 1570, the Eclogues were appended to his edition of The Ship of Fools.
106. 1514-15 Kingston-upon Thames, Surry: 12s. received for Robin Hood’s gathering; another 9s. 4d. received for his gathering at Croydon [Finny, ‘Mediaeval Games,’ 121].
107. 1515 On his way to Greenwich, Henry VIII and the Queen, and many lords and ladies, are met by two hundred yeomen on Shooter’s Hill, with one calling himself Robin Hood, the second royal Robin Hood activity recorded by Edward Hall in The Union of the Two Noble and Illustre Famelies of Lancastre and Yorke (see no. 95 above and no. 200 below). See also, State Papers and Mss Relating to English Affairs Existing in the Archives and Collections of Venice, and in Other Libraries of Northern Italy, ed. Rawdon Brown and G. Cavendish Bentnick, London: HMSO, 1864, 2.248, #624).
108. 1515 An edition of the Gest by Julian Notary (see The Rhymes of Robin Hood 9).
109. 1515-16 Kingston-upon Thames, Surry: 23s. received at Whitsun for Robin Hood’s gathering; 8d. paid for a pair of shoes for Robin Hood [Finny, ‘Mediaeval Games,’ 104].
110. 1515-16 Kingston-upon-Thames, Surry: Churchwarden’s accounts list ‘Chooses for Mores Davnsars and Roben Hod and hes Compenye: . . . . . Item for Roben Hod a peyer of chone 8d. . . . . Item to Roben Hode for hes labor 12d. Item to Leytell Jhon for hes labor 10d. Item to Freer tuk 8d. Item in mony amongest Roben Hodes men at nythe 8d. [Finny, ‘Mediaeval Games,’ 115].
111. c. 1516 John Skelton (c. 1460-1529), Tudor poet and satirist, was possibly born in Diss, Norfolk. He wrote the first secular morality play in English, Magnyfycence (his only surviving play), a political satire, in which the character named ‘Fancy’ mentions Friar Tuck (line 373). (See also no. 127 below). Skelton had an illustrious career: He was educated at the University of Cambridge and achieved the status of ‘poet laureate’. Another skill was his translation of ancient Greek and Roman authors, which led to his appointment as court poet to Henry VII in 1488, later as an addition, he became a tutor to the Duke of York (later Henry VIII). When Henry became heir to the throne, Skelton became rector of Diss, in Norfolk, although he lived in London from 1512, where the King granted him the title of orator regius. In this position Skelton became an adviser to the King, in court poems, on public issues, and on church affairs. Little of Skelton’s early work is known, but his reputation was such that in 1499 while visiting England, Desiderius Erasmus, the great figure of the Dutch Renaissance, referred to him as ‘the incomparable light and glory of English letters.’ Not all were as flattering, Skelton had a later reputation as a ‘beastly’ poet. His many works include poems such as Bowge of courte, Phyllyp Sparowe, and Ware the Hawke, and court poems such as A ballad of the Scottysshe Kynge. His three major political and clerical satires were Speke Parrot (written 1521), Collyn Clout (1522), and Why come ye nat to courte (1522). Skelton’s reputation declined in a 16th-century protestant England, and his fame as an English poet of major importance was only restored in the 20th century. His individual poetic style of short rhyming lines, based on natural speech rhythms, has been given the name of Skeltonics. Magnyfycence appears to have been printed by John Rastell in about 1530 (see also John Skelton: The Critical Heritage, Anthony Edwards, Routledge, 1981; John Skelton and the Politics of the 1520s, Greg Walker, Cambridge University Press, 2002).
112. 1516-17 Yeovil, Somerset: St John Baptist churchwardens accounts include 20s. presented ‘by Robarte Hood and by the devotion of the pepylle’ [REED: Somerset, 405].
113. 1517 Aberdeen, North Sea Coast: Certain disobedient residents who have refused to process with Robin Hood and Little John are reproved and warned to obey the proclamation ‘and pas with þe saidez Robert and Iohn all þe sondais of may and vther tymes quhen þai be warnit’ [Mill, Medieval Plays, 140].
114. 1517-18 Kingston-upon-Thames, Surrey: 6s. 6d. received for Robin Hood’s gathering [Finny, ‘Mediaeval Games,’ 121].
115. 1518 Edinburgh, Lothian: City records relate that the Abbot of Narent is now ‘callit Robin Huid and Little Jhone’ [J. D. Marwick, ed., Extracts from the Records of the Burgh of Edinburgh AD 1403-1528. (Edinburgh: printed for the Scottish Burgh Records Society, 1869), 66; Mill, Medieval Plays, 220].
116. 1518 Edinburgh, Lothian: Francis Bothwell submits a letter from the Earl of Arran to excuse him ‘fra the office of Litiljohn, to the quhilk he was chosin for this yeir.’ According to the letter, ‘Francis Boithwell your nichtbour is chosin to be Litiljohn for to mak sportis and jocositeis in the toun, the quhilk is a man to be vsit hiear and gravar materis, and als is apon his viage to pas beyond sey his neidfull erandis’ [Marwick, Extracts, 176; Mill, Medieval Plays, 220].
117. 1519 Worcester, Worcestershire: Prior William More, at Worcester the week of June 19-25, pays 3s. 4d. in ‘rewardes to Robyn whod & hys men for getheryng to tewkesbury bruge’ [REED: Worcester, 462; William More, Journal of Prior William More, ed. Ethel S. Fegan (London: Worcester Historical Society, 1913-14), 87].
118. 1519-20 Yeovil, Somerset: £6 8½d. received of Richard Hacker as Robin Hood ‘that be his gud prouysyon and dylygent labors and by the gud deuocion of the towne and the contrey he presentyd to god and holy church.’ Also a belt with silver buckle and chape and gilt bells are donated by Joan Withers ‘to the intent the Sayd gyrdyll shuld too honour to god and worshyp to the sayd church and parysh when Robyn hood makyth hys besyness Or such other lyke’ [REED: Somerset, 405].
119. 1519-20 Kingston-upon-Thames, Surrey: Churchwarden’s accounts include: ‘Item Reseuyd of Jhon gaddysbe for Robyn Hode ye yere before past, 3s. 2d. [Finny, ‘Mediaeval Games,’ 104]. ‘Item Resayued of the Maye game and Robyn Hode £3 12s. 4d.
| The Expenses |
| ‘For ye Maye game and Robartte Hode: |
| ‘Furst payet for VII yerdys satane . . . . at 2s. ye yerd 14s. |
| ‘Item payett for canves to lyne ye same cottes 16d. |
| ‘Item payett for ye makyn of ye same cottes 2s. |
| ‘Item payett for III brode yerdes of rosett to make ye freers cott 3s. |
| ‘Item payett for XIIII candall cottes, beside ye gyfthe of Masters of the towne, and for ye makyng of ye same cottes 12s. |
| ‘Item payett for VIII payers of schewes for ye morris daunsers, ye freer and made maryen at VIIId ye payer 5s. 4d.’ [Finny, ‘Mediaeval Games,’ 117-18]. |
120. 1520 Henley-on-Thames, Oxfordshire: £4 13s. 4d. collected ‘of Robyne Hoodys money’ [P. M. Briers, ‘Henley Borough Records,’ 189].
121. c. 1520 Transactions in the day-book of John Dorne, an Oxford bookseller, include a book of carols, or ballads such as ‘Undo your dore’, or ‘Robin Hood’ [English Books and Readers 1475 to 1557 (second edition) H. S. Bennett, Cambridge University Press, 1969;F. Madan, ‘The Day-book of John Dorne’, Oxford Historical Society, Collectanea, vol. 1 (1885), pp. 71-178].
122. c.1520 John Rastell (c.1475–1536) the son of a leading Coventry citizen and Warwickshire justice of the peace, is credited with writing and publishing The Interlude of the Four Elements, a morality play intended to awaken interest in natural science and discovery. It includes a three-part song with music, the first printed musical score in English. Interlude has a mention of a Robin Hood song by the character ‘Ignorance’ that begins with the well known phrase ‘Robyn Hode in Barnysdale stode’ (see no. 13 above). Rastell is credited with another play Of Gentylnes and Nobylyte and probably Calisto and Melibea as well. Other works include The Pastyme of People (1529) a chronicle dealing with English history, and A New Boke of Purgatory (1530). An innovative printer, barrister, playwright, author, member of Parliament, and brother-in-law of Thomas More, he also entered into the service of Sir Edward Belknap in London, where he was charged with the preparation of state occasions and the entertainment of the King, his guests, and the court. Rastell published several of More’s works, including A Dialogue Concerning Heresies, in 1529. After his conversion to Protestantism in 1530-31, Rastell began printing Protestant tracts; in a letter to Thomas Cromwell, probably written in 1536, he says that he had spent his time in upholding the king’s cause and opposing the pope, with the result that he had lost both his printing business and his legal practice, and was reduced to poverty. He was sent to prison in 1536, where he probably died. His son William Rastell, also a lawyer, took over his father’s printing business in 1530, publishing plays and interludes as well as many works by his uncle Thomas More (see no. 145 and 153 below). There are several editions of Interlude such as: Dodsley (1874-6), Fischer (1903), Farmer (1906), Coleman (1971), and Axton (1979). Printed versions include: William Middleton (c. 1544), William Copland (c. 1560), and John Allde (1569). (see also, Das ‘Interlude of the Four Elements,’ mit einer Einleitung, ed. Julius Fischer, Marburg: N. G. Elwert, 1903; Interlude of the four Elements in Siberch Celebrations, 1521-1971, ed. Brooke Crutchley, Cambridge, 1971, pp. 81-113).
123. 1520-21 Kingston-upon-Thames, Surrey: 8s. received for Robin Hood’s gathering at Whitsun [Finny, ‘Mediaeval Games,’ 104].
124. 1521 Dundee, North Sea Coast: The provost and baillies authorize a grant of 5 marks or a citizenship to Robin Hood for building archery butts [Mill, Medieval Plays, 173].
125. 1521 John Mair or Major (1467-1550) philosopher, theologian, and historian, was the third in line to the Scottish chroniclers Andrew of Wyntoun and Walter Bower (see nos. 9 and 17 above). He attended grammar school in the Scottish town of Haddington , and later went to Cambridge, and then to Paris, where he was a professor of theology. Major returned to Scotland in about 1518, but he had apparently already finished his latin work Historia Majoris Britanniae (published in Paris in 1521), which was translated as History of Greater Britain, as well England and Scotland, in 1892. Another of Major’s works, In tertivm Sententiarum disputations Theologicae Joannis Maioris denuo recognitae et repurgatae, mentions ‘Roberto Hudo’. Like his predecessors Major believed that Robin and John were real people, and he places them in the 1190s, the time of Richard I and Prince John. He does not give any evidence for his claims, but his dating was accepted by later antiquarians such as John Stow and Richard Grafton. It is likely that Major also influenced the author of the Sloane ‘life’ of Robin Hood (see no. 397 below). Some of his other publications include De Gestis Scotorum (Paris, 1521), Quaestiones logicales (Paris, 1528), and Commentary on the Four Gospels (Paris, 1528). (see also, John Major, Historia Majoris Britanniae, ed. R. Freebairn, Edinburgh, 1740, p.128; J. Durkan ‘New light on John Mair’, Innes Review, Edinburgh, Vol. IV, 1954; A Broadie, The Circle of John Mair: Logic and Logicians in Pre-Reformation Scotland, Oxford, 1985; A Companion to the Theology of John Mair, ed. John T. Slotemaker, Leiden: Brill, 2015.
126. 1521-22 Kingston-upon-Thames, Surrey: 8s. ½d. received for Robin Hood’s gathering [Finny, ‘Mediaeval Games,’ 121].
127. 1522 John Skelton includes what is probably the earliest mention of the proverb ‘Good evyn, good Robyn Hood’ in his poem Why come ye nat to courte (he had already named Friar Tuck; see no. 111 above), printed by Richard Kele in about 1550, and in numerous subsequent editions. Pithy, plesaunt and profitable workes of maister Shelton, Poete Laureate. Nowe collected and newly published, printed by Thomas Marshe in 1568, was reprinted in 1736. A scarce reprint of Filnour Rummin by Samuel Rand appeared in 1624 (see also F. Brie, ‘Skelton Studien’ in Englische Studien, vol. 38 (Heilbronn, 1877, etc.); A. Rey, Skelton’s Satirical Poems… (Berne, 1899); A selection of his works was edited by W.H. Williams (London, 1902); Zur Charakteristik John Skeltons by Dr. Arthur Koelbing (Stuttgart, 1904); A. Thummel, Studien über John Skelton (Leipzig-Reudnitz, 1905); G. Saintsbury, Hist. of Eng. Prosody (vol. i, 1906); A. Kolbing in the Cambridge History of English Literature (vol. iii, 1909); and Complete Poems of John Skelton, ed. P. Henderson, London, 1959. See also, Rymes of Robyn Hood: An Introduction the the English Outlaw, R. B. Dobson and J. Taylor, London, 1976, p. 289; Robin Hood: A Collection of all the Ancient Poems, Songs and Ballads, J. Ritson, London, 1846, pp. 25-6; English Proverbs and Proverbial Phrases: A Historical Dictionary, G. L. Apperson, London, 1929, p. 535; A Dictionary of the Proverbs in England in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries, M. P. Tilley (Ann Arbor, 1950), No. E 188; Proverbs, Sentences and Proverbial Phrases from English Writings mainly before 1500, Cambridge, Mass., 1968, No. R 155; The Oxford Dictionary of English Proverbs, Third Edition, revised by F. P. Wilson, Oxford, 1970, p. 319.
128. 1522-23 Kingston-upon-Thames, Surrey: Churchwarden’s accounts include: ‘Res. for ye gaderyng of Robyn Hode 46s. 8d.
| ‘Pd. for the hyre of 20 hattes for Robin Hode 16d. |
| ‘Pd. for a hatt that was lost 10d. |
| ‘Pd. for 1500 of leveres for Robyn Hode 5s. |
| ‘Pd. for 4 estrygge fethers for Robyn Hode 20d. |
| ‘Pd. for 2 peyre of shone for Robyn Hode and lytell Jhon 21d.’ [Finny, ‘Mediaeval Games,’ 121]. |
129. 1523-24 Kingston-upon-Thames, Surrey: 45.s 4d. received for the gathering of Robin Hood [Finny, ‘Mediaeval Games,’ 121].
130. 1524-25 Kingston-upon-Thames, Surrey: £3 10s. 5d. profits received from the King Game and Robin Hood; also 12s. 6d. paid for 6¼ yards of satin for Robin Hood’s coats [Finny, ‘Mediaeval Games,’ 122].
131. 1525 Leicester, Leicestershire: Witnesses before an episcopal visitation at Newark College testify that ‘touchyng Maygamys, and Robyn Hode and sanct George many tymys vseth to comme into the colledge’ [A. H. Thompson, ed., Visitations in the Diocese of Lincoln 1517-1531, Lincoln Record Society 37 (Hereford: printed for the Lincoln Record Society by the Hereford Times, 1947), 145.
132. 1525-26 Bristol, Western England: St. Nicholas Church pays 6s. 8d. for ‘two pair of hosyn for Robin Hood and Lytyll John . . . and for lyning of the same’ [Mark Pilkinton, Records of Early English Drama: Bristol (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1997), 37].
133. 1525-26 Kingston-upon-Thames, Surrey: 20s. received for Robin Hood’s gathering [Finny, ‘Mediaeval Games,’ 122].
134. 1526 Leicester, Leicestershire: The parish of St. Leonard is owed 40s. from John Laverock for a Robin Hood play enacted for the benefit of the church [A. P. Moore, ‘Proceedings of the Ecclesiastical Courts in the Archdeaconry of Leicester 1516-1535,’ Associated Architectural Societies Reports and Papers 28:1 (1905), 202].
135. 1526-27 Kingston-upon-Thames, Surrey: 31s. 2d. received for Robin Hood’s gathering [Finny, ‘Mediaeval Games,’ 122].
136. 1526-27 Ashburton, Devon: St. Andrews churchwardens accounts record money paid for a new coat (tunica) for ‘Robyn Whode’ [REED: Devon, 21; Alison Hanham, ‘Churchwarden’s Accounts of Ashburton, 1479-1580,’ Devon and Cornwall Record Society New Series 15 (Torquay: Devonshire Press, 1970), 78].
137. 1526-27 Croscombe, Somerset: Gifts include £4 4d. for Robin Hood [REED: Somerset, 90].
138. 1527 Little John’s large bones supposedly seen at Pette in Moray by Hector Boece, Boyce, or Boethius (c.1465–1536), which is recorded in his Latin History of Scotland, the Scotorum Historiae, printed at Paris in 1527 by Jodocus Badius Ascensius. This was republished at Paris in 1575 with an appendix by the Italian Humanist Giovanni Ferrerio, and reproduced with the addition of a modern translation into English by Dana F. Sutton. Boece’s edition contained seventeen books, and Giovanni Ferrerio’s publication included the eighteenth book and a fragment of the nineteenth. Boece’s Historiae was translated into Scots prose by John Bellenden as commissioned by James V, who also commissioned William Stewart to translate the Historiae into Scots verse (see no. 170 below). ‘Continuations’ of Boece’s Historiae include De origine, moribus, et rebus gestis Scotorum libri decem (1578) by John Leslie, and The Historie and Chronicles of Scotland by Robert Lindsay of Pitscottie, the first history of Scotland to be composed in Scots, completed by 1579. An English translation of Boece’s Historiae appeared in Raphael Holinshed’s chronicle (see no. 308 below).
A Scottish philosopher and historian, Boece was born at Dundee and educated at the relatively new University of St Andrews. Like many of his contemporaries, he proceeded to the University of Paris where he met Erasmus, with whom he became close friends. Boece went on to become secretary to the Master of the Collège de Montaigu, Jan Standonck. In 1497 he was appointed to the post of professor of philosophy at the University. In 1500 Boece accepted a very generous financial offer from William Elphinstone, the Bishop of Aberdeen, made on behalf of James IV, to leave Paris and become the first principal of King’s College, later the University of Aberdeen. As well as acting as principal Boece gave lectures on medicine and divinity. He also established himself as a historian, and in 1522 he published Vitae Episcoporum Murthlacensium et Aberdonensium, or ‘Lives of the Bishops of Murthlack and Aberdeen’. His more ambitious Scotorum Historiae dedicated to James V, charts the history of Scotland from its origins right through to the accession of James III. Boece received a small pension from the Scottish court (1527–34) and was a canon of Aberdeen, vicar of Tullynessle, and then rector of Fyvie in Aberdeenshire in 1534. He died in Aberdeen two years later at the age of 71. Boece’s Historiae was well received and became very popular, especially in Europe after its translation from Latin into French, and in Scotland after its translation into Scots. Boece’s approach to history was partisan and inaccurate in many respects. He tended to uncritically blend historical fact with myth and folklore, and he also tended to write with an eye to ensuring he stayed in good favour with James V.
Boece’s Historiae began to attract critics, most notable was the English antiquary John Leland (see no. 156 below). In 1572 the Welsh antiquary Humphrey Lhuyd published Commentariolo Descriptionis Britannicae Fragmentum, which further challenged Boece’s reputation as an historian. Boece’s account of Macbeth of Scotland flattered the ancestors of James IV, and maligned the real Macbeth. It was Boece’s version that Raphael Holinshed incorporated it into his Chronicle (see no. 308 below), which formed the basis of Shakespeare’s famous play Macbeth. The sources for Boece’s Historiae seem to include John of Fordun, Walter Bower (see no. 17 above), Turgot, a Bishop of St. Andrews, and John Campbell. There is also the mysterious ‘Veremund,’ possibly Richard Vairement, a Culdee of St. Andrews of the thirteenth century. A 1527 edition of Boece’s Historiae is in the British Library, which also contains the 1575 edition published by Giovanni Ferrerio. A 1527 edition was auctioned at Christie’s in 2002, and William Drummond of Hawthorden (1585-1649) owned a copy of whose whereabouts (or survival) is not known. See, The Philological Museum, Hector Boethius, Scotorum Historia (1575 version). A hypertext critical edition by Dana F. Sutton, The University of California, Irvine, posted 2010; The Institute for the Study of Scottish Philosophy; Undiscovered Scotland; Encyclopedia Britannica, 1911, Vol. 4, Boece, Hector, p. 112
139. 1527-28 Kingston-upon-Thames, Surrey: 12s. received for Robin Hood’s gathering [Finny, ‘Mediaeval Games,’ 122].
140. 1528 Kent/Sussex: Lord Warden of the Clinq Ports orders mayors of Sandwich, Faversham and other towns not to organize or permit any ‘play, Robin Hood’s play, watches or wakes, revels, or other such like plays whereby that any great assembly of the king’s people should be made’ [Peter Clark, ‘Reformation and Radicalism in Kentish Towns’ c. 1500-1533,’ in The Urban Classes, the Nobility, and the Reformation, ed. Wolfgang J. Mommsen, Publications of the German Historical Institute London 5 (Stuttgart: Klett-Cotta, 1979), 112].
141. 1528 William Tyndale also known as William Hychyns (c. 1494-1536) was a scholar and theologian, who condemns tales of Robin Hood in his book The Obedience of a Christian Man. This book is believed to have greatly influenced Henry VIII’s decision in declaring the Act of Supremacy, by which he became Supreme Head of the Church of England.It was originally published by the printer Merten de Keyser in Antwerp (1528); a facsimile was published in 1977 as number 897, ‘The English Experience’ by Theatrum Orbis Terrarum, Ltd., Keizersgracht 526, Amsterdam, and Walter J. Johnson, Inc., 355 Chestnut Street, Norwood, New Jersey; there was another printed edition of Obedience in 1535, and by W. Hill in 1548 (see also, The Obedience of a Christian Man, Volume 5 of Christian classics series, ed. Richard Lovett, Religious Tract Society, 1900; The Obedience of a Christian Man, ed. David Daniell, Penguin Books, 2000).
Tyndale was born in Gloucestershire and educated at Oxford and Cambridge where he became a strong supporter of church reform. He was ordained as a priest in around 1521 and returned to Gloucestershire to serve as a chaplain to a member of the local gentry. In 1523, Tyndale moved to London with the intention of translating the New Testament into English, an act that was strictly forbidden by the established Catholic Church, as these sorts of ideas were closely associated with Martin Luther and other controversial Protestant religious reformers. In 1524 Tyndale left England for Germany to continue his translation work in greater safety, and sought the help of Martin Luther at Wittenberg. Tyndale’s translation of the New Testament was the first ever to be written and printed in English, and a model for subsequent English translations of the bible. His English New Testament was printed in Cologne in 1525, however the full edition was printed in Worms in 1526. Copies were smuggled into England, where Tyndale’s work was denounced by the Catholic Church (particularly by Thomas More) and Tyndale himself was accused of heresy. He went into hiding and began work on a translation of the Old Testament directly from Hebrew into English. Tyndale was betrayed by his friend Henry Phillips, and arrested for heresy by the Catholic authorities in Antwerp in 1535, then imprisoned in the castle of Vilvoorde outside Brussels. In October 1536 Tyndale was tried and convicted of heresy and treason, and put to death by being strangled and burned at the stake in the castle’s courtyard. His other works include ‘The parable of the wicked mammon’ (Antwerp, 1527), ‘The practice of prelates’ (Antwerp, 1530) and ‘An Answer Unto More’s Dialogue’ (1531), which is a reply to Thomas More’s Dialogue Concerning Heresies (see no. 145 below).
142. 1528 William Roy (or Roye) and Jerome Barlow, two observant friars, complete a stinging satire against Cardinal Wolsey in Strasburg, which has a mention of the church preventing laymen from reading any fruitful English book, but not tales of Robin Hood. This appears in Rede me and be nott wrothe, For I saye no thinge but trothe. Printed 1528, Strasburg; 1546, London; reprinted in 1812 in ‘Harleian Miscellany,’ and separately in London, both in 1845 and by Professor Arber in 1871. Roy, and apparently Barlow as well, had assisted William Tyndale in the translation of the New Testament (see no. 141 above). Thomas More, in his ‘Confutation of Tyndale’s Answer,’ says on hearsay that Roy was burned in Portugal. Foxe (Acts and Monuments, iv. 696, 753) repeats the story, dating the burning in 1531, from an entry in Bishop Tunstal’s ‘Prohibition.’ Tindal gives an unfavourable account of Roy’s character in the address to the reader preceding the ‘parable of the wicked mammon.’ Roy was apparently born in Calais and may have been of Jewish stock. He could have studied at Cambridge University and joined the group that discussed Lutheranism at the White Horse tavern, which was frequented by Cambridge men such as Tyndale, Latimer, Bilney, Ridley, and Barnes. Apparently, Roy entered the Franciscan Observant Convent at Greenwich (ca. 1516-18), an institution that he left in about 1524 to join William Tyndale in Hamburg to assist him in his translation of the New Testament. Roy’s other works include: 1. ‘A lytle treatous or dialoge very necessary for all christen men to learne and to knowe’ also known as ‘A Brefe Dialoge bitwene a Christen Father and his stobborne Sonne’, dedicated to the Estates of Calais, Strassburgh, 1527–8; reprinted at Vienna, 1874. 2. ‘An exhortation to the diligent studye of scripture, made by Erasmus Roterodamus, and translated into English, to which is appended an exposition unto the seaventh chapter of the first epistle to the Corinthians,’ Marburg, 20 July 1529. 3. ‘A proper dyalogue betwene a gentillman and a husbandman . . . .,’ 1530, Marburg (2 editions); 1863, London; reprinted by Arber in 1871. 4. ‘A compendious olde treatyse howe that we ought to have ye Scripture in Englysshe,’ Marburg, 1530 (2 editions); 1546 (?), London; in Foxe’s ‘Acts and Monuments,’ 1563; Bristol, 1863; 1871, reprinted by Arber. Heber and Hazlitt also attribute to him some verses beginning ‘I, playne Piers,’ printed by Wynkyn de Worde, 4to, n.d. (Handbook, p. 473). See A Brefe Dialoge bitwene a Christen Father and his stobborne Sonne ‘The first Protestant Catechism published in English’ (William Roye), Douglas H. Parker and Bruce Krajewski, University of Toronto Press, 1999; Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Vol. 49, Roy, William (fl. 1527) by William Arthur Shaw, pp. 370-371.
143. 1528-29 Kingston-upon-Thames, Surrey: 15s. 4d. received for Robin Hood’s gathering at Whitsun [Finny, ‘Mediaeval Games,’ 122].
144. 1529 Worcester and Battenhall, Worcestershire, : Prior William More, at Worcester and Battenhall the week of May 16-22 (the week leading up to Whitsun) pays 12d. in ‘rewardes to certen yong men of seynt Elyns þat pleyd Robyn Whod’ [REED: Worcester, 503; William More, Journal of Prior William More, ed. Ethel S. Fegan (London: Worcester Historical Society, 1913-14), 293].
145. 1529 Thomas More (1478 – 1535), English lawyer, scholar, writer, member of parliament, councillor to Henry VIII, and lord chancellor, refers to Robin Hood ‘frère tuk’ and ‘mad Maryon’ in A Dialogue Concerning Heresies, a major link in the chain of books that comprise the More-Tyndale controversy. It attacks Tyndale’s 1525-26 New Testament translation as being a Lutheran book, as well as criticism of subsequent Tyndale publications of the late twenties (see no. 141 above), and for the earlier mention of Robin by More’s brother-in-law John Rastell (see no. 122 above). More was close to the radical Catholic theologian Erasmus,but opposed the Protestant Reformation (which is evident in his writings) and in particular, the theology of Martin Luther and William Tyndale (see no. 141 above and no. 153 below). More also opposed the king’s separation from the Catholic Church, refusing to acknowledge Henry as Supreme Head of the Church of England and the annulment of his marriage to Catherine of Aragon. After refusing to take the Oath of Supremacy, he was convicted of treason and beheaded. In 1935 Pope Pius XI canonised More as a martyr. The Dialogue was published for the first time by More’s brother-in-law John Rastell (see no. 122 above) in 1529, and a second edition was published in 1531 by John Rastell’s son, William Rastell. William Rastell supervised its publication again as part of his 1557 Folio Edition of More’s English Works. The first modern edition, edited by W. E. Campbell and A. W. Reed, was published in 1927, and was reissued in 1931 as Volume II of The English Works of Sir Thomas More. The first real critical edition of Dialogue was published in 1981 as Volume 6 of The Yale Edition of the Complete Works of St. Thomas More. More’s many works include: A Rueful Lamentation (1503), A Merry Jest (1516), The Life of Pico della Mirandola (trans., 1510), The History of King Richard the Third (c.1513-1518), and probably his most important work, Utopia (1516).
146. 1529-30 Kingston-upon-Thames, Surrey: 26s. 8d. received for Robin Hood’s gathering; also 2d. paid for mending Robin Hood’s coats [Finny, ‘Mediaeval Games,’ 122].
147. 1530 Worcester and Battenhall, Worcestershire: Prior William More, at Worcester and Battenhall the week of June 12-18 (the week following Trinity Sunday) pays 12d. ‘to þe box of Rybyn hood &c xij d.’ [REED: Worcester, 507; William More, Journal of Prior William More, ed. Ethel S. Fegan (London: Worcester Historical Society, 1913-14), 309].
148. 1530 Amersham, Buckinghamshire: Money received ‘of the lad [? read: lades] for Robyn hode’ [Wiles, Early Plays, 64; F. G. Lee, ‘Amersham Churchwardens Accounts,’ Records of Buckinghamshire 7 (1897), 44; The Edwardian Inventories for Buckinghamshire, transcr. J. E. Brown, ed. F. C. Eeles, Alcuin Club Collections 9 (1908), 126].
149. 1530-31 Kingston-upon-Thames, Surrey: 20s. 6d. received for Robin Hood’s gathering; also 3d. paid ‘for spungyng and brushyng of Robin Howdes cotes’ [Finny, ‘Mediaeval Games,’ 122].
150. 1531 Scotland: The crown pays 22s. 6d. for taffeta for ‘the Kingis Robene Hudis baner’ [Accounts of the Lord High Treasurer of Scotland, Scottish Record Office (Edinburgh: H. M. General Register House, 1877), 5.432.
151. 1531 Cleeve Prior, Worcestershire: Prior William More, while at Crowle the week of July 23-29, pays 6s. 8d. ‘in reewardes to the tenantes of clyve pleying with Robyn Whot Mayde Marion and other’ [REED: Worcester, 513; 338n. 77; William More, Journal of Prior William More, ed. Ethel S. Fegan (London: Worcester Historical Society, 1913-14), 332].
152. 1531-45? London: Stephen Gardiner, Bishop of Winchester 1531-1551, ‘forbad the players of London . . . . to play any mo playes of Christe, but of Robin Hode and litle Johan, and of the Parlament of Byrdes and suche other trifles’ [W. Wraghton, pseud. (William Turner), The Rescuynge of the Romishe Fox Other Wyse Called the Examination of the Hunter Deuised by Steuen Gardiner (Bonn: L. Mylius, 1545), sig G2r]. (see no. 191 below).
153. 1532-33 Thomas More refers to Robin Hood ‘frère tukke’ and ‘madde Maryon’ for the second time (see no. 145 above) in The Confutation of Tyndale’s Answer, a two volume reply to Tyndale’s Answer Unto More’s Dialogue. The Confutation, More’s longest work, contains an imaginary dialogue between More and Tyndale, with More addressing each of Tyndale’s criticisms of Catholic rites and doctrines, the final exchange of the More-Tyndale controversy (see no. 145 above). More’s nephew, William Rastell, published volume one of Confutation in 1532 (see also More, Sir Thomas, Saint, The Confutation of Tyndale’s Answer, part 1. in The Complete Works of Saint Thomas More, Vol. 8.: I (New Haven, Yale University Press); More, Sir Thomas, Saint, The Confutation of Tyndale’s Answer, part 2. in The Complete Works of Saint Thomas More, Vol 8.: II (New Haven, Yale University Press); Schuster, Louis, ‘Thomas More’s Polemical Career, 1523-1533’ in The Complete Works of Saint Thomas More, Vol. 8.: III (New Haven, Yale University Press); Marius, Richard ‘Thomas More’s View of the Chuch’ in ibid.
154. 1532-33 Hythe, Kent: New Romney Accounts include 4s. paid to Robin Hood players from Hythe, and 8d. in expenses on them [Records of Plays and Players in Kent 1450-1642, ed. Giles E. Dawson. Malone Society Collections 7 (Oxford: printed for the Malone Society by the University Press, 1965), 133].
155. 1533 Another variant of the phrase ‘Robyn Hode in Barnysdale stode’ (see no. 122 above) appears in The Image of Ypocresye (MS. Lansdown 794, which belonged to Peter le Neve in 1724. He sold it to a Mr. West, who allowed Thomas Martin of Palgrave to make a copy, which fell into the hands of Dr. Farmer of Cambridge, which in 1819, was in the possession of Richard Heber Esq. of Hodnet in Shropshire). Incorrectly attributed to John Skelton, this four-part satirical poem (by an unknown author) is against the Clergy and Religious Orders and those under them, or connected with them, from the Pope, Cardinals and Friars, to the Summoner and Bell-ringer (see also The Poetical Works of John Skelton: with notes, and some account of the author and his writings, Rev. Alexander Dyce, Vol. II, pp. 413-446, London, 1843; The Image of Ypocresye, published by Chadwyck-Healey, 1992).
156. c. 1533-43 John Leland was the first to mention Robin Hood’s grave at Kirklees in Collectanae (see Robin Hood’s Grave), and he records Robin Hood’s Bay in the North Riding of Yorkshire (see Robin Hood Place Names), and also associates him with Barnsdale in Itinerary; he also mentions a Robin Hood’s Cross in Lincolnshire. Leland (also spelt Leyland) was the earliest of a prominent group of English antiquarians. Born in London in about 1506 and educated at St. Paul’s School and Christ’s College, Cambridge (B.A., 1522), he later studied at Oxford and also in Paris. He was Ordained into the church, and had become chaplain and librarian to Henry VIII by 1530. In 1533, Leland was given the authority to search cathedral and monastic libraries for manuscripts of historical interest. He tried to preserve the manuscripts scattered at the dissolution of the monasteries, but his powers did not appear to extend to their actual collection; however he did procure for the king’s library some valuable additions, mainly from the abbey of St Augustine at Canterbury. From about 1536 to 1543 he made a series of journeys through England and Wales, where he collected much topographical and antiquarian material. In the mid-1540s, Leland wrote a letter to Henry VIII which gave an outline of his achievements so far, and his future plans, describing what use he intended to make of the information he had accumulated. He planned to execute a historical dictionary of British writers, a historical topography of Britain alongside an engraved map, an account of the antiquities of Britain, and a genealogical study of Britain’s noble families, using material he had collected in his journeys. The letter was subsequently published by John Bale in 1549 (with Bale’s own additional commentary) under the title: The laboriouse Journey and Serche of Johan Leylande for Englandes Antiquitees Geven of hym as a Newe Yeares Gyfte, to King Henry the viii, in the xxxvii Yeare of his Raygne, with declaracyons enlarged by Johan Bale. The letter has been reprinted several times, by Ralph Brook and John Weever, from Bale, and by Thomas Hearne in the first volume of ‘Itinerary’; more recently by W. A. Copinger (Manchester, 1895), and Lucy Toulmin Smith (‘Itinerary’, Vol. 1 parts 1 to 111, London, 1907). The letter has traditionally (following Bale) been regarded as a ‘New Year’s gift’ to the King for January 1546.
Leland worked on his papers at his house in the parish of St Michael le Querne, Cheapside, London, but he was not destined to complete his great labours; certified insane in March 1550, he died on the 18th of April 1552. Most of his work had remained in manuscript form at the time of his death. Leland’s manuscripts and papers were placed in the care of Sir John Cheke, a Cambridge man, however he died in 1557. After passing through various hands, the bulk of Leland’s surviving manuscripts were deposited in the Bodleian at Oxford by William Burton, the historian of Leicestershire. Today they are kept in various libraries (British Library, MS Cotton Julius C VI; British Library, MS Royal 18A LXIV; Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Tanner 464.4; Oxford, Bodleian Library, MSS top. gen. c. 1-4, e. 8-15; Cambridge University Library, MS Ee. 5.14). Prized for their information, copies were made and volumes borrowed, mistreated, or lost. Only one copy made in the sixteenth century still survives, that transcribed by John Stowe (see no. 262 below) in about 1576. Now in the Bodleian Library, it is the most complete form of Leland’s work. Stow’s copy was made before much damage was done to Leland’s manuscripts, and has therefore filled in the gaps left by damage and decay, and supplied the whole of three lost books. Leland’s work was freely used by other antiquaries, including his friend John Bale, and following Stow came (among others) William Harrison with his ‘Discription of England’; Holinshed the Chronicler; William Camden with his ‘Britannia’; Michael Drayton for the ‘Polyolbion,’ and William Dugdale, all owe a debt to Leland. In the seventeenth century several transcripts more or less complete were made, by William Burton (which he named ‘The Itinerary of John Leland’), William Dugdale, and Thomas Gale, one for Robert Plot, and two or three by anonymous hands. In the early years of the eighteenth century Browne Willis, and finally Thomas Hearne again copied the work. The account of Leland’s manuscript of his journeys in England and Wales (‘The Itinerary’ compiled by Leland c. 1536-43), was published by Thomas Hearne (9 vols., Oxford and Eton, 1710-1712); a second edition appeared in 1744 and 1745 and a third in 1768-9. ‘The Itinerary’ was newly edited in five volumes by Lucy Toulmin Smith (London, 1906-10), and another edition by John Chandler (John Leland’s Itinerary: Travels in Tudor England, Sutton Publishing Ltd, 1993, second edition, 1998). Leland’s manuscript of his other most important work (‘The Collectanea’ containing many notes and transcripts from his visits to monastic libraries, including most of his book-lists, compiled c. 1533-6), was also published by Hearne (6 vols., Oxford, 1715); another edition was published in 1774. Leland’s ‘De viris illustribus’ (his unfinished commentary on British writers), which had been used and distorted by his friend John Bale, was published by Anthony Hall (2 vols., Oxford, 1709), as Commentarii de scriptoribus Britannicis, and again (with its original title) and more authoritatively by James Carley in 2010; this edition of Carley’s is not only the most authoritative of any Leland text, it provides a very thorough introduction to the text, it’s manuscript, and even the life of the author.
Leland was also a Latin poet of some merit, one of his most famous pieces being the Cygnea Cantio (1545) in honour of Henry VIII; many of his minor works are included in Hearne’s editions of the Itinerary and the Collectanea, and many were published by Dana F. Sutton and James Carley. Leland also wrote a tract on the historicity of King Arthur, which expanded into his Assertio inclytissimi Arturii regis Britanniae (published in 1544 by Reyner Wolfe, and again with Richard Robinson’s English translation, by John Wolfe in 1582). See also: The Life of John Leland, Edward Burton, London (1896); The Itinerary of John Leland . . . Vol 1, parts 1 to 111, Lucy Toulmin Smith, pp. vii – xxxv, London (1907); Encyclopædia Britannica, Vol. 16, (1911); Medieval History in the Tudor Age, May Mc Kisack, Oxford (1971); ‘John Leland, Wales, and Early British History’, Caroline Brett, Welsh History Review, 15: 169–82(1990); De uiris illustribus: On Famous Men, James P. Carley, Toronto and Oxford: Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies/Bodleian Library (2010); ‘The Encyclopedia of Medieval Literature in Britain’, Sian Echard, Robert Rouse, Vol. 3, pp. 1169-1174, Wiley-Blackwell (2017).
157. 16th century An obscure Scottish poem ‘Symmie and his Bruther’ mentions Robin Hood, ‘Johine’ and ‘Wallace.’ Another edition appears in Chronicle of Scottish Poetry: From the Thirteenth Century to the Union of the Crowns, Vol 1, pp. 360-61, J. Sibbald, Edinburgh and London (1802). It survives in the Bannatyne manuscript (see The Bannatyne manuscript writtin in tyme of pest, 1568, W. Tod Ritchie, vol. iii, p. 39, Scottish Text Society, Edinburgh and London (1928-34).
158. 1534 Leicester, Leicestershire: William Billar registrar of the Archdeaconry Court of Leicester, submits a bill of expenses incurred in participation in a Robin Hood game, including 16d. for a yard and a half of Kendal, 4d. for the hire of a coat for two days, and 8d. for borrowing a sword and buckler [William Kelly, Notices Illustrative of the Drama (London: John Russell Smith, 1865), 61].
159. 1534 Dumfries, Southern Lowlands, Scotland: Jock Wilson and Will Thomson are made citizens by the Robin Hood and Little John who were chosen the previous Easter [Mill, Medieval Plays, 171].
160. 1535 Battenhall, Worcestershire: Prior William More, at Battenhall the week of May 30-June 5 (the second week after Trinity Sunday), pays 12d. to ‘Robyn Whod and litle Iohn of Ombursley’ [REED: Worcester, 529; William More, Journal of Prior William More, ed. Ethel S. Fegan (London: Worcester Historical Society, 1913-14), 405].
161. 1535-36 Stratton, Cornwall: Parish receives 12s. 4d. from ‘I. Greby which was callyd Robynhode & of his felows’ [Reference courtesy of Evelyn Newlyn and Sally L. Joyce].
162. 1536 Stratton, Cornwall: Parish receives £1 18s. 4d. from ‘John Marys and his company that playd Robin Hoode’ [Reference courtesy of Evelyn Newlyn and Sally L. Joyce ?].
163. 1536 Dumfries, Southern Lowlands, Scotland: Simeon Crocket is made a citizen by Robin Hood and Little John [Mill, Medieval Plays, 171].
164. 1536. Dumfries, Southern Lowlands, Scotland: Two men are to be chosen to become citizens at the hands of Robin Hood and Little John [Mill, Medieval Plays, 171].
165. 1536 Dumfries, Southern Lowlands, Scotland: John Pawtonson is made a citizen by Robin Hood and Little John for 40d. [Mill, Medieval Plays, 171].
166. 1536-37 Kingston-upon-Thames, Surrey: ‘Charges for Robyn Hodde’ include costumes for a friar, fool, morris dancers, and Maid Marian, 6 pair of single-soled shoes and 6 pair of double-soled shoes, and 1300 livery badges [Finny, ‘Mediaeval Games,’ 126].
167. 1536-37 Kingston-upon-Thames, Surrey: £5 6s. 8d. received for Robin Hood’s gathering [Finny, ‘Mediaeval Games,’ 122].
168. 1536-37 Kingston-upon-Thames, Surrey: 2s. paid for 600 ‘Robyn hoddes lyuereys’ [Reference courtesy of Sally-Beth MacLean].
169. c. 1536-39 Sir Richard Morison (c.1513-1556), an English scholar, diplomat, theologian and politician, complains about plays of Robin Hood, Maid Marian, and Friar Tuck in ‘A Discourse Touching the Reformation of the Lawes of England’ (MS. London, British Library, Cotton Faustina C 2, fols. 5-22). In this briefing paper, which contains anti- catholic comments, Morison attempts to understand and arrange the common law, which he proposed to Henry VIII. In regards to Robin Hood he wrote: ‘In somer comenly upon the holy daies in most places of your realm, ther be playes of Robyn hoode, mayde Marian, freer Tuck, wherin besides the lewdenes and rebawdry that ther is opened to the people, disobedience also to your offices, is tought, whilest these good bloodes go about to take from the shiref of Notyngham one that for offendyng the lawes shulde have suffered execution. How moche better is it that those plaies shulde be forbodden and deleted and others dyvysed to set forthe and declare lyvely before the peoples eies the abhomynation and wickednes of the bisshop of Rome, monkes, ffeers, nonnes, and suche like, and to declare and open to them thobedience that your subiectes by goddes and mans lawes owe unto your magestie’.
Morison’s place of birth is uncertain, but he appears to have been the son of a Thomas Morison of Hertfordshire by a daughter of Thomas Merry of Hatfield . He attended Cardinal College, Oxford, and graduated B.A. in about 1528, then entered into the service of Thomas Wolsey. He soon left the cardinal, visited Hugh Latimer at Cambridge (see no. 204 below), and later went to Italy where he lived for several years, learning Italian and studying the Greek classics. Becoming a proficient scholar, and always interested in literature, he adopted Calvinistic religious views. These were poverty-stricken times for Morison and in 1533 he sought aid at home. Apparently nothing came of this and in the following year Morison wrote to Cromwell, who at last invited him into his household. In 1536 Morison returned to England and in quick succession wrote two tracts, A Lamentation in whiche is shewed what Ruyne and destruction cometh of seditious rebellyon and A Remedy for Sedition, both in print before the end of the year. Although the author’s name did not appear on either, they were a personal triumph for Morison, and established his reputation as a government propagandist. Morison was knighted in 1550, and in his long and varied career held several offices, such as: Gentleman of the privy chamber 1539; collector, petty customs London 1545-50; ambassador to Denmark and the Hanse towns 1546-7; made commissioner to visit the university of Oxford 1549; King’s Councillor 1550, and ambassador to the German court of Charles V for Edward VI 1550-53. By 1554 he was back on the Continent, this time in Strasbourg where he died in 1556. A rich man, Morison had begun to build the mansion of Cashiobury in Hertfordshire, which his son completed. He had married Bridget, daughter of John, lord Hussey to whome he left Cashiobury and all his property in London for life, with remainder in turn to their son Charles, and apparently Morison’s illegitimate children. Other works by Morison include: ‘Apomaxis Calumniarum,’ London, 1537, 8vo; A translation of the ‘Epistle’ of Sturmius, London, 1538, 8vo; ‘An Invective ayenste the great detestable vice, Treason,’ London, 1539, 8vo, and a translation of the ‘Introduction to Wisdom’ by Vives, London, 1540 and 1544, dedicated to Gregory Cromwell. He is also said to have written ‘Comfortable Consolation for the Birth of Prince Edward’, rather than ‘Sorrow for the Death of Queen Jane,’ after the death of Jane Seymour in 1537. The manuscript of Discourse is seemingly not yet published, but a portion of it appears in ‘An Early Tudor Programme for Plays and Other Demonstrations Against the Pope’, Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes 20, Sydney Anglo, 1957, pp. 176-9. See also: Dictionary of National Biography,1885-1900, Volume 39; The History of Parliament: the House of Commons 1509-1558, S.T. Bindoff, London, 1982; ‘Humanist Scholarship and Public Order’: Two Tracts Against the Pilgrimage of Grace, David Sandler Berkowitz, Folger Books, 1984; Renaissance and Reform in Tudor England: The Careers of Sir Richard Morison c. 1513-1556, Tracey A. Sowerby, Oxford, 2010.
170. c. 1537 Robin Hood and Little John mentioned in John Bellenden’s printed translation of the Scotorum Historiae written in Latin by Hector Boece (see no. 138 above). James V commissioned Bellenden to translate the Historiae into Scots, (as well as the first five books of Livy) and he also commissioned a verse translation into Scots by William Stewart (1481?–1550?), which was given the title The Buik of the Cronicilis of Scotland. Stewart’s translation began in 1531, but remained in manuscript until 1858, when it was published in three volumes in the Rolls Series. It was edited by William Barclay Turnbull from a unique manuscript which, after being in the possession of Hew Craufurd of Cloverhill, Bishop Moore, and George I, was presented by the last-named to Cambridge University library (Kk. ii. 16). For another partial prose translation preserved in a MS. now in the possession of the Pierpont Morgan Library, see George Watson, The Mar Lodge translation of the History of Scotland (Scottish Text Society Publications 3:17, Edinburgh, 1946). Bellenden’s translation of Boece’s Historiae, which became The History and Chronicles of Scotland, was presented in manuscript to James V in 1531. This manuscript is now held in the Pierpont Morgan Library, New York, MS M 527 (hereafter MS M). The text was revised by Bellenden in several stages, and at least two recensions of MS M exist in manuscript. Representative manuscripts of these stages are Cambridge, Trinity College, MS 0.3.21 (hereafter MS C) and London, University College, MS Angl. 1 (hereafter MS A). MS C represents an early stage of revision work, whereas MS A is a later intermediary manuscript.
After its thorough revision the final version was printed and published by Thomas Davidson, the king’s printer, in Edinburgh in about 1537. Altogether nine Manuscripts of Bellenden’s Chronicle are now known to exist. Although claimed to be a translation of Boece’s Historiae, Bellenden’s translation is far from identical with Boece’s original Latin in terms of its contents, organization historiographical and political views. Bellenden does include (in the printed edition of c. 1537) Boece’s mention of Little John’s remains at Pette in Moray (Bellenden calls it ‘Murray land’) and he also includes (in the printed edition of c. 1537) Boece’s mention of the baronial rebellion under the leadership of Simon de Montfort. As can be seen, Bellenden makes an addition – he includes Robin Hood and Little John in the context of the rebellion, thus following Walter Bower (see no. 17 above). Another edition of Bellenden’s translation appeared as The Chronicles of Scotland: Compiled by Hector Boece, Translated into Scots by John Bellenden 1531. Edited in: Continuation of the Work of the Late Walter Seton by R. W. Chambers, Edith C. Batho and H. Winifred Husbands/ The Scottish Text Society, Edinburgh and London, 2 Vols., 1938-41. This edition is based on the Pierpont Morgan manuscript, which is probably the earliest of Bellenden’s manuscripts.
John Bellenden, Ballantyne or Bannatyne (fl. 1533-1587) an eminent writer and poet, was born about the end of the 15th century, in the south-east of Scotland, perhaps in East Lothian. He appears to have been educated, first at the university of St Andrews and then afterwards at the university of Paris, where he took the degree of Doctor of Divinity. Ballenden brought over Boece’s Historiae when he returned to Scotland, and from his own statement, in one of his poems, we learn that he had been in the service of James V. from the king’s earliest years, and that the post he held was clerk of accounts. As a reward for his labours he was appointed archdeacon of Moray and a canon of Ross. As a strenuous opponent of the Reformation, he was in the succeeding reign, compelled to go into exile. He is said by some authorities to have died at Rome in 1550; by others to have been still living in 1587. See, Fresche Fontanis: Studies in the Culture of Medieval and Early Modern Scotland, Janet Hadley Williams and J. Derrick McClure, Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2013/ Kingship and Imperial Ideas in the Chronicles of Scotland, Ryoko Harikae, pp. 217-229; Encyclopædia Britannica, Vol. 3 (1911), Bellenden, John, p. 698; Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Vol. 4, Bellenden, John by , pp. 186-87; A Biographical Dictionary of Eminent Scotsmen, Vol 1, 1857, Ballentyne (or Bellenden), John by Robert Chambers and Thomas Napier Thomson, pp. 124-27; Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Vol. 54, Stewart, William by
171. 1537 Robin John, little hode, and frier tucke mentioned in the play Thersites. The character (Thersites) is named after the Greek soldier Thersites from Homer’s lliad, and is modelled after Pyrgopolinices and Thraso, from the Roman playwrights Plautus and Terence. The play has plenty of action but little plot. Thersites is an anti-hero who carries a club, he shows his valour in combat with a passing snail, and he berates his mother. In the epilogue the author gives the almost exact date the play was written, as he mentions the birth of Prince Edward (later Edward VI), born on 12th October 1537, and he calls upon the Almighty to save the ‘Queen, lovely Lady Jane,’ who died of childbirth complications on October 24. This anonymous play was possibly written by Nicholas Udall (see no. 184 below), and printed as A new enterlude called Thersytes (London: John Tysdale [1562?] ‘at hys shop in the upper ende of Lombard Strete in Alhallowes Churche yearde neare untoo Grace Church’. There is a facsimile by E. W. Ashbee, London, 1876 (Huntington Library copy) and J. S. Farmer, Tudor Facsimile Texts, London, 1912, (Huntington Library copy). There are editions by Joseph Haslewood (Two Interludes Reprinted for the Roxburghe Club, Kent, 1820); Francis Child (Four Old Plays, Cambridge, 1848); W. C. Hazlitt (Dodsley’s Plays, I, London, 1874); A. W. Pollard (English Miracle Plays, Moralities and Interludes, Oxford, 1890); J. S. Farmer (Six Anonymous Plays, London, 1905); Marie Axton (Three Tudor Classical Interludes, Thersites, Jacke Jugeler, Horestes, Cambridge, 1982). Sixteenth century editions of Thersites are housed in the John Work Garrett Library of Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, Maryland; Huntington Library, San Marino, California; Carl H. Pforzheimer Library, New York.
172. 1537 Chagford, Devon: Parish pays 35s. ‘for dowing the office of the Howde Coat’ [Ethel Lega-Weekes, ‘Howde Men’: Robin Hood’s Men at Chagford,’ Notes and Queries 11 ser. no. 1 (April 30, 1910), 346].
173. c. 1537-62 Robin Hood mentioned in the play Jacke Jugeler, which appears to have been written for children, possibly by Nicholas Udall (see no. 184 below). The ‘Prologue’ tells us that the play is based on Plautus’ ‘first commedie’ Amphitruo. Jake Jugler first appears in Langland’s Piers Plowman (B-text VI. 72), and in the sixteenth century jack is used as a common noun for ‘knave’ or ‘low-bred fellow’. Juggler meant (1) buffoon, entertainer; (2) a magician or conjuror; (3) generally a deceiver. All senses are current in late medieval and Tudor usage. The play was entered in the Stationers’ Register by William Copland between 16 October 1562 and 22 July 1563, but composition was probably earlier. Earliest editions are: A new enterlued for chyldren to playe named Jacke Jugeler both wytte, very playsent, and merye. Neuer before Imprented (London: Wyllyam Copland [1562?] ‘in Temes strete at the Vintre unpon [sic] the thre Crayne wharfe’); A new Enterlued for Chyldren to playe named Jacke Jugeler both wytte, and very playsent. Newly Imprented (London: Wyllyam Copland [1565?] ‘in Lothbury’); An Enterlude for Chyldren to playe named Jack Jugeler, bothe wittie and very plesant. Newly Imprinted (London: John Allde [c. 1570] ‘at the long Shop ajioyning unto Saint Mildreds Churche in the Pultrie’). There is a facsimile by E. W. Ashbee, London, 1876; J. S. Farmer, Tudor Facsimile Texts, London, 1912; W. W. Greg, Malone Society Reprints, Oxford, 1933 and 1937. There are editions by Joseph Haslewood (Two Interludes Reprinted for the Roxburghe Club, Kent, 1820); Francis Child (Four Old Plays, Cambridge, 1848); W. C. Hazlitt (Dodsley’s Plays, II, London, 1874); J. S. Farmer (Six Anonymous Plays, London, 1905); Maurice Hussey (Play of the Weather and other Tudor Comedies, London, 1968); Marie Axton (Three Tudor Classical Interludes, Thersites, Jacke Jugeler, Horestes, Cambridge, 1982). Sixteenth century editions of Jacke Jugeler are housed in the Rosenbach Museum and Library, Philadelphia; Huntington Library, San Marino, California; Folger Library, Washington D.C.
174. 1538 Stratton, Cornwall: Parish receives £3 10d. ‘of Robyn hode and of hys men.’ [Reference courtesy of Evelyn Newlyn and Sally L. Joyce?].
175. 1538-39 Kingston-upon-Thames, Surrey: 23s. 1d. received for Robin Hood’s gathering; 7s. paid for Robin Hood’s coats [Finny, ‘Mediaeval Games,’ 122].
176. 1539-40 Yeovil, Somerset: £12 14s. 1d. received of John Phelips as Robin Hood [REED: Somerset, 406].
177. 1539 and 1540 Ayr, Southern Lowlands, Scotland: £6 13s. 4d. are paid for the ‘Robert Hudis plais’ at 5 marks each year [George S. Pryde, ed., Ayr Burgh Accounts 1534-1624, Scottish Historical Society 3rd ser. 28 (Edinburgh: Scottish Historical Society, 1937), 84].
178. 1540 Whitby, North Riding, Yorkshire: A Robin Hood’s Stone near Whitby (see Robin Hood Place Names).
179. 1540 Ayr, Southern Lowlands, Scotland: 5 marks are paid to William Nesbit ‘for robert hudis plais,’ and the same to Alexander Kennedy for the plays the following year [Mill, Medieval Plays, 165].
180. 1540-41 Woodbury, Devon: St. Swithins churchwardens accounts include 8s. paid ‘ffor Robert Hode and lytyll Iohn Cott’ and 2s. paid ‘ffor ther Wardyns Labor as the Custome ys’ [REED: Devon, 284].
181. 1540-41 Yeovil, Somerset: £8 12s. 2½d. received of John Dore as Robin Hood [REED: Somerset, 406].
182. 1541-42 Ashburton, Devon: Parish pays 19s. 11d. for coats for Robin Hood and his followers [REED: Devon, 25].
183. 1541-42 Yeovil, Somerset: £8 7s. 5d. received of William Short as Robin Hood [REED: Somerset, 406].
184. 1542 Two mentions of Robin Hood which include the well known phrase ‘Robin Hood in Barnsdale stode’ (see no. 155 above), appear in Nicholas Udall’s Apophthegmes, a translation of part of ‘Apophthegms’ by Erasmus of Rotterdam. An English schoolmaster, translator and playwright, Nicholas Udal or Udall (1504–1556), appears to have come from the Uvedale family of Wickham in Hampshire. His name being latinized as Udallus, and then anglicized as Udall, also appears as Yevedale, Owdall, Woodall, and other variants. Nicholas was elected a scholar of Winchester College in 1517, and admitted a scholar of Corpus Christi College in 1520; he is called Wodall as a lecturer at that college in 1526 to 1528. He became a good friend of John Leland (see no. 156 above), and together they produced ‘dites’ (ditties) ‘and interludes’ at Anne Boleyn’s coronation on the 31st of May 1533. Leland’s contributions are all in Latin; those of ‘Udallus,’ which form the chief part, are mostly in English. In about 1534 Udall became headmaster of Eton College, an office he held intermittently for nearly eight years. His time at Eton came to an abrupt end. On the 14th of March 1540/1541 Udall was brought up before the privy council for being ‘counsail’ with two of the boys, for stealing some silver images and chapel ornaments. He denied the theft, but confessed to the much more scandalous offence of sodomy with one of the boys, and was sent to the Marshalsea prison. Udall’s imprisonment was of short duration, and his reputation was not permanently damaged. He had on 27 September 1537 become vicar of Braintree, and that benefice he retained on his departure from Eton, he held this office for nearly seven years.
Udall’s literary skills were noticed by Henry VIII’s new queen, Catherine Parr, whose theological views inclined, like his own, to Lutheranism. Under her patronage he took charge of a translation of Erasmus’ paraphrase of the New Testament. The first volume, containing the Gospels and Acts, was published in 1548; the Gospel According to Luke was translated by Udall, and the Gospel According to John was mostly translated by Princess Mary (later Queen Mary I). In 1549 Udall became tutor to the young Edward Courtenay; in 1551 he obtained a prebend at Windsor, and in 1553 he was presented to the rectory of Calborne in the Isle of Wight. Meanwhile he had become famous as a playwright and translator. Udall flourished under Edward VI and survived into the reign of the Roman Catholic Mary I; various documents refer to his connection with plays presented before the queen. He became a tutor in the household of Stephen Gardiner, bishop of Winchester, and in December 1555 he became headmaster of Westminster school. Udall was buried in the church of St. Margaret’s, Westminster, on 23 December 1556. Undall’s Apophthegmes was printed by Richard Grafton in 1542, with another edition in 1564, and a facsimile edition appeared in 1969 (Theatrum Orbis Terrarum Ltd., Amsterdam, and Da Capo Press). The edition by Robert Roberts (Boston, Lincolnshire, 1877), was reprinted in 2009 (Kessinger Publishing) and 2017 and 2018 (ReInk Books). Udall’s other works include: Floures for Latine Spekynge, selected and gathered out of Terence and the same translated into Englysshe, and a translation by Udall of Geminus’s Anatomieor Compendiosa totius anatomiae delineatio, a huge volume with gruesome plates, published in 1553. The only surviving play that can certainly by attributed to Undall is ‘Ralph Roister Doister, which enjoys the distinction of being the earliest English comedy known. Udall is universally recognised as one of the most notable pioneers in the history of English dramatic literature. The anonymous interludes Jacke Jugeler and Thersites (see nos. 173 and 171 above) are also attributed (uncertainly) to him. See also, Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Vol. 58; Encyclopedia Britannica, 11th edition, Vol. XXVII, Cambridge University Press, 1910.
185. 1543 Ayr, Southern Lowlands, Scotland: The town pays £3 6s. 8d. ‘to Robert hudis play’ [Mill, Medieval Plays, 166].
186. 1543 Stratton, Cornwall: Martha Rose and Margaret Martin are paid 3s. for the ‘wode of Robyn Hode is howse’ [N. M. & A., ‘Howde Men’: Robin Hood’s Men,’ Notes and Queries 11 ser., no.2 (July 2, 1910), 16].
187. 1544 Edinburgh, Lothian: (April 21, Saturday 2 weeks after Easter). The crown donates money ‘to Robert Hude in Edinburght’ [Accounts of the Lord High Treasurer of Scotland, 8.282].
188. 1544-45 Yeovil, Somerset: £5 8s. 9½d. received ‘Of Iohn Delagryse being R Hood this yere’ [REED: Somerset, 406].
189. 1545 Perth, North Sea Coast: (May 16, May 21, and May 27). Robert Sibbald , Robert Meik, and Walter Oliphant are made citizens, paying their fees to James MacBrek as Robin Hood [Mill, Medieval Plays, 265].
190. 1545 Ayr, Southern Lowlands, Scotland: Treasurer Andrew Dalzell incurred reimbursable expenses as Robin Hood [Pryde, Ayr Burgh Accounts, 102; Mill Medieval Plays, 166].
191. 1545 William Turner (c.1508-1568) refers to Robin Hood and Little John in The Rescuynge of the Romishe Fox Other Vvyse Called the Examination of the Hunter Deuised by Steuen Gardiner: [Imprynted haue at winchester [i.e. Bonn]: anno Domini 1545. 4. nonas Martij. By me Hanse hit prik [i.e. Laurenz von der Meulen, 1545]. Referring to bishop Stephen Gardiner, he writes: ‘Where as ye compare me vnto the Turc whiche forbiddethe open shewes and preachyng of Christe / i meruel withe what face ye call me Turkish in that behaff when as ye your self forbad the players of london (as it was told me) to play any mo playes of Christe / but of robin hode and litle Iohan / and of the Parlament of byrdes and suche other trifles. Now syr bisshop which of vs ij is more lyke the Turk’. Turner used the pseudonym W. Wraghton in what appears to be another edition (see no. 152 above). There is a modern edition by Ann Arbor (Early English Books Online: Text Creation Partnership, Oxford, 2007-10). See also, Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Volume 57, by William Hunt; Encyclopædia Britannica, Volume 27, 1911; William Turner: Father of English Botany, Marie Addyman, Friends of Carlisle Park Morpeth, 2008; Reformation Unbound: Protestant Visions of Reform in England, 1525-1590, Karl Gunther, Cambridge University Press, 2014.
An English clergyman, reformer, physician, and botanist, Turner was a native of Morpeth in Northumberland. He became a student of Pembroke Hall, Cambridge, where he learnt Greek from Nicholas Ridley (afterwards bishop of London). Turner often heard Hugh Latimer (see no. 204 below) preach, and he accepted his Protestant teachings. He obtained his B.A. in 1529–30, and was elected junior fellow. Becoming joint-treasurer of his college in 1532, he received his M.A. in 1533, and was senior treasurer in 1538. Before leaving Cambridge he published his translation of ‘The Comparison between the Olde Learnynge and the Newe’ in 1537, a small religious book, ‘Unio Dissidentium,’ in 1538, and in the same year his ‘Libellus de re Herbaria,’ his first essay in the field of botany. The first Englishman to study plants scientifically, Turner established the science of botany in England. He left Cambridge in 1540 and travelled about preaching in various places, stayed for a time at Oxford, and was afterwards imprisoned for preaching without a license. On his release he travelled in Holland, Germany, Italy and Switzerland, always increasing his knowledge of botany and medicine, collecting plants, and writing books on religion, which were so popular in England that they were forbidden by proclamation in July 1546. Turner returned to England on the accession of Edward VI, became chaplain and physician to the duke of Somerset, and in 1550 prebendary of York. In November 1550 he was made dean of Wells. In 1551, he published the first of three parts of his famous A new herball, wherin are conteyned the names of herbes, on which his botanical fame rests. In 1552 he was ordained priest by Bishop Ridley, but was deprived of his deanery in 1553, and during Queen Mary’s reign lived at various places in Germany, mostly along the Rhine. Returning to England in 1558, Turner regained his deanery, and did all he could to bring the Anglican Church into conformity with the Reformed Churches of Germany and Switzerland. On the complaint of his bishop, Gilbert Berkeley, he was suspended for Nonconformity in 1564. He passed his last days in Crutched Friars, London, and died on the 7th of July 1568.
192. 1545-46 Yeovil, Somerset: £9 10d. received of John Hacker the Elder as Robin Hood [REED: Somerset, 406].
193. 1546 Two proverbs of Robin Hood, a well known variant – ‘But many a man speaketh of Robyn Hood that never shot in his bowe’ (see no. 30 above), and the earliest of the proverb – ‘Tales of Robin Hood are good among fooles,’ in the work of John Heywood. First printed as: A dialogue conteinyng the nomber in effect of all the prouerbes in the englishe tongue compacte in a matter concernyng two maner of mariages, made and set foorth by Iohn̄ Heywood: Londini: [Imprinted at London in Fletestrete by Thomas Berthelet prynter to the kynges hyghnesse], An. M.D.XLVI. [1546]. Reprinted in the house of Thomas Berthelet ‘Newely ouersene, and somewhat augmented’ in 1550. There were several other editions including those of 1562, 1566, and 1598. Further editions include: The Proverbs and Epigrams of John Heywood (A. D. 1562). Reprinted from the original (1562) edition, and collated with the second (1566) edition. Printed for the Spenser Society, Manchester, 1867; The proverbs of John Heywood, being the ‘Proverbes’ of that author printed 1546 (Julian Sharman, London, 1874); Early English Dramatists: The Proverbs, Epigrams, and Miscellanies of John Heywood. Privately Printed for Subscribers by the Early English Drama Society (John S. Farmer, London 1906); A dialogue of the effectual proverbs in the English tongue concerning Marriage by John Heywood (John S. Farmer, London, 1906); John Heywood’s A Dialogue of Proverbs (R. E. Habenicht, Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1963, II, ix L1). See also, R. B. Dobson and J. Taylor, Rymes of Robyn Hood: An Introduction the the English Outlaw, London, 1976, p. 292; J.Ritson, Robin Hood: A Collection of all the Ancient Poems, Songs and Ballads (London, 1846, p. 26); M. P. Tilley, A Dictionary of the Proverbs in England in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries (Ann Arbor, 1950, No T 53); B. J. Whiting, Proverbs, Sentences and Proverbial Phrases from English Writings mainly before 1500 (Cambridge, Mass., 1968, No. R 157); The Oxford Dictionary of English Proverbs, Third Edition, revised by F. P. Wilson (Oxford, 1970, p. 803).
John Heywood (1497?–1580?), was an English dramatist, also known as a musician and for his poems and collection of proverbs. He is thought to have been a native of North Mimms, near St. Albans, Hertfordshire, although John Bale says he was born in London. He is said to have been educated at Broadgates Hall (Pembroke College), Oxford. From 1519 Heywood was active at the court of Henry VIII as a singer and ‘player of the virginals’ (a keyboard instrument) and later as master of a company of children who played before the court. In March 1538 Heywood received 40s. for ‘pleying an interlude with his children bifore the Princess Mary’, to whom he was probably introduced by Sir Thomas More. Heywood had married More’s niece Eliza Rastell, the sister of William Rastell, who printed some of Heywood’s plays. William Rastell was the son of More’s brother-in-law, John Rastell, who organized dramatic representations, and possibly wrote plays himself (see no. 145 above). Heywood’s stage works were interludes— performed separately, or preceding or following a play, or between the acts; this type of entertainment was popular in 15th- and 16th-century England. The four interludes to which Heywood’s name is attached are: The Play called the foure PP. . . a newe and a very mery interlude of a palmer, a pardoner, a potycary, a pedler; The Play of the Wether, a new and mery interlude of all maner of Wethers; The Play of Love, and Wytty and Wytless or A Dialogue on Wit and Folly (more of an academic dispute than a play). Two others are generally considered to be by him. These are: A Mery Play between the Pardoner, the Frere, the Curate and Neybour Pratte, and A Mery Play betwene Johan Johan the Husbande, Tyb his Wyfe, and Syr Jhān the Preest. Heywood’s other writings include collections of proverbs and epigrams, published together as John Heywoodes Woorkes in 1562 (though a reference on the title-page to additions proves that it was not the original). Among his ballads there is ‘The Willow Garland,’ sung by Desdemona in Othello, and a long verse allegory, The Spider and the Flie . Heywood was retained at four subsequent royal courts (Henry, Edward, Mary, and Elizabeth), despite being a devout Catholic. Under Edward, he was accused of denying the king’s supremacy over the church, and had to make a public recantation in 1544. On Elizabeth’s accession, or later, he retired to Malines (Belgium), where he is supposed to have died. He is probably the John Heywood who wrote from Malines in 1575. His name is included in a return of catholic fugitives, dated 1577. Heywood’s son was the poet and translator Jasper Heywood, his daughter was Elizabeth Heywood, and his grandson was the poet and preacher John Donne. Heywood has sometimes been credited with the authorship of the dialogue of Gentylnes and Nobylyte printed by Rastell without date, and there are some grounds for attributing to him the anonymous New Enterlude called Thersytes, played 1538 (see no. 171 above). See also, Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Adolphus William Ward, Volume 26, p. 331; Encyclopedia Britannica, Eleventh Edition, Vol XIII, Cambridge University Press, 1910, pp. 438-9.
194. 1547 (May)Edinburgh, Lothian: The crown pays money ‘to certane menstrallis of the toun, and thair Robert Hude’ [Accounts of the Lord High Treasurer of Scotland, 9.73-74].
195. 1547 (May 14, Saturday before Ascension) Edinburgh, Lothian: The crown pays £4 8s. ‘to Robert Hude of Edinburght’ [Accounts of the Lord High Treasurer of Scotland, 9.74].
196. 1547 Ayr, Southern Lowlands, Scotland: The town pays 35s. 8d. ‘to george dun for þe franchemennis lawingis in robert hvdis playis’ [Mill, Medieval Plays, 166; Pryde, 100].
197. 1547 Robin Hood’s tales mentioned in a letter of Edward Seymour, 1st Duke of Somerset (Lord Protector from 1547 to 1549 in the minority of his nephew Edward VI), to Stephen Gardiner (Henry VIII’s principal secretary in 1529, and bishop of Winchester in 1531). This appears in The Acts and Monuments, also known as Foxe’s Book of Martyrs (see no. 226 below). The work of John Foxe or Fox, this famous book has an account of Christian martyrs throughout Western history, but deals mainly with the martyrdom of English Protestants from the 14th century to the reign of Mary I, in Foxe’s own time. Widely read and owned by English Puritans, the book also gave a graphic description of the Inquisition, which fanned the hatred of Spain, and helped shape popular opinion about Catholicism for years to come.
John Foxe (1516-1587) born at Boston in Lincolnshire, apparently entered Brasenose College, Oxford, at age sixteen, but his definite connection to the university is with Magdalen College. He took his B.A. in 1537 and his M.A. in 1543, and was lecturer on logic in 1540-1541. He wrote several Latin plays on biblical subjects, and became a fellow of Magdalen College in 1539, resigning in 1545. After leaving Oxford he became a tutor for a short time, and married Agnes Randall. Moving to London in about 1547, Foxe found a patron in Mary Fitzroy, Duchess of Richmond. He was ordained deacon of the Church of England by Nicholas Ridley in 1550. Moving to Reigate Castle, he became tutor to the duchess’s orphan nephews. On the accession of Queen Mary, Foxe was deprived of his tutorship by the boys’ grandfather, the Duke of Norfolk, who was now released from prison. Foxe worked for the Reformation, writing several tracts. He also began his account of martyrs, which formed the first outline of the Actes and Monuments, which appears to have been influenced by his contact with John Bale and others. This was carried no further than 1500 when the accession of the Roman Catholic queen Mary I in 1553 forced him to flee overseas. In Strasbourg, France, he published his partly completed martyrology in Latin as Commentarii rerum in ecclesia gestarum (printed by Wendelin Richelius, 1554; ‘Commentaries on Affairs Within the Church’). He then went to Frankfurt, then to Basel, where he wrote Ad inclytos ac praepotentes Angliae proceres . . . supplicatio (‘To the Renowned and Powerful Nobles of England’, 1557), an appeal to the English nobility to restrain the queen from persecuting Protestants. With the aid of manuscripts sent to him from England, he carried his account of the martyrs up to 1556 and had it printed by Oporinus and Nicolaus Brylinger in 1559, with the title Rerum in ecclesia gestarum . . . pars prima in qua primum de rebus per Angliam et Scotiam gestis atque in primis de horrenda sub Maria nuper regina persecutione narratio continetur. Foxe returned to London and devoted himself to the completion of his great work. Sifting through official registers and using the memories of eyewitnesses, he enlarged his story. His English translation was first printed in March 1563 by his associate John Day, under the lengthy title: Actes and Monuments of these latter and perillous Dayes, touching matters of the Church, wherein are comprehended and described the great Persecution and horrible Troubles that have been wrought and practised by the Romishe Prelates, speciallye in this Realme of England and Scotland, from the yeare of our Lorde a thousande to the time now present. Gathered and collected according to the true Copies and Wrytinges certificatorie as well of the Parties themselves that Suffered, as also out of the Bishop’s Registers, which were the Doers thereof, by John Foxe, which immediately acquired the popular name The Book of Martyrs. Several errors that had appeared in the Latin version, and had been since exposed, were corrected in this edition, however its accuracy was attacked by Catholic writers. These criticisms caused Foxe to produce a second corrected edition, Ecclesiastical History, contayning the Actes and Monuments of things passed in every kynges tyme . . . in 1570. He made few changes in his third (1576) and fourth (1583) editions. The eighth edition (1641) contains a memoir of Foxe supposedly by his son Samuel, the MS. of which is in the British Library (Lansdowne MS. 388), however this was disputed by Dr S. R. Maitland in On the Memoirs of Foxe ascribed to his Son (1841). The best-known modern edition of the Martyrology is that (1837-1841) by the Rev. Stephen R. Cattley, with an introductory life by Canon George Townsend. The numerous inaccuracies of this life and the frequent errors of Foxe’s narrative were exposed by Dr Maitland in a series of tracts. This led to Cattley and Townsend’s new edition (1846-1849) under the same editorship. A new text prepared by the Rev. Josiah Pratt was issued (1870) in the ‘Reformation Series’ of the Church Historians of England, with a revised version of Townsend’s Life and appendices giving copies of original documents. A later edition by W. Grinton Berry appeared in 1907. Foxe’s papers are preserved in the Harleian and Lansdowne collections in the British Library. Extracts from these were edited by J. G. Nichols for the Camden Society (1859). See also W. Winters, Biographical Notes on John Foxe (1876); James Gairdner, History of the English Church in the Sixteenth Century; Encyclopedia Britannica, 1911, Vol. 10, pp. 770-771; Foxe based his accounts of the martyrs partly on authentic documents and reports of the trials, and on statements received direct from the friends of the sufferers. Unfortunately he was a hasty worker and his support of Protestantism did not allow for an impartial account of the large amount of facts with which he had to deal.
Anthony a Wood says that Foxe ‘believed and reported all that was told him, and there is every reason to suppose that he was purposely misled, and continually deceived by those whose interest it was to bring discredit on his work,’ but he admits that the book is a monument of his industry, his laborious research and his sincere piety. To his credit, Foxe was an advocate of religious tolerance far in advance of his day. One of the earliest students of Anglo-Saxon, he and John Day published an edition of the Saxon gospels under the patronage of Archbishop Parker. He died on the 18th of April 1587 and was buried at St Giles’s, Cripplegate.
198. 1548 Ayr, Southern Lowlands, Scotland: The town pays 10 marks ‘quhilk suld haue bene gevin to George dun and hew montsode quhen þai wer robert hude and litle Johnn’ [Mill, Medieval Plays, 166].
199. 1548 A record of a ‘Robyn-hodes walke’ inside Richmond Park, Surrey (see Robin Hood Place Names).
200. 1548 Richard Grafton (see no. 275 below) first published Edward Hall’s chronicle The Union of the Two Noble and Illustre Famelies of Lancastre and Yorke, the year after Hall’s death (see no. 95 above). There was some belief that Thomas Berthelet, royal printer and bookbinder to Henry VIII, had printed Hall’s work in 1542, but this is unlikely. A second edition by Grafton (who was Hall’s friend) appeared in 1550, and both editions contain Grafton’s continuation of Hall’s Chronicle from 1532, using Hall’s notes. With it’s clear Protestant sympathies, Hall’s work was even ordered to be destroyed by Queen Mary, which only increased public interest, and it was to influence Shakespeare through the medium of Raphael Holinshed. Hall’s Chronicle begins with Henry IV, and with Grafton’s continuation, ends with the death of Henry VIII and the accession of Edward VI. A modern edition was published in 1809, under the supervision of Henry Ellis, which was reprinted in New York in 1965, with reproductions from the original in 2010 and 2015.
201. 1549 Edinburgh, Lothian: The crown pays £4 10s. ‘to Jhonne Arthure, Robene Hude of Edinburght’ [Accounts of the Lord High Treasurer of Scotland, 9.316].
202. 1549 Ayr, Southern Lowlands, Scotland: William Wallace and John Campbell (a barber) apply for citizenship for their labors when they served as Robin Hood and Little John [Mill, Medieval Plays, 166].
203. 1549 A tale of Robin Hood and Little John, and a dance of Robin Hood, mentioned in The Complaynt of Scotland. This book is believed to be the work of Robert Wedderburn, who with his brothers James and John, studied at St. Andrews University. Described as poets and religious reformers, the brothers, natives of Dundee, were the sons of James Wedderburn, a prosperous merchant. Having written some anti-Catholic ballads, all three brothers were compelled to flee to the continent because of their heretical views. In 1542 John Wedderburn returned to Scotland, and in conjunction with John Scott or Scot (fl. 1550), printer in Dundee, he began publishing the ballads which he and his two brothers had composed against the Romish religion. Several acts of parliament were passed forbidding the publication of these ballads, which were known as ‘the Dundee Psalms’.
Robert Wedderburn, the probable author of Complaynt graduated MA in 1530, was ordained a priest, and ultimately succeeded his uncle John Barry as vicar of Dundee. Before he could act in this capacity, he was accused of heresy, and was compelled to flee to France and Germany. He returned to Scotland in 1546 and was vicar of Dundee in 1552. A number of psalms and songs contributed by the three Wedderburns appear in the ‘Compendious Book’. A careful examination and a comprehensive account of it is found in A Compendious Book of Godly and Spiritual Songs, Commonly Known as ‘The Gude and Godlie Ballatis’ (reprinted from the edition of 1567, edited, with introduction and notes by A. F. Mitchell, D. D., LL.D., for the Scottish Text Society, Edinburgh and London, 1897). This book also has an account of the evidence which led Dr. David Laing and others to attribute the Complaynt to Robert Wedderburn. The authorship of Complaynt has also been assigned to David Lyndsay, a Scottish poet and Lyon king of arms, and James Inglis, who was chaplain of the Abbey of Cambuskenneth from about 1508 to 1550. The Complaynt is dedicated to Mary of Guise (born in Bar-le-Duc, Lorraine, France, regent of Scotland from 1554 until her death in 1560) and consists of the ‘Dreme’ of Dame Scotia and her complaint against her three sons. These two sections are connected by a ‘Monologue Recreatif,’ in which the author displays his general knowledge of popular songs, dances and tales, of astronomy, natural history and naval matters. The book is an important source for information on Border ballads and contains some of the first references to ballads such as Tam Lin, Froggy would a-wooing go and The Ballad of Chevy Chase. Four copies are extant, but none preserve the title-page. In the Harleian catalogue the book is entered as Vedderburn’s Complainte of Scotlande, wyth ane Exortatione to the thre Estaits to be vigilante in the Deffens of their Public Veil (1549) (Catalogus Bibliothecae Harleianae, vol. 1. no. 8371). The book has borrowed from Alain Chartier’s Quadrilogue invectif, and some parts are borrowed from Octavien de Saint Gelais and David Lyndsay. The text of the Complaynt was first edited by J. Leyden with the title The Complaynt of Scotland, Written in 1548, with a Preliminary Dissertation and Glossary (Edinburgh, 1801). James A. H. Murray’s edition for the Early English Text Society was published in London in 1872. The Scottish Text Society’s edition by A. M. Stewart (The Complaynt of Scotland,Edinburgh, 1979) supports Wedderburn’s authorship. Printed in 1549 (probably in France) the book is a Scottish response to the propaganda campaign that accompanied England’s military onslaught.
In the 1540s, England launched a series of military assaults against Scotland, the main objective was to force the infant Mary Queen of Scots into a dynastic marriage with Henry VIII’s young Prince Edward, later Edward VI. The campaign, which failed in its main objective, was known as the Rough Wooing. The English plan was to unite the two countries, with England dominant. The publication of books in England were a means to justify this aim. The English drew on a body of medieval traditions, including Merlins prophesies, which told that Britain had once been a united realm, and would be again. This is in contrast to Complaynt, where the author argues that Scotland has never been part of Britain, and ridicules English faith in Merlin’s prophesies, predicting that the island will soon be united under one ruler, a Scottish one. See also, Encyclopedia Britannica, 1911, Vol. 28, pp. 464-465; , Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Volume 60, pp. 136-137.
204. 1549. Hugh Latimer complains about being unable to preach in a certain town* (apparently in the 1530s) as the church door was locked. He was told that it was ‘Robyn hoodes daye’ and the parish had gone abroad ‘to gather for Robyn hoode’. This is recorded in the sixth of Latimer’s seven sermons preached before Edward VI. Originally printed in two separate small volumes, the first sermon appeared in one volume and the other six in the second, printed by John Day and William Seres in London in 1549 ( Hugh Latimer, Seven Sermons before Edward VI, Edward Arber, Birmingham, 1869, p. 16). Editions after Latimer’s death with other works were printed in London: An edition in 1562 was followed by those of 1571, 1575, 1578 and 1584 (printed by John Day), with further editions in 1596, 1635, 1758, 1788, 1824, and 1830. There was an edition for the Parker Society by the Rev. G. E. Corrie, B. D. (Cambridge, 1844).
*E.K. Chambers suggested that ‘Perhaps the town was Melton Mowbray, where Robin Hood was very popular, and where Latimer is shown by the churchwardens accounts to have preached several years later in 1553’ (The Mediaeval Stage, E. K. Chambers, Oxford, 1903, Vol. 1, p. 180, n. 3).
Hugh Latimer (c. 1490-1555) born at Thurcaston, Leicestershire, was the son of a yeoman, who rented a farm. John Foxe (see no. 197 above) states that at ‘the age of fourteen years he was sent to the university of Cambridge’. He was elected fellow of Clare in 1509, received his B. A. in 1510, his M.A. in 1514, and was ordained a priest. Latimer gained a reputation as a preacher at Cambridge, and although he was a Roman Catholic he converted to Protestantism under the influence of Thomas Bilney. Latimer joined a group of Protestant reformers including Tyndale, Bilney, Ridley, and Barnes, who met regularly at the White Horse tavern. Latimer’s conversion induced the Bishop of Ely to prohibited him from preaching in the university or in any pulpits of the diocese. However Latimer’s friend, Robert Barnes prior of the Austin Friars at Cambridge, allowed him to preach at their monestary as it was exempt from episcopal control. This led to Latimer being summonsed to London to explain his teaching to Cardinal Wolsey, and after a gentle warning was given licence to preach throughout England. After gaining royal favour by supporting the efforts of Henry VIII to obtain an annulment of his marriage to Catherine of Aragon, Latimer received the benefice of West Kington, Wiltshire, in 1531. He became friends with two rising Reformers: Thomas Cromwell, who was to become the king’s chief minister, and the future archbishop of Canterbury Thomas Cranmer; this did not protect him from accusations of heretical preachings. Before investigators, Latimer refused in January 1532, to subscribe to certain articles of faith, such as the existence of purgatory and the need to venerate saints. Consequently, he was excommunicated and imprisoned until he made a submission in April 1532. Thanks to Cromwell’s influence, Latimer was elevated to bishop of Worcester in 1535. By 1536 he was generally regarded as one of the Reform leaders, although there is no indication that he played any part in the various attempts to introduce changes in church doctrine. As a result of being opposed to Henry VIII’s ‘act of the six articles, ‘ Latimer resigned his bishopric in 1539 and was ordered into custody. With the sudden fall of Cromwell in July 1540, he lost his main support at court, and for the remainder of Henry’s reign Latimer existed in the shadows. He spent some time in the Tower of London, where he was kept during the last few months before the accession of Edward VI in January 1547. The new government advanced towards Protestantism, which gave Latimer a chance to exercise his talents. He refused to resume his bishopric, because he wanted to be free to preach without fear or favour. His sermons attracted large crowds and were often patronized by the court. With his success in promoting the Reformation, Latimer was condemned when the Catholic Mary Tudor took the throne. In September 1553 he was arrested on charges of treason and imprisoned in the Tower. He was taken to Oxford for trial, and was burned outside Balliol College with the Reformer Nicholas Ridley on Oct. 16, 1555. At the stake Latimer exclaimed ‘Be of good comfort, Master Ridley, and play the man, we shall this day light such a candle, by God’s grace, in England, as I trust shall never be put out.’ The main contemporary authorities for his life are his own Sermons, John Stow’s Chronicle and Foxe’s Book of Martyrs. See also Encyclopedia Britannica, Vol. 16, 1911, Hugh Chisholm, pp. 242-243; Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Vol. 32, James Gairdner, pp. 171-173; Hugh Latimer: Apostle to the English, Allan G. Chester, New York, 1978, a reprint of an edition of 1954; ‘Latimer, Hugh (c.1485–1555)’ Susan Wabuda, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford, 2004.
205. 1550 Edinburgh, Lothian: The crown pays £3 9s. ‘to Robert Hude in Edinburgh’ [Accounts of the Lord High Treasurer of Scotland, 9.393].
206. 1550 Ayr, Southern Lowlands, Scotland: 5 marks paid ‘to Johnn Jamesone quhen he was robene hude’ [Mill, Medieval Plays, 167]
207. 1550 Robin Hood and Clim of the Clough mentioned in the preface of Walter Lynne’s edition titled The true beliefe in Christ and his sacramentes set forth in a Dialoge betwene a christen father and his sonne . . . .* Lynne’s edition is a copy of William Roye’s English translation of Wolfgang Capito’s De Pueris Instituendis Ecclesiae Argentinensis Isagoge, first published in Latin in 1527 and, in the same year, in a German edition as Kinder bericht vnd fragstuck von gemeynen puncten Christlichs glaubens. Roye must have set to work on his translation very soon after Capito’s original appeared, for at the conclusion of his prefatory letter, we learn that Roye’s translation appeared in 1527 as well: ‘Written in the cite of Argentyn/the last daye of August/the yere of oure lorde a thousande fyve hondred/and seven and twenty’. Roye’s translation, like Capito’s original, was published in Strassburg. The printer of Roye’s edition was Johann Schott, who was also responsible for issuing Roye and Jerome Barlowe’s verse satire Rede Me and Be Nott Wrothe in 1528 (see no. 142 above). The preface in Lynne’s edition is dedicated to ‘Lady Ann, douchesse of Somerset’, which is entirely different to Roye’s preface, and there is some belief that Lynne printed the title-page and first three leaves; the rest being printed abroad. However it appears that Lynne’s edition was actually printed in London by Steven Mierdman (see A Brefe Dialoge bitwene a Christen Father and his stobborne Sonne ‘The first Protestant Catechism published in English’ (William Roye), Douglas H. Parker and Bruce Krajewski, University of Toronto Press, 1999, p. 76).
*Roye’s title is A Lytle treatous or dialoge very necessary for all christen men to learne and to knowe, also known as A Brefe Dialoge bitwene a christen Father and his stobborne Sonne whom he wolde fayne brynge to the right vnderstondynge of a christen mans lyvynge.
Walter Lynne, also known as Gwalter Lynne, was a printer and translator who published Protestant works in London. Under the patronage of Thomas Cranmer, Lynne printed and translated works of a religious nature into English; he was probably the Wouter van Lin who was active in Antwerp in the early 1530s. He appears to have arrived in London in about 1540, where he lived at Somers Quay, near Billingsgate, and he also seems to have kept a shop at the sign of the Eagle, near St. Paul’s School. His mark consisted of a ram and a goat, with the letters W. and L. Lynne claimed that he did not know the author of The true beliefe, however he repeats Roye’s statement that the work initially appeared in two languages, first ‘in the duche tong (ie, German) and then translated into latine’. After 1550 Lynne seems to have given up publishing to became a wine importer. There are only two existing copies of Roye’s 1527 first edition, one in the National Library of Austria, the other in the library of the Duke of Bath, Longleat, Warminster, Wiltshire, England. Roye’s edition was reprinted (not entirely accurately) by Adolf Wolf under the title: William Roye’s Dialogue between a Christian Father and his Stubborn Son ( Vienna, 1874). There is a copy of Lynne’s 1550 edition in the British Library. See A Brefe Dialoge bitwene a Christen Father and his stobborne Sonne ‘The first Protestant Catechism published in English’ (William Roye), Douglas H. Parker and Bruce Krajewski, University of Toronto Press, 1999; Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Vol. 34, Lynne, Walter by
208. 1550 Robert Crowley or Crole, Croleus, Crowlaeus (1518?-1588), stationer, poet, Protestant clergyman and puritan, refers to Robin Hood in The Voyce of the Last Trumpet. Born probably in Gloucestershire, he became a student at the university of Oxford in about 1534. He was made a demy at Magdalen College, and in 1542 was probationer-fellow, having taken his B.A. degree. Crowley was attracted by the doctrines of the Reformation, and in 1548 published three controversial works, printed by John Day and William Seres. There is some disagreement among scholars as to whether or not Crowley actually operated or managed a press that he owned or leased. Crowley’s imprints and colophons usually read along the lines of ‘imprynted by Roberte Crowley, dwellyng in Ely rentes in Holburne,’ which appears in some twenty books. It is likely that he was a printer directly engaged in the production of the many social and religious reformist texts that bear his imprint. This includes the first edition of the ‘Vision of Pierce Plowman,’ (see no. 1 above) in 1550, of which he issued no less than three impressions in that year. Between 1549, when he became a member of the Stationers’ Company, and 1551, when he was ordained, Crowley had been the author of eleven or twelve books and edited, translated, or acted as printer and/or publisher of seven others. Notable items that are Crowley’s work include the first, complete, metrical rendering of the psalms in English and the first psalter with harmonised music, the first translation of the gospels into Welsh, and Piers Plowman. It is not unusual that his type, initials, borders, and woodcut illustrations came from other printers and were used at different times by protestant printers including Day, Richard Grafton, Richard Tottell, Stephen Mierdman, Reyner (or Reginald) Wolfe, John Cawood, Richard Jugge, and Edward Whitchurch.
Crowley was ordained deacon by Bishop Ridley on 29 September 1551, and was described in the bishop’s register as ‘stationer, of the parish of St. Andrew, Holborn’. He then apparently gave up printing, and during the reign of the Catholic queen Mary I, was among the Marian exiles at Frankfort, which included John Foxe and John Bale. After Elizabeth I’s accession he returned to England and was incumbent of various London parishes. He preached at Paul’s Cross on the 19th of October 1559 and again on the 31st March 1561. However in 1566, his objection to surplices (he forbade his choir to wear them) caused his deprivation and imprisonment. The vestment question troubled him greatly, and he published ‘A Discourse against the Outwarde Apparell and Garmentes of the Popishe Churche’. Crowley resigned his Archdeaconry in 1567, and in 1576 he was presented to the vicarage of St. Lawrence Jewry, from which he resigned in 1578. He preached in several places and in 1580 he and another were appointed to visit the Roman catholic prisoners in the Marshalsea and White Lion at Southwark. He died in 1588, at about the age of seventy, and was buried in the chancel of St. Giles, Cripplegate. Whether as printer, divine, versifier, or controversialist, Crowley passed his life in battling for the new doctrines. His popularity as a preacher is shown by the numerous entries in Machyn’s ‘Diary’ (Camden Soc., 1848). His other works include The Way to Wealth, wherein is plainly taught a most present remedy for sedicion (London, Crowley, 1550) in which he attributed the government’s failure to stop enclosure of common land to the organized resistance of the rich. Other works include An Informacion and Peticion agaynst the Oppressours of the Pore Commons of this Realme (London, Day & Seres, 1548); The Confutation of the Mishapen Aunswer to the misnamed, wicked Ballade (by Miles Hoggard) called the Abuse of ye Blessed Sacrament of the Aultare (London, Day & Seres, 1548), and works in verse. There is another book that may have been Crowley’s work; Pyers plowmans exhortation, unto the lordes, knightes and burgoysses of the Parlyamenthouse. Imprinted at London: by Anthony Scoloker dwelling in the Sauoy tentes without templebarre (1550?) (see no. 1 above).
In 1549 Richard Grafton and Stephen Mierdman apparently published Crowley’s The Psalter of Dauid newly translated into English metre in such sort that it maye the more decently, and with more delete of the mynde, be reade and songe of all men. Wherunto is added a note of four parties…. See, The Select Works of Robert Crowley, J. M. Cowper, Early English Text Society, Extra Series 15, London, 1872, reprinted in 1905, and by Kraus Reprint Company, 1975; Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Vol. 13, Crowley, Robert by Political Consciousness and the Uses of the Past in Reformation England, Dan Knauss: www.scribd.com/document/14780260/.
209. c.1550? Possible date for the ballad ‘Robin Hood and the Curtal Friar’, the main elements of which were probably well known by the beginning of the reign of Elizabeth I; the play concerning Friar Tuck was appended to William Copland’s edition of the Gest c. 1560 (see no. 237 below). Of all Robin Hood’s many adventures, his famous battle with the curtal friar has been among the most popular. Ballads concerning this contest were already circulating quite widely by the middle of the seventeenth century, and Robin Hood and the Curtal Friar holds a prominent place in all the Robin Hood Garlands from the 1660s onwards. The first printed version appears to be a broadside (Pepys collection I, 78, no. 37, printed by H. Gosson around 1607-41). The friar’s association with Fountains Abbey (which can only be a post-Reformation fabrication) is seen in both ballads: Robine Hood and Ffryer Tucke and Robin Hood and the Curtal Friar. The name ‘Friar Tuck’ does not appear in either of these ballads, and although Child points out that the curtal friar should not be too readily identified with Friar Tuck, both may have sprung from the same common tradition. The curtal friar plays little or no part in the traditional Robin Hood saga outside his own ballad and was probably a legendary figure in his own right, before being absorbed into the world of Robin Hood. Child believed that Friar Tuck owed his association with Robin Hood to the May Games and the Morris Dance, ‘and not in the least to popular ballads’ (Child, III, p. 122). In any case the name of ‘Frere Tuk’ was used as an alias by a notorious robber in the early fifteenth century, and ‘Ffrere Tuke’ appears as a member of Robin’s company in The Dramatic Fragment. Also the play of 1537 called Thersites (see no. 171 above), refers to someone being ‘as tall a man as Frier Tucke’. Robine Hood and Ffryer Tucke (Percy Folio version) consists of the following source: British Library, Additional MS. 27, 879, fos. 4v-6r; printed in Bishop Percy’s Folio Manuscript, Hales and Furnivall, I, 26-31. Editions include: Francis James Child, The English and Scottish Popular Ballads, 1888, vol. III, pp. 123-4; R. B. Dobson and J. Taylor, Rymes of Robyn Hood, London, 1976, pp. 159-61; Stephen Knight and Thomas H. Ohlgren, Robin Hood and Other Outlaw Tales, Michigan, 1997. The famous Battle between Robin Hood and the Curtall Fryer. To a New Northern Tune (Broadside version) consists of the following source: Bodleian Library, Oxford, Wood MS. 401, leaves 15v 16r (a broadside printed for F. Coles, T. Vere and W. Gilbertson, c. 1660). Other sources are: Pepys collection I, 78, no. 37, a broadside printed by H. Gosson around 1607-41; Garland of 1663, No. 11; Garland of 1670; Pepys collection, II, 99, No. 86; Douce collection, II, 184; Roxburghe collection, III, 16. Editions include: Thomas Evans, Old Ballads, 1777, vol. 1 pp. 136-143; Joseph Ritson Robin Hood, 1795, part II, pp. 58-65; John Mathew Gutch, A Lytell Geste of Robin Hode with other Ancient & Modern Ballads, 1847, vol. II, pp. 190-6; Francis James Child, The English and Scottish Popular Ballads, 1888, vol. III, pp. 124-6; A. Quiller-Couch, The Oxford Book of Ballads, 1910, pp. 600-7; Mac Edward Leach, The Ballad Book, 1955, pp. 361-5; R. B. Dobson and J. Taylor, Rymes of Robyn Hood, London, 1976, pp. 161-64; Stephen Knight and Thomas H. Ohlgren, Robin Hood and Other Outlaw Tales, Michigan, 1997.
210. 1551 Ayr, Southern Lowlands, Scotland: 40s. paid ‘for Þe expens of four frenchemen quhen george dun wes robene hude in his hous xl s.’ Also five marks each are paid to Charles Campbell and Robert McMillan when they were Robin Hood and Little John [Mill, Medieval Plays, 167].
211. 1551-52 Yeovil, Somerset: £8 11s. 4d. received of Tristram Brook as Robin Hood. Also £11 12s. 5d. received of John Marchant as Robin Hood (perhaps for a previous year?) [REED: Somerset, 406-7].
212. 1552 London: Inventory includes ‘xv Robyne Hoodes Cottes’ at Holy Trinity the Less [H. B. Walters, London Churches at the Reformation with an Account of their Contents (London: Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge; New York: Macmillan, 1939), 129].
213. 1552-53 Shrewsbury, Shropshire: Bailiffs accounts include 49s. 3½d. paid for painted coats and other clothing for Robin Hood, and 14s. for wine for the players [REED: Shropshire, 203].
214. 1553 Robin Hood mentioned by Richard Robinson, who basically follows John Major (see no. 125 above) in The Auncient Order, Societie, and Unitie Laudable, of Prince Arthure. . . . , also recorded by Joseph Ritson. Richard Robinson (fl. 1576–1600), was an author and compiler, and a freeman of the Leathersellers Company. In 1576 he was residing in a chamber at the south side of St. Paul’s. In the registers of St. Peter’s, Cornhill (Harl. Soc.), there are several entries of the births and deaths of the children of Richard Robinson, skinner. In 1585 he is described as of Fryers, and in 1595 he presented to Elizabeth the third part of his ‘Harmony of King David’s Harp.’ In his manuscript ‘Eupolemia’ he gives an amusing account of the queen’s reception of the gift. His hope of financial recognition was not realized, and he was obliged to sell his books and the lease of his house in Harp Alley, Shoe Lane. He was a suitor to the queen for one of the twelve alms-rooms in Westminster. Robinson assisted the poet Thomas Churchyard in the translation from Meteren’s ‘Historiæ Belgicæ’ (1602), and Churchyard prefixed a poem in praise of Robinson in his ‘Auncient Order’, which Robinson dedicated to M. Thomas Smith Esquier, the then Prince Arthur of this fellowship. The assumption that he was the father of Richard Robinson, an actor in Shakespeare’s plays, is not supported by any evidence (Collier, Memoirs of the Principal Actors in the Plays of Shakespeare). Robinson’s ‘Auncient Order’ was reproduced in 2010 (EEBO Editions, ProQuest).
Robinson’s other works include: 1. ‘Certain Selected Histories for Christian Recreations, with their severall Moralizations brought into English Verse,’ 1576, 8vo. 2. ‘A Moral Methode of Civil Policie’ (a translation of F. Patrizi’s ‘Nine Books of a Commonwealth’), 1576, 4to. 3. ‘Robinson’s Ruby, an Historical Fiction, translated out of Latin Prose into English Verse, with the Prayer of the most Christian Poet Ausonius,’ 1577. 4. ‘A Record of Ancyent Historyes, entituled in Latin Gesta Romanorum [by John Leland?], Translated, Perused, Corrected, and Bettered,’ 1577, 8vo. 5. ‘The Dyall of Dayly Contemplacon for Synners, Moral and Divine Matter in English Prose and Verse, first published in print anno 1499, corrected and reformed for the time’ (dedicated to Dean Nowell), 1578. 6. ‘Melancthon’s Prayers Translated .. into English’ (dedicated to Sir Philip Sidney), 1579. 7. ‘The Vineyard of Virtue, partly translated, partly collected out of the Bible and … other authors,’ 1579, 1591. 8. ‘Melanchthon his Learned Assertion or Apology of the Word of God and of His Church,’ 1580. 9. ‘Hemming’s Exposition upon the 25th Psalm, translated into English,’ 1580. 10. ‘A Learned and True Assertion of the Original Life, Actes, and Death of … Arthure,’ (a translation of John Leland’s work), 1582. 11. ‘Part of the Harmony of King David’s Harp, conteining the first 21 Psalmes … expounded by Strigelius, translated by [Robinson],’ 1582, 4to. 12. ‘Urbanus Regius, an Homely or Sermon of Good and Evil Angels … translated into English,’ 1583 (dedicated to Gabriel Goodman, dean of Westminster); later editions 1590 and 1593. 13. ‘A Rare, True, and Proper Blazon of Coloures in Armoryes and Ensigns (Military),’ 1583.
The following works by Robinson in manuscript are contained in Royal MS. No. 18: 1. ‘Two Several Surveys of the … Soldiers Mustered in London,’ 1588 and 1599. 2. ‘An Account of the Three Expeditions of Sir Francis Drake,’ Latin. 3. ‘An English Quid for a Spanish Quo … being an Account of the 11 Voyages of George, Earl of Cumberland’ (also in Hist. MSS. Comm. 5th Rep. p. 304, 12th Rep. pt. i. p. 16). 4. ‘Robinson’s Eupolemia, Archippus, and Panoplia,’ being an account of his works, 1576–1602. See also, Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Vol. 49, Robinson, Richard (fl. 1576-1600) by
215. 1553-54 Exeter, Devon: St. Johns Bow churchwardens accounts include money from ‘Robyn whode and lytell Iohn’ for the sale of ale [Reed: Devon, 145].
216. 1554 Ayr, Southern Lowlands, Scotland: 4s. 6d. paid for gunpowder ‘To robene hudis playis’ [Mill Medieval Plays, 167].
217. 1554-55 Chagford, Devon: St. Michael’s parish accounts include ‘The accompte of the yongemen off the parysche of Chagfford, Iohn Northecott and other for the howde,’ with profits of 10s. [REED: Devon, 54].
218. 1555 Peebles, Southern Lowlands, Scotland: Robert Murro is made a citizen, paying his ‘burges siluer’ to ‘my lord Robene Hude’ [Mill, Medieval Plays, 263].
219. 1555 Chagford, Devon: Parish accounts include 10s. received ‘of Iohn Northcutt And other Roben Howde ys Company’ [REED: Devon, 54].
220. 1555 Bridport, Dorset: Money made for a Robin Hood Ale, and for sale of a booth [Reference courtesy of R. C. Hays and C. E. McGee].
221. ?c. 1555 Manchester, Lancashire: ‘It is reported and belieued that Iohn Bradford preaching in Manchester in king Edwards dayes tould the people as it were by a Prophetical spirit that because they did not readily embrace the word of God the Masse should bee sayd againe in that church and the play of Robin Hood acted there which accordingly came to passe in Queen Maries reigne’ [Richard Hollingworth, Mancuniensis [17c.], cited REED: Lancashire, 283].
222. 1555 Scotland: Robin Hood games were banned by the Scottish parliament in 1555 – Parliament decrees ‘that in all tymes cummyng na maner of persound be chosin Robert Hude nor Lytill Johne, Abbot of unressoun, Quenis of Maii, nor otherwise, nouther in Burgh nor to landwart in ony tyme to cum’ [Acts of the Parliament of Scotland, ed. Thomas Thomson, Record Commission Publications 36 (Edinburgh: Record Commission, 1814), 2.500]. In defiance of this ban, Robin Hood plays were apparently being sponsored on the estates of Sir William Sinclair, 14th Baron of Rosslyn, who was appointed Lord Chief Justice of Scotland by Queen Mary in 1559. The plays continued to be performed annually in Roslin Glen, in May and June by gypsies, who were given a welcome refuge. It is no coincidence that the Castle of the Sinclairs at Rosslyn had two towers, one named Robin Hood and the other Little John, and the Green Man at Rosslyn Chapel is said to represent Robin Goodfellow, ‘Jack o the Green’, and/or Robin Hood. The efforts of the city authorities to supress a revival of the Robin Hood games in Edinburgh led to a riot in 1561 (see no. 241 below). See The Quest for the Celtic Key, Karen-Ralls Macleod and Ian Robertson, Edinburgh, 2002, Chapter 9, with further editions in 2003 and 2005, and eBook in 2013; Imagining Robin Hood: The Late Medieval Stories in Historical Context, A. J. Pollard, Oxfordshire and New York, 2004, pp. 173-74.
223. 1555 Robin Hood and Bevis of Hampton mentioned in Robert Braham’s preface (‘The pistle to the reader’) in his edition of John Lydgate’s Troy Book, with the title: ‘The auncient Historie and onely trewe and syncere Cronicle of the warres betwixe the Grecians and the Troyans, and subsequently of the fyrst euercyon of the auncient and famouse Cytye of Troye vnder Lamedon the king, and of the laste and fynall destruction of the same vnder Pryam, wrytten by Daretus a Troyan and Dictus a Grecian both souldiours and present in all the sayde warres and digested in Latyn by the lerned Guydo de Columpnis and sythes translated in to englyshe verse by Iohn Lydgate Moncke of Burye’. And newly imprinted. An. M. D. L. V. [Colophon] Imprinted at London, in Fletestrete at the sygne of the Princes armes, by Thomas Marshe. Anno. do. M. D. L. V. British Library F°. (11⅛ x 7¾). F. 15.
‘The pistle to the reader’, is signed by the editor, Robert Braham. The signature has been printed ‘Quod Robert Braham’ and an ornament has then been stamped over the ‘Quod’. In his ‘pistle’, Braham is critical of The Recuyell of the Historyes of Troye, an account of the Trojan legend, printed by William Caxton, the first book printed in English, and he seems to have published it at Ghent, in around 1473. This was Caxton’s own translation (from the French of Raoul Lefèvre ) and he states in the preface that he had completed the translation while he was in Cologne in September 1471. Braham also criticized the printer of the first edition of Lydgate’s Troy Book, which came from the press of Richard Pynson in 1513 (with the title The hystorye / sege and dystruccyon of Troye), as ‘being printed about .xliii. yeares agoe, euen then in the tayle (as it hapned) of the dercke and vnlearned times’. Braham does praise William Thynne, who had recovered the works of Chaucer. Lydgate’s Troy Book (completed in 1420) is a verse rendering of the prose ‘Historia Destructionis Troiae’ written in Latin by Guido delle Colonne. This is in its turn based on the French ‘Roman de Troie’ by Benoît de Sainte More, the chief sources of which are the ‘De Excidio Troiae’ the reputed work of Dares Phrygius, which may have existed in a fuller version than is now known, and the ‘Ephemeris Belli Trojani’ which is under the name of Dictys Cretensis. A modernised version of the Troy Book by Thomas Heywood was published in London by Thomas Purfoot in 1614, as The Life and Death of Hector . . . , followed by an edition in 1909 by Franz Albert. The influence of the Troy Book can be found in the works of Robert Henryson, Thomas Kyd, Christopher Marlowe, and William Shakespeare, particularly in Cressida’s character in his Troilus and Cressida. See Lydgate’s Troy Book, Henry Bergen, 2 vols., parts I, II, III, IV, London, 1906, 1908, 1910, 1935; Typographical Antiqities, Joseph Ames, vol. 1, pp. 16-25; Troy Book: Selections (Introduction), Robert R. Edwards, Michigan, 1998; Capell’s Shakespeariana, W. W. Greg, Cambridge, 1903, pp. 82-83; Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Vol. 6, Braham, Robert, by Sidney Lee, p. 197-98.
224. 1555-56 Chagford, Devon: Parish accounts include ‘The accompte of Robard Iopass, Iohn frend, and other of the howde ys men of the parysche of Chagford,’ with 4s. paid for two coats [REED: Devon, 54].
225. 1556 Melton Mowbray, Leicestershire: Townwardens accounts include 29s. 8d. gathered by Steven Shaw and his company with ‘Robyn Hoods playe’ over two years; also 5s. received of John Hopkins in payment of ‘Robyn Hoods money’ [Kelly, Notices Illustrative of the Drama, 64]. Melton had a Lord of Misrule at Whitsun the same year [61].
226. 1557 Tales of Robin Hood mentioned in the third examination of Richard Woodman, on 12th May, in John Foxe’s Acts and Monuments (see no. 197 above). Woodman was burned along with nine others on 22nd June.
227. 1557-58 Chagford Devon: Parish accounts include ‘The accompte of Iohn Newcomb Iunior and other of the howddes men with yn the parysche of Chagfford,’ with profits of 24s. 4d. [REED: Devon, 54-55]. There is also an account from ‘Roberd Iopas, Iohn penycott, and of other of the howdde ys men,’ with 6s. 8d. paid ‘for the howddes Cote’ [REED: Devon, 55].
228. 1557-8 Bridport, Dorset: £7 6d. received of Robin Hood’s money [Reference courtesy of R. C. Hays and C. E. McGee].
229. 1557-58 Yeovil, Somerset: £13 5d. received of John Hacker as Robin Hood [REED: Somerset, 407].
230. 1557-58 ‘A ballett of Wakefylde and a grene’ was entered to Master John Wallye and Mistress Toye in the Stationers Registers. It is likely that the main outlines of its story appear in The Jolly Pinder of Wakefield, of which the first surviving copies date from the middle of the seventeenth century; it is one of four, besides the Gest, that were known to the author of the Life of Robin Hood in Sloane MS., 780, which dates from c. 1600 (see no. 397 below). The Broadside version consists of the following source: Bodleian Library, Oxford, Wood MS. 402, leaf 42 (a broadside printed for F. Coles, T. Vere and W. Gilbertson, c. 1650-60). Other sources are: Wood, 401, leaf (or folio) 61 b; Garland of 1663, No. 4; Garland of 1670, No. 3; Pepys collection, II, 100, No. 87 a. There is another copy in the Roxburghe Collection, III, 24, and there are two in the Bagford. There are two versions in the Forresters manuscript, one an independent version of the garland text, the other a larger text apparently related to the prose history of George a Greene. Editions include: Thomas Evans, Old Ballads, 1777, vol. 1 pp. 99-101; Joseph Ritson Robin Hood, 1795, part II, pp. 16-18, ‘From an old black letter copy, in A. a Woods collection, compared with two other copies in the British Museum, one in black letter.’; John Mathew Gutch, A Lytell Geste of Robin Hode with other Ancient & Modern Ballads, 1847, vol. II, pp. 143-6; Francis James Child, The English and Scottish Popular Ballads, 1888, vol. III, p. 131; MacEdward Leach, The Ballad Book, 1955, pp. 365-6; R. B. Dobson and J. Taylor, Rymes of Robyn Hood, London, 1976, pp. 147-48; Stephen Knight and Thomas H. Ohlgren, Robin Hood and Other Outlaw Tales, Michigan, 1997. The Percy Folio version consists of the following source: British Library, Additional MS. 27,879, fo. 6r (fragment); printed in Bishop Percy’s Folio Manuscript, John W. Hales and Frederick J. Furnivall, 1867, vol. 1, pp. 34-36. Editions include: Francis James Child, The English and Scottish Popular Ballads, 1888, vol. III, pp. 131-32; R. B. Dobson and J. Taylor, Rymes of Robyn Hood, London, 1976, pp. 148-49; Stephen Knight and Thomas H. Ohlgren, Robin Hood and Other Outlaw Tales, Michigan, 1997. By 1599 George a Green, the Pinner of Wakefield, had become an important figure in his own right, the subject of a play (see Plays and the May Festivities 2 and no. 383 below) and a character that spurned the proverbial expression (‘As good as George-a-Green’). The poet Michael Drayton recorded that the fight between Robin and George a Green had become so famous ‘that every freeman’s song/Can tell you of the same.’ The origins of the Pinner of Wakefield are lost in time, although Joseph Ritson thought that he may have entered the world of Robin Hood through the May Games, perhaps those at Wakefield itself. Francis James Child believed that the ballad had been ‘pretty well sung to pieces before it was printed’, and the first surviving broadside copies provide little in the way of circumstantial detail.
231. 1558-59 Barnstaple, Devon: Receivers accounts record 3s. 4d. ‘paid to Robart Hode for his pastime’ [REED: Devon, 42].
232. 1558-59 Chagford, Devon: Parish accounts include 20s. 8d. received ‘of Robert Lapas howdde Þat yere’ and 24s. 4d. received ‘of Iohn Newcomb Iunior and other owddes men that yere’ [REED: Devon, 55].
233. 1558-59 Yeovil, Somerset: £11 10s. 5½d. received of Lionel Harrison as Robin Hood [REED: Somerset, 407].
234. 1559 A procession in London which included Robin Hood, Little John, Maid Marian and Friar Tuck, recorded in the diary of Henry Machyn (1498?–1563). Machyn or Machin was according to his own inconsistent account, fifty-six on 16 May 1554 (Diary, p. 63), and sixty-six on 20 May 1562 (ib. p. 283). A citizen of London, he lived in the parish of Trinity the Little by Queenhithe, and called himself a merchant tailor. He was probably also a parish clerk, since details are given of the delivery of bills of mortality relating to the sweating sickness in 1551 (Diary, p. 8). Machyn’s diary, is apparently an eyewitness account of events in London between July 1550 and August 1563, in the style of a chronicle continuation. It is mainly concerned with public events: changes on the throne, state visits, insurrections, executions and festivities. Machyn was also a furnisher of funerals (probably his main occupation), which explains why so much of his diary is concerned with minute accounts of funerals in London. He wrote his diary during a turbulent period in England: the Reformation, initiated by Henry VIII and carried through by Edward VI, which was followed by the return to Catholicism (and burning of heretics) under Queen Mary I. His enthusiastic account of the shrine of Edward the Confessor in 1557 (Diary, p. 132), suggests that Machyn was a Catholic himself. He circulated libellous information about the Protestant preacher John Véron, for which he made penance at Paul’s Cross in November 1561. Towards the end of Machyn’s diary there is an account of the outbreak of the plague in London in 1563, and it is possible that he himself fell victim to the disease. The manuscript of his work is at the British Library (MS. Cotton. Vitellius F v.), however it was severely damaged in the fire at the Cottonian Library in 1731. After remaining neglected till 1829, the damaged leaves were carefully repaired by Sir Frederick Madden. John Strype (1643- 1737) consulted Machyn’s manuscript at the beginning of the eighteenth century, before the fire, and parts of it appear in his ‘Ecclesiastical Memorials’ and ‘Annals.’ The diary was first printed by the Camden Society in 1848, edited by J. G. Nichols. See also, ‘Tudor Chronicler or Sixteenth-Century Diarist? Henry Machyn and the Nature of His Manuscript.’ This article was first published in The Sixteenth Century Journal, Vol. 33, No. 4 (Winter, 2002), Ian Mortimer, pp. 981-998; Mortimer, Ian (January 2008) [First published 2004] ‘Machyn (Machin), Henry (1496/1498–1563 )’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online edition), Oxford University Press, https://doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/17531; A London Provisioner’s Chronicle, 1550–1563, by Henry Machyn: Manuscript, Transcription, and Modernization (electronic scholarly edition created by Richard W. Bailey, Marilyn Miller, and Colette Moore), hosted by Michigan Publishing, a division of the University of Michigan Library; Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Volume 35, Machin or Machyn, Henry by Sidney Lee, pp. 108-9.
235. 1559 The proverb Robin Hood’s mile recorded in William Cunningham’s Cosmographical Glasse, a mile much longer than eight furlongs. Cunningham used the device of a dialogue between a teacher and pupil to explain this geographical work, which includes the influence of climate on human physiology and on settlement, and later in his regional survey of the world’s continents, he dealt with the scientific description of individual cultures, with matters such as diet, religious and cultural behaviour, and weapons of war. Alongside these he included some remarks on the botanical and zoological characteristics of each region. Cunningham was a practised astrologer, and in 1558, a year before the Cosmographical Glasse was published, he had issued A New Almanacke and Prognostication, in which he identifies the inappropriate times of that year in which to buy or sell, take medicine, sow and plant, or undertake journeys – an exercise he repeated for the year 1565. In 1560 he even published his own apologia for astrological practice under the title An Invective Epistle in Defence of Astrologers. See Dictionary of National Biography; The Geographical Tradition: Episodes in the History of a Contested Enterprise, David N. Livingstone, Oxford, 1992, Massachusetts, 1993, pp. 74- 75.
236. 1559-60 Chagford, Devon: Parish income includes 5s. ‘of Iohn Row and other hys felowys howdesmen’ [REED: Devon, 55].
237. c. 1560 William Copland’s edition of the Gest with the title ‘A mery geste of Robyn Hoode and of hys lyfe, wyth a newe playe for to be played in Maye games very plesaunte and full of pastyme.’ Copland’s edition was reproduced in facsimile in Old English Drama (Students Facsimile Edition) (1914). This ‘newe playe’ is actually two distinct works (see ‘The Play of Robin Hood and the Friar’ and ‘The Play of Robin Hood and the Potter’.
238. 1560 Robin Hood included in the debate between Thomas Churchyard and Thomas Camel, in the edition with the title: The Contention betwyxte Churchyeard and Camell vpon Dauid Dycers Dreame sett out in suche order, that it is bothe wyttye and profytable for all degryes. Rede this littell comunication betwene Churchyarde: Camell: and others mo Newlye Imprinted and sett furthe for thy profyt gentill Reader Imprinted at London by Owen Rogers, for Mychell Loblee dwelyng in Paulls churchyeard. ANNO M.D.LX. A second edition appeared in 1566. This book, with numerous headings, includes the contribution of others such as Steven Steple and William Waterman. A broadside entitled Davy Dycars Dreame (c. 1551–1552), a short poem in the style of Piers Plowman, brought Chuchyard into trouble with the privy council, but he was dismissed with a reprimand. This tract was the starting-point of a controversy between Churchyard and Thomas Camel, the whole ‘flyting’, the poetic exchange of insults, being reprinted in the edition of 1560. This was reproduced in the Text Creation Partnership, Ann Arbor, Oxford, 2005-10 (EEBO-TCP Phase 1).
A Replication vnto Camels Obiection. |
| Your knowledge is great, your iudgement is good, |
| The most of your study hath ben of Robyn hood. |
| And Beuys of Hampton, and syr Launcelot de lake, |
| Hath taught you full oft, your verses to make: |
| By sweete sait Benet, I swere by no foole, |
| you are not to learne, you plyde well your scole. |
Camels Reioindre, to Churchyarde. |
| An asse bindes no camels, tho he braye neure so loud. |
| Robin hode so shewed me, out of a cloude. |
| And when asses forget, to know what they are, |
| Sir Launcelot then biddes, to nip them more nar. |
| And Beniz of Hampton, whose clergy I knowe: |
| Biddes me serue you with the sams sede you sow. |
The Surreioindre vnto Camels reioindre, |
| Your sodain stormes and thudre claps, your boasts and braggs so loude. |
| Hath doone no harme thogh Robyn Hood, spake with you in a cloud. |
| Go learne againe of litell Iho, to shute Robyn Hods bowe, |
| Or Dicars dreame shalbe vnhit, and all his, whens, I trowe, |
Thomas Camell. |
| It well appearres, the Godes, whom you them liken till, |
| ware neither goddes ne me of cyuyle lyuing good |
| But fansyes of ydolatres, & dreames of Robin hood, |
| But graunt that they ware goddes of olde gentilitie |
Thomas Churchyard (c.1529-1604) was a man of many faces, a soldier of fortune, courtier, author, entertainer, and amateur spy. The son of a farmer, he was born at Shrewsbury and received a good education. After serving in the household of Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey, he began his career as a soldier of fortune in 1541 , being he said, ‘pressed into the service.’ Churchyard fought in almost every campaign in Scotland, Ireland, the Low Countries, and France under various banners. A servant to five monarchs, he had a literary career spanning over half a century during which time he produced over fifty different works (which have never been completely printed) in a variety of forms and genres. His adventures were many, he served under the emperor Charles V. in Flanders in 1542, returning to England after the peace of Crépy (1544). In the Scottish campaign of 1547 he was present at the barren victory of Pinkie, and in the next year was taken prisoner at Saint Monance, but aided by his persuasive tongue he escaped to the English garrison at Lauder, where he was once more besieged, only returning to England on the conclusion of peace in 1550. In that same year he went to Ireland to serve the lord deputy, Sir Anthony St Leger, who had been sent to pacify the country. In 1552 he was in England again, trying vainly to secure a fortune by marriage with a rich widow. After this failure he departed once more to the wars to the siege of Metz (1552), and ‘trailed a pike’ in the emperor’s army, until he joined the forces under William, Lord Grey of Wilton, with whom he says he served eight years. Grey was in charge of the fortress of Gaines, which was besieged by the duke of Guise in 1558. Churchyard arranged the terms of surrender, and was sent with his chief to Paris as a prisoner. He was not released at the peace of Cateau Cambrésis for lack of money to pay his ransom, but he was finally set free on giving his bond for the amount, an engagement which he repudiated as soon as he was safely in England. ‘Shore’s Wife,’ his most popular poem, was printed in the 1563 edition of A Mirror for Magistrates, a collection of verse laments by several authors and to that of 1587 he contributed the ‘Tragedie of Thomas Wolsey’. Repeated petitions to the queen for assistance produced at first fair words, and then no answer at all. He therefore returned to active service under Lord Grey, who was in command of an English army sent (1560) to help the Scottish rebels, and in 1564 he served in Ireland under Sir Henry Sidney. The religious disturbances in the Netherlands attracted him to Antwerp, where as the agent of William of Orange he allowed the insurgents to place him at their head, and was able to save much property from destruction. This action made him so hated by the mob that he had to flee for his life in the disguise of a priest. In the next year he was sent by the earl of Oxford to serve definitely under the prince of Orange. After a year’s service he obtained leave to return to England, and after many adventures and narrow escapes in a journey through hostile territory he embarked for Guernsey, and thence for England. His patron, Lord Oxford, disowned him, and the poet, whose health was failing, retired to Bath. He appears to have made a very unhappy marriage at this time, and returned to the Low Countries. Falling into the hands of the Spaniards he was recognized as having had a hand in the Antwerp disturbance, and was under sentence to be executed as a spy when he was saved by the intervention of a noble lady. This experience did not deter him from joining in the defence of Zutphen in 1572. The troubles of the remaining years of his life were chiefly domestic. Later, at court, he devised pageants for Queen Elizabeth’s progresses to Bristol (1574) and Norwich (1578), but a passage in his Churchyarde’s Choise (1579) offended Elizabeth, and Churchyard fled to Scotland. He was restored to favour about 1584, but was still at arms in 1587 when he accompanied the Earl of Leicester to the Low Countries to fight the Spanish – he received a small pension from Elizabeth in 1593. Churchyard lived right through Elizabeth’s reign, and was buried in St. Margaret’s church, Westminster, on the 4th of April 1604. The main account for Churchyard’s life is his own ‘Tragicall Discourse of the unhappy man’s life’ (Churchyardes Chippes, 1575). In 1817 George Chalmers published Churchyard’s Chips Concerning Scotland, which also contains an account of Churchyard’s life. See also, Encyclopædia Britannica, 1911, Volume 6, Churchyard, Thomas by Hugh Chisholm, pp. 348-349; Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Volume 10, Churchyard, Thomas by Thomas Churchyard: pen, sword, and ego, Matthew Woodcock, Oxford University Press, 2016.
239. 1560-61 Braunton, Devon: St. Brannocks churchwardens accounts record 2s. paid ‘for meat and drynke for Robyn hoode and his company’ [REED: Devon, 52].
240. c. 1560-75 Lute music of Robin Hood in the Giles Lodge Lute Book (Washington, Folger Shakespeare Library, V.a.159). The Giles Lodge manuscript contains several names, including one on the reverse side of the first folio at the head of a list of ‘money owing to Giles Lodge, 1591’. Three hands added lute music to this manuscript, the third of which noted the debt to Lodge, who otherwise may have had no connection with the rest of the manuscript’s contents. It contains a mixture of music and miscellaneous writings, including remedies and recipes; this mixture was typical of commonplace books of the time. The lute music was probably added sometime after 1558, and the last eleven pieces appear to date from the 1570s or the 1580s. The lute music was transcribed for keyboard by Arnold Dolmetsch (1858-1940) and published in 1907 (Franklin Library, Ms. Coll. 301). A French-born musician and instrument maker, he established an instrument-making workshop in Haslemere, Surrey. Lute music in the manuscript is listed by Dolmetsch: (1) Will ye go walke the woode so wilde, (2) Pretye Shivall , (3) I am my Lord gr[ei]s man, (4) Blame not my lute, (5) Robin hoode, (6) A galliard, (7) Passameasure galiarde, (8) High mistris Whiler, (9) The motlye, (10) The flatt pavion, (11) The Antycke, (12) Alebon galliarde, (13) Reports J.ff, (14) A pavion, (15) The bagpipes, (16) A hornepipe, (17) The passe a mesures pavion, (18) Trenchmore, (19) A round, (20) Initium, (21) Of love to learne to skyll, (22) The Hunte yis uppe, (23) Paul’s galiarde, (24) [Labeckae], (25) O Heavenly God : My L[ord] of Essex song, (26) A Dumpe, (27) Quarter Brawle, (28) The french galiarde, (29) Almaine, (30) Vaine is wordlye pleasure, (31) The upright esquire, (32) All of greene willowe, (33) In Crete dissend, (34) A measure, (35) Westones pavion. See, The Lute in Britain: A History of the instrument and its Music, Matthew Spring, Oxford University Press, 2001, pp. 70, 71, 85, 88, 89, 256; John Dowland, Diana Poulton, University of California Press, 1972, revised ed. 1982, p. 186.
241. 1561 Riots in Edinburgh due to the banning of Robin Hood games in Scotland (see no. 222 above). On 23 April, in anticipation of a Robin Hood parade, the Edinburgh Council issued the following directive:
‘The prouest baillies and counsale, vnderstanding that the prentissis and seruandis of merchanttis and craftismen and vtheris within this burgh ar of mynd vpoun Sounday nixt to mak convocatioun and assemblie efter the auld wikit maner of Robene Hude, nocht regarding the pvnishment thretnit in Goddis word vpoun the braikaris of the Saboth, nor having feir of the temporale pvnischment content in our Souerane actis vpoun the vsurparris of sic vane pastymes, quhairfor they all in ane voce, as cairfull fadderis our their commontie, and for eschewing of the pvnismentis and dangerris abone written, ordanis ane proclamatioun to be maid at the foure principale pairttis of this burgh, in our Souerane Ladeis and thair names, dischargeing all sic conventionis and assemblais within this burgh and boundis of the samyn, and of all bering of armour, wappinnis, striking of suesche, sounding of trumpet, bering of baner standert or anseyne of lyke instrument, for sic vane besynes certefeing the maister quhais seruand sall happin to be found cumand in the contrair heirof that he sall tyne his fredome of this burgh for euir, the seruand prentise or vther apprehendit or notat to tyne the armour and abulyement apprehendit with him and banist the toun for euer; the lenneris of armour wappinnis and abulyement to be reput and haldin as manteinaris of the wikit inemeis to all gude ordour, and thairfor pvnist in thair personis and guddis at the will of the said prouest baillies and counsale; and siclik that na assemblay nor convocatioun be found within this burgh with armour and wappinnis of the inhabitantis of the samyn, nor of the tounis adiacent, bot euerye man to gang and behaif him self in honest and sempill maner without multitude or gaddering, vnder the said pane of warding and pwnisment at the saidis jugis will.’
Despite the ban, an Edinburgh tailor George Dury was elected Robin Hood, or ‘Lord of Inobedience’, and a parade went ahead on Sunday 9 May, in disregard of the burgh magistrates who came out to try and stop it. As well as wielding a banner, ‘ane displayit handsenʒé,’ Robin Hood’s men roamed Edinburgh ‘makand plane rebellioun,’ carrying: ‘culveringis [hand-guns], morriounis [helments], twa handit swerdis, cotis of malʒé, and vÞeris wapynnis invasive.’ It was alleged at their trial in July that the burgh revellers had also marched with outsiders and rogues: ‘in cumpanye with certane brokin men of were’. These rowdy May events in Edinburgh had escalated into a serious craft riot by late July, in response to the death sentence handed out to James Gillone or Kyllon, one of the Robin Hood revellers at the trials. Queen Mary arrived after the riots, and an Act of Parliament was issued in 1562 (see no. 248 below).
A contemporary account is given by John Knox, leader of the Scottish Reformation, in his work The History of the Reformation of Religion in Scotland. Knox seems to give the incorrect date of 1560, and in the edition of this work by David Buchanan (London, 1644, Folio, and reprinted at Edinburgh, 1644, Quarto), concerning the riots, there is inserted in the margin: ‘A foolish play used in time of darknesse, hence we say any foolish thing to be like a play of Robin-Hood’. Another edition of Knox’s work was edited by David Laing (Edinburgh: Printed for the Woodrow Society, 2 vols., 1846-48).
The games seem to have taken place peacefully in 1572 (see no. 288 below) but even as late as 1579 it was still deemed necessary to warn the residents of Edinburgh against accompanying ‘any sic as ar of mynde to renew the playes of Robene Hude’ (see no. 316 below). Robin Hood games continued in smaller Lothian towns and villages. The Presbytery in Dalkeith warned against them in 1582, and the town authorities in Haddington tried to abolish them in 1588, but they were still taking place in 1589. Lasswade had games in 1583, Dirleton in 1585, and Cranston in 1590. St. Andrews also had games: they were banned there in 1575, and a commission was sent by the General Assembly of the Kirk in the same year to inquire why the games had not been suppressed. The minister protested that they were the work of ‘certane servandis and young childering,’ and that he had consistently preached against the games and sought their suppression by the town magistrates. Robin Hood games continued in Aberdeen after the ban, but without official support, as there was an action against one Henry Marshall for ‘making of robin huid and litill Iohnne’ in 1565. Residents of the nearby parish of Arbuthnot were still holding games in 1570. Robin Hood plays appear to have continued in Dumfries as witnessed by a case in 1570 when the council fined a disobedient citizen who had refused to ‘accept on hym the office of robert huyd and littill Iohn.’ See, Medieval and Renaissance Drama in England, Vol. 12, ed., John Pitcher: The Crying of ane Playe: Robin Hood and Maying in Sixteenth-Century Scotland, Keely Fisher, Associated University Presses, Inc., 1999, pp. 29-30; Robin Hood: The Shaping of the Legend, Jeffrey L. Singman, 1998, p. 68, and Appendix B: The Edinburgh Riots of 1561; Images of Robin Hood: Medieval to Modern, edited by Lois Potter and Joshua Calhoun, ‘From the Castle Hill they came with violence’: The Edinburgh Robin Hood Riots of 1561, Michael Wheare, Newark: University of Delaware Press, 2008, pp. 111-120.
242. 1561 Chudleigh, Devon: St. Martins and St. Marys churchwardens accounts include ‘The Count of Robyn Hodde and Litle Iohn’ [REED: Devon, 57. For that year there is a considerable ‘Count of Robyn Hodde and Litle Iohn’:
| Recettes | ||
| In primis received of theyr gathering in the parishe | xx s. | |
| Item received of the parishe | xl s. | |
| Item received of William Showbrocke | vj s. viij d. | |
| Item received for our alle solde | iij li. | |
| Sum totall vj li. vj s viij d | ||
| Expences | ||
| In primis paid for the clothe of vij cottes | xl s. | |
| Item paid for the Hoode cott cloth | xj s. iij d. | |
| Item paid for the vyces cott | ii s. | |
| Item paid for sylke & bottonse for the same cottes | vj s. iiij d. | |
| Item paid for sylke & whyplasse for the Hoodes cott | iij s. | |
| Item paid for making of ix cottes | x s. | |
| Item paid for the cuckes wages & the brewsters | iiij s. | |
| Item paid for a pere of showes for the vyce | xvj d. | |
| Item paid for wrytting this acount | ij d. | |
| Sum totall iij li. xviij s. j d. | ||
| And so remaynethe declare xliiij s. vij d. finis. . . | ||
| Received of Robyn Hoode Richard Pynson xliiij s. vij d. |
243. 1561-62 Braunton, Devon: St. Brannocks Church ale expenses include 12s. ‘payd for cloth to make Robyn hoodes Cote.’ Whitsun payments include 12d. ‘for Robyn hood and hys Company’ [REED: Devon, 52, 310].
244. 1561-62 Yeovil, Somerset: £10 13s. and odd pence received of Reynold Harding as Robin Hood [REED: Somerset, 407].
245. 1562 Chagford, Devon: John Newcombe is paid 35s. ‘for dowing the office of the Howde’ [Lega-Weekes, ‘Howde Men,’ 346].
246. 1562 Longleat, Wiltshire: Longleat accounts mention payment to players of a Robin Hood play in the house of Sir John Thynne [David Burnett, Longleat. The Story of an English Country House (London: Collins, 1978), 30].
247. 1562 Edinburgh, Lothian: Town treasurer’s accounts include a payment for a trumpet blown at the town cross for the proclamation against Robin Hood plays [Edinburgh Records. The Burgh Accounts, ed. Robert Adam (Edinburgh: for the Lord Provost, Magistrates and Council, 1899), 1.367; Mill, Medieval Plays, 224].
248. 1562 (April 30) Edinburgh, Lothian: Queen Mary writes to the Town Council that ‘it is notour vnto yow that be oure act of parliament it is statute and commandit that na Robene Hudis nor Litil Jhoneis suld be chosin within oure realme, nochttheles as we are informeit ye intend to elect and cheis personis to beir sic offices this Maii approcheand, incontrair the tennour of oure said act, quha vnder colour of Robene Hudis play purpoissis to rais seditione and tumult within our said burgh, for perturbatioun of the commoun tranquilitie quhairin oure gude subjectis ar desyrous to leif; quhairfore it is oure will, and we charge yow, that on na wys ye permit nor suffer this yeir ony sic as Robene Hude or Litil Jhonne to be chosin.’ The proclamation enjoins ‘that na maner of persoun . . . tak vpoun thaime ony sic office or power as Robene Hude, Litil Jhonne, Abbat of Vnressoun of the like office . . . to mak convocatioun or beir armour, contrair the tennour . . . of the actis of parliament’ [Mill, Medieval Plays, 223]. (See no. 241 above).
249. 1562-63 Yeovil, Somerset: £9 18s. received of William Longye as Robin Hood [Reed: Somerset, 407].
250. 1562-63 ‘A ballett of Robyn Hod.’ See Printed Sources for the Tales of Robin Hood).
251. 1563-64 Braunton, Devon: 6s. 8d. paid ‘for litle Iohns Cote’ [REED: Devon, 52].
252. 1563-64 Chagford, Devon: The accounts from Nicholas Peryman and ‘otheres of hys Companye the howdes men’ includes 45s. received for ale sold that year [REED: Devon, 55-56].
253. 1563-64 Yeovil, Somerset:£9 15s. 3 ½d. received of John Gaylord as Robin Hood [REED: Somerset, 408].
254. 1564 Chagford, Devon: £4 9d. received ‘of Iohn Newcomb and other howdesmen.’ Also in the accounts ‘Iohn Newcomb beyng howde’ and ‘Nycollas peryman and other howdes men’ [REED: Devon, 56].
255. 1564-65 Yeovil, Somerset: £10 5s. 8¼d. received of John Dennis as Robin Hood [REED: Somerset, 408; Goodchild 63].
256. 1564-65 Edinburgh, Lothian: A Minstrel named Sandy Stevin (or Alexander Stephan) is convicted of blasphemy after joining in a scornful church service, and alleging ‘that he would give no more credit to the New Testament then to a tale of Robin Hood’. This is recorded in The History of the Reformation in Scotland by John Knox (see no. 241 above). Around the same time, this is referred to in a letter (Calig. Book X, British Library) by Thomas Randolph (English ambassador to the Scottish court serving Elizabeth I), to Sir William Cecil, (chief advisor of Elizabeth I). See also, History of the Affairs of Church and State in Scotland, From the Beginning of the Reformation to the Year 1568, Robert Keith, Vol 2, Edinburgh, 1845, pp. 268-69.
257. 1565 (May 11) Aberdeen, North Sea Coast: One Henry Marshall ‘Is convickit for being in conventious with his colleggis in making of robin huid and litill Iohnne aganis Þe act of parliament’ [Mill, Medieval Plays, 153].
258. 1565 (May 14) Aberdeen, North Sea Coast: The provost and baillies order a bellman to make proclamation ‘to all burges men craftismen and all vtheris . . . That nane of thame tak vpone hand . . . to convene Þe quenis legis in chesing of robin huid litill Iohnne abbot of ressoune queyne of maij or siclyk’ [Mill, Medieval Plays, 153].
259. 1565 (May 28) Aberdeen, North Sea Coast: The provost reads publicly a letter from the Queen to the town that ‘Certane seditious personis, craftismen, cutlaris baxteris, saidlers, swerdslipparis, cordinaris, blaksmythis, goldsmythis, cowparis, barboris and vÞeris . . . hes arrogantlie attemptit in this instant moneth of maij to elect amangis thame selffis Robene hude and Litil Iohnne And to mak oppine convocatioun in weirlyk maner alsweill on the sabbaoth as vÞeris prophane dayis Tending as appeiris to na thing vÞer bot a plane seditioune and wproar and witht tyme to aspure vnto farther Licentious libertie gif thair temerarius attemptatis be nocht quiklie repressit’ [Mill, Medieval Plays, 154].
260. 1565 The proverb ‘Robin Hood’s pennyworths’ recorded at St John’s College, Cambridge: ‘Making Robin Hoodes pennyworthes of their copes and vestments’ (Calendar of State Papers Domestic, Elizabeth, vol. I, 262). The usual meaning is a commodity or quantity sold at a robber’s price, i.e. far below the real value. The proverb is repeated down the years: 1. (1582) ‘The cunning Lawier, that buyeth Robin hoodes penneworthes and yet with some nice forfaitures threatneth the seller with continuall bondage’ ( G. Whetstone, Heptameron of Civil Discourses, T 2). 2. (1600) Title of a now missing play by W. Haughton (Henslowe’s Diary, ed. W. Greg, II, 215). 3. (1631) ‘The moveable goods as they were sold, Robin Hoods peniworths, amounted to more than one hundred thousand pounds’ (J. Weever, Ancient Funeral Monuments, p. 104) 4. (1662) ‘To sell Robin Hood’s penny-worths. It is spoken of things sold under half their value; or, if you will, half sold half given’ (T. Fuller, Worthies of England, 1662, p. 315). 5. (1670) ‘This may be used in a double sence, either he sells things for half their worth . . . or he buys things at what price he pleases’ (John Ray, A Collection of English Proverbs, p. 191). 6. (1721) ‘This Proverb is usually applied to such as having gotten any Thing dishonestly, sell it at a Price much below the Value . . . and Robin Hood is alluded to because being an expert Archer, and so becoming easily by it, he could afford to sell Venison as cheap as Neck-Beef . . . but others on the contrary apply it to such as would buy lumping Pennyworths, still alluding to Robin, but upon another Consideration, viz. his being a Robber . . .’ (Nathan Bailey, Divers Proverbs, with their Explication and Illustration . . .). See also, Rymes of Robyn Hood: An Introduction the the English Outlaw, R. B. Dobson and J. Taylor, London, 1976, p. 291; Robin Hood: A Collection of all the Ancient Poems, Songs and Ballads, J. Ritson, London, 1846, p. 26; A Dictionary of the Proverbs in England in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries, M. P. Tilley (Ann Arbor, 1950), No. R 149); The Oxford Dictionary of English Proverbs, Third Edition, revised by F. P. Wilson, Oxford, 1970, p. 681.
261. 1565 Robin Hood and Maid Marian mentioned in the Jest-Book with the title Merie tales of the made men of Gotam gathered to gether by A.B. of phisike doctour (Imprinted at London in Fletstret, beneath the Conduit, at the signe of S. John euangelist, by Thomas Colwell). Attributed to Andrew Boorde (1490?-1549), this is apparently a copy of a now lost chapbook collection of twenty tales about ‘the mad men of Gotham’ published in about 1540. With subsequent editions, the word ‘mad’ became ‘wise,’ creating the myth of the Wise Men of Gotham. The only other extant edition before the Restoration it that of 1630, which was reprinted in W. Carew. Hazlitt’s Old English Jest Books, 3 vols. (1864). There was another edition with the title The Merry Tales of the Wise Men of Gotham by James Orchard Halliwell (1840), which was reprinted from a copy printed at Hull in the nineteenth century, in the possession of the Rev. Joseph Hunter, F.S.A. The extent of Boorde’s contribution is unclear, and there is an earlier reference to ‘the foles of Gotham’ in the Towneley Mysteries (Surtees Society, 1836, p. 88), a series of thirty-two mystery plays based on the Bible, probably performed in the town of Wakefield between about 1422 to 1483. There is mention of ‘a towne callyd Gotam’ in a black-letter folio printed by John Rastall in 1526 (All about the Merry Tales of Gotham, Alfred Stapleton, Nottingham, 1900, pp. 102-104). At least one of the twenty published tales makes an appearance in an earlier MS, a work with the title Descriptio Norfolciensium allegedly written by a monk of Peterborough in the twelfth century. It is the people of Norfolk that are accused of ‘madness’ in this story.
The ‘Merie Tales’ appear to be set in the village of Gotham in Nottinghamshire, although at least forty-five other English villages and one in Wales lay claim to the tales. According to one tradition the villagers pretend to be mad: ‘King John passing through this place, towards Nottingham, intending to go over the meadows, I have just described, was prevented by the villagers; they apprehending that the ground over which a king passed, was for ever after to become a public road. The King incensed at their proceedings, sent from his court, soon after, some of his servants to enquire of them the reason of their incivility and ill treatment, that he might punish them by way of fine, or some other way he might judge most proper. The villagers, hearing of the approach of the king’s servants, thought of an expendient to turn away his majesty’s displeasure from them: When the messenger arrived at Gotham, they found some of the inhabitants engaged in endeavouring to drown an eel, in a pool of water; some were employed in dragging carts, upon a large barn, to shade the wood from the sun; others were tumbling their cheeses down a hill, that they might find the way to Nottingham for sale; and some were employed in hedging in a cuckoo, which had perched upon an old bush which stood where the present one now stands; in short they were all employed in some foolish way or other, which convinced the king’s servants that it was a village of fools. Whence arose the old adage; ‘The wise men,’ or ‘The fools, of Gótham‘ (Thoroton’s History of Nottinghamshire: Republished With Large Additions By John Throsby, Vol. 1, London, 1797, pp. 42-43). Washington Irving brought the tales to America, where he gave the title of ‘Gotham City’ (a city of fools) to his native New York. This in turn evolved into the Gotham City of Batman.
Andrew Boorde was an English physician and author of the first English guidebook to Europe. Born in Sussex, he was educated at the University of Oxford and became a member of the Carthusian order at a young age. In 1521 he was ‘dispensed from religion’ to act as suffragan bishop of Chichester, but he never took the office. In 1529 he was released from his monastic vows as he was not able to endure the religious hardships. He travelled abroad and visited several universities, and saw ‘much abominable vices’ at Rome, and went on pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela in Spain. Boorde was again in London at the Charterhouse in 1534, then Thomas Cromwell seems to have sent him abroad to determine public feeling about Henry VIII’s policies. Boorde was studying and practicing medicine at Glasgow in 1536 and in about 1538 he again travelled extensively, visiting nearly all the countries of Europe and later making his way to Jerusalem. He settled for a time at Montpellier in France and before 1542 had completed his First Book of the Introduction of Knowledge (1548), which is known as the earliest continental guidebook. He also published Dietary of Health (1542?) and Breviary (1547). He probably returned to England in 1542, but was sent to the Fleet prison in London toward the end of his life, and here he made his will in 1549. Boorde died soon after, and he may have been imprisoned for keeping ‘loose women’ in his quarters at Winchester. See also, The Common Touch: Popular Literature from the Elizabethans to the Restoration, Paul A. Scanlon and Adrian Roscoe, Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2014, p. 244; Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Volume 05, Boorde, Andrew by
262. 1565 Robin Hood and Little John as outlaws in the time of Richard I, recorded by John Stow (c. 1525–1605), the London tailor, historian, and antiquary, in A Summarie of Englyshe Chronicles, where he quotes John Major (see no. 125 above) quite closely. There is a copy in the Huntington Library, San Marino, California. This work was well received, being frequently reissued until the year preceding Stow’s death. Successive editions (with varying degrees of content – some being abridgements) appeared in 1566, 1567, 1570, 1573, 1574, 1575, 1579, 1584, 1587, 1590, 1598, and 1604; these brought the information up to date. A subsequent edition by Edmund Howes with the title ‘The abridgement or summarie of the English chronicle, first collected by master Iohn Stow, and after him augmented with sundry memorable antiquities, and continued with maters forrein and domesticall, vnto this present yeare 1607. By E.H. Gentleman,’ appeared in 1607, with another in 1618.
Stow’s grandfather and father were Tallow-Chandlers, but he did not follow in their footsteps. Nothing is known of his education, so he was presumably self-taught. In 1544 a false charge, which is not defined, was brought against him by a priest, but his accuser was convicted of perjury. After serving his apprenticeship to one John Bulley, Stow was admitted to the freedom of the Merchant Taylors Company in 1547. He established himself in his business at a house by the well within Aldgate, between Leadenhall and Fenchurch Street, and was for many years a working tailor. From about 1560 onwards much of his time was spent in the collection of printed books, legal and literary documents, and charters, in the transcription of ancient manuscripts, inscriptions, and the like, all dealing with English history, archaeology, and literature. His zeal as a collector increased with his years, and he spent considerable amounts on his library. He came to know all the leading antiquaries of his day, including William Lambarde, Camden, and Fleetwood, and was acquainted with the playwright and poet Ben Jonson. He supplied manuscripts of medieval chronicles to Archbishop Parker, his patron, editing some of them for publication under the archbishop’s direction, and he joined the Society of Antiquaries formed by the archbishop.
Stow’s first publication was an edition of ‘The woorkes of Geffrey Chaucer, newly printed, with divers addicions whiche were never in printe before’ (London, 1561). In 1562 Stow acquired a manuscript of a treatise, The Tree of the Commonwealth, written by Edmund Dudley. Stow copied it in his own hand, and presented it to the author’s grandson Robert, afterwards Earl of Leicester, who suggested to Stow that he should undertake some historical work of his own – Stow took his advice, but it was not until 1565 that he produced his ‘Summarie of Englyshe Chronicles’. Stow had an ongoing dispute with Richard Grafton (see no. 275 below), with each contesting the others scholarly credentials in the prefaces of their historical works, and accusing each other of plagiarism. It would appear that Stow did not accept the reformed church with much enthusiasm, and as he was a collector of documents, he came under the suspicion of Elizabeth’s ministers. In 1568 he was charged with being in possession of a copy of the Duke of Alva’s manifesto against Elizabeth which the Spanish ambassador had disseminated in London. He was examined by the council, but was not punished. Soon afterwards his house was searched for recently published papistical books, and a list was made of those found. The officials of the ecclesiastical commission who made the search reported that they found, in addition to the forbidden literature, ‘foolish fabulous books of old print as of Sir Degory Triamour,’ ‘old written English chronicles,’ ‘miscellanea of divers sorts both touching physic, surgery, and herbs, with medicines of experience,’ and ‘old fantastical books’ of popish tendencies. There was a long running family dispute between Stow and his brother Thomas, who gave information which led to another summons before the ecclesiastical commission in 1570, but the charge against John was quashed. Stow also had a dispute with one William Ditcher. Though he still called himself ‘Merchant-Taylor,’ Stow had left his trade, and probably at the same time changed his residence to a house in St. Andrew’s parish in Lime Street Ward, near the Leadenhall. This must have been not long after 1570. Stow continued his historical and antiquarian work throughout the period of his persecution by the council and his bitter controversy with Grafton. With Archbishop Parker’s patronage Stow produced Matthew of Westminster’s ‘Flores Historiarum’ in 1567, Matthew Paris’s ‘Chronicle’ in 1571, and Thomas Walsingham’s ‘Chronicle’ in 1574.
In 1580 Stow produced the first edition of his original contribution to English history entitled ‘The Chronicles of England from Brute unto this present yeare of Christ, 1580. Collected by J. Stow, citizen of London,’ (London, by ‘R. Newberie at the assignement of H. Bynneman). This repeats the record of Robin Hood and Little John, but also adds the story of King John and Mawd, or Matilda (see no. 321 below). A new expanded edition developed twelve years later (in 1592) had the more familiar title of ‘The Annales of England faithfully collected out of the most authenticall Authors, Records, and other Monuments of Antiquitie from the first inhabitation untill … 1592,’ (London, by Ralph Newbery, 1592). This also repeats the record of Robin Hood and Little John, and the story of King John and Mawd, or Matilda, but also adds a mention of Friar Tuck (see no. 363 below). Stow’s editorial work for Parker brought him into association with Reyne Wolfe, the printer, and when Wolfe died in 1573, Stow purchased many of his collections. At the time of his death Wolfe had been preparing a Universal History. His design was carried out on a less ambitious scale under the direction of Raphael Holinshed, to whom Stow lent ‘divers rare monuments, ancient writers, and necessary register-books’. Stow helped in the revision of the second edition of Holinshed’s ‘Chronicle,’ which was published in January 1586–7 (see no. 308 below).
Stow’s final work was ‘A Survay of London’, which contains another reference to Robin Hood – the account by Edward Hall (see no. 107 above) of Henry VIII and the Queen’s meeting with two hundred yeomen on Shooter’s Hill (see no. 381 below). In his old age, Stow’s funds were diminished, and he was compelled to seek charity. James I granted him Letters Patent, first on 8 May, 1603, and again in February and October, 1604, giving him licence to ask and take benevolence. Ben Jonson noted that: ‘John Stow had monstrous observations in his Chronicle, and was of his craft a tailor. He and I walking alone, he asked two cripples what they would have to take him to their order’. This suggests that Stow accepted his poverty cheerfully. He received financial aid from William Camden and also the Merchant Taylors’ Company (and others), but the tradition of his poverty seems to have been exaggerated; his widow was rich enough to provide a substantial monument for her husband’s grave. Stow died in April 1605, and was buried in the church of St. Andrew Undershaft in Leadenhall Street. He was probably the most accurate and efficient English annalists or chronicler of the sixteenth century. Edmond Howes stated that ‘he always protested never to have written anything either for malice, fear, or favour, nor to seek his own particular gain or vainglory, and that his only pains and care was to write truth’. See, Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Volume 55, Stow, John by Sidney Lee, pp. 3-6; Encyclopædia Britannica, 1911, Volume 25, Stow, John, p. 972; John Stow, ‘Introduction: The life of Stow’, in A Survey of London. Reprinted From the Text of 1603, ed. C L Kingsford (Oxford, 1908), pp. vii-xxviii.
263. 1565-67 Melton Mowbray, Leicestershire: 49s. 9d. owed by John Dalderby and William Blyth for the Lord and Lady’s money for 1563; also 14s. 1d. of Robin Hood’s money received of John Downes [Reference courtesy of REED].
264. 1566 Abingdon, Berkshire: St. Helen’s pays 18d. for setting up ‘Robin Hoodes bowere’ [Cox, Churchwardens Accounts, 284; J. Ward, ‘Extracts from the Church-wardens Accompts of the Parish of St. Helens in Abingdon, Berkshire,’ Archaeologia 1 (177), 16; David Wiles, Early Plays of Robin Hood (Woodbridge: D. S. Brewer, 1981), 64].
265. 1566 ‘prate of Robin hood’ in Churchyardes farewell (Printed in Fleetestreete, for Edwarde Russell). Another mention of Robin Hood by Thomas Churchyard (see no. 238 above and 266 below) in this broadside ballad. There is a copy in the Huntington Library.
266. 1566 ‘Robin Hood farewell’ mentioned in the broadside poem Great thankes to the welcome, in Churchyards behalfe. It is signed: (q[uod]) Ra. Sm., i.e. Ralph Smart – an unknown author. There is a copy in the Huntington Library.
Some six years after the publication of The Contention betwyxte Churchyeard and Camell (see no. 238 above), Thomas Churchyard seems to have become involved in another poetical disagreement. In 1566 he issued a series of broadside ballads with titles evidently speaking of a rift between himself and a couple of fellow writers. This clash apparently began with the publication of Churchyardes farewell (1566) and A farewell cauld, Churcheyards, rounde From the courte to the country grownd (1566). In both of these ballads, Churchyard expresses his estrangement from the court. His bitter criticism in these ballads are seemingly personal and, at times, poignant. Two of his further poems, A greater thanks for Churchyardes welcome home (1566) and Churchyardes lamentacion of freyndshyp (1566), are likely to be products of a dispute between Churchyard, the ballad writer Clement Robinson, and Ralph Smart. Robinson appears to have responded to the Churchyard farewell broadsides in his pamphlet Churcheyardes Wellcome home, which is now lost. Churchyardes farewell was so bitter in its accusations of flattery and oath-breaking among courtiers at Elizabeth’s court that it earned a Camell-like response poem from Smart (Great thankes to the welcome, in Churchyards behalfe). Churchyard’s A greater thanks is his response to Smart. There is even some belief that Ralph Smart may actually be a pseudonym for Churchyard himself. See, Two Thousand Years of Solitude: Exile after Ovid, Jennifer Ingleheart, Oxford University Press, 2011, ‘Elizabethan Exile after Ovid: Thomas Churchyard’s Tristia (1572)’, Liz Oakley-Brown, pp. 114-15; Thomas Churchyard: Pen, Sword, and Ego, Matthew Woodcock, Oxford University Press, 2016, pp. 127-8.
267. 1566-67 Yeovil Somerset: £4 8d. received from Robin Hood [Reed: Somerset, 408].
268. 1566-67 Ludlow, Shropshire: Bailiffs and chamberlains accounts include 10s. given to Robin Hood [REED: Shropshire, 83].
269. 1567 Farway, Devon: St. Michaels churchwardens accounts record 5s. 6d. owing to Walter Bucknoll who was chosen as ‘Robert howde’ but ‘after put owt’ [REED, Devon, 207].
270. 1567 ‘Robin Hood, or Litle Iohn’ mentioned in A counterblast to M. Hornes vayne blaste against M. Fekenham, by Thomas Stapleton (1535-1598). The substance of this work was in reality penned by Fekenham, who was in custody in England, and who requested Stapleton to revise the manuscript and to publish the work in his own name. There are two copies in the British Library, and another in the Harvard University Library.
A Catholic theologian and controversialist, Thomas was born at Henfield, Sussex, in July 1535, the son of William Stapleton, steward to the bishop of Winchester, and a member of the Carlton family of Stapleton (Chetwynd-Stapylton, Stapeltons of Yorkshire, 1897, p. 161). William did not sympathize with the religious changes then being introduced into the realm, and he may have named his son after the recently executed Thomas More. The young Thomas acquired the rudiments of grammar in the free school at Canterbury under John Twyne. In 1550 he was admitted a scholar at Winchester College, where the entry in the register states that he was then twelve years of age and that he was a native of, or a resident at, Oving, Sussex (Kirby, Winchester Scholars, p. 129). Thomas was elected to a fellowship at New College, Oxford, 18 Jan. 1552–3, and graduated B.A. on 2 Dec. 1556 (Oxford Univ. Register, i. 233). Shortly before the death of Queen Mary in 1588, he was collated by Bishop Christopherson to the prebend of Woodhorne in Chichester Cathedral. It was clear that the new monarch, Elizabeth, had no intention of maintaining the connection with Rome that her sister had re-established. The parliament that assembled in January 1559 passed in due course the Acts of Supremacy and Uniformity, which revived the state church and the protestant worship, as they had developed in the days of the queen’s father and brother. But in contrast to the similar situation created by Henry VIII twenty-five years before, more than a few prominent Catholics declined to conform. Some of them, in imitation of the Protestants at the beginning of Mary’s reign, decided to retire abroad and wait for better times. Among them was Thomas Stapleton, who in late 1559 departed England for the Low Countries. Once in Belgium, he obtained the necessary royal warrant which permitted him to reside outside the kingdom for three years. He settled at Louvain, where he applied himself to the study of theology. Subsequently he proceeded to the university of Paris in order to complete his knowledge of the sacred tongues, and then ‘for devotion sake’ paid a visit to Rome. On his return to Louvain he found letters from his father desiring his immediate attendance in England. He complied with the request, and was required by his diocesan Bishop Barlow to abjure the authority of the pope, and to acknowledge the spiritual supremacy of the queen. He told bishop Barlow that he would swear that part of the oath of supremacy which acknowledged the queen as ‘supreme governor’ in temporal affairs, but ‘upon refusal of the other [religious] part, he deprived me (as much as lay in him) of my prebend in Chichester Church’. Thomas again retired to Louvain, taking with him his father and some other members of his family, and never saw England again. He kept in close contact with his fellow English refugees, the bulk of whom had settled in parts of Belgium. The hope was that one day England would restore the Catholic faith. This optimism inspired an avalanche of polemical writing in English, most of it emanating from presses located it the Netherlands. In this endeavour Thomas made his controversial debut, or as he expressed it ‘At this time I began to write my first books against the heretics, but in the vernacular tongue only’ (Compendium, 1620). His The Fortresse of the Faith (1565), A returne of vntruthes vpon M. Iewels Replie (1566), and A Counterblast to M. Hornes vayne blaste against M. Fekenham [q. v.], earned an honourable place among that recusant literature of the 1560s.
In 1569 William (afterwards Cardinal) Allen invited Thomas to the recently established English College in the university of Douay, where he was both a teacher and a benefactor; he was appointed lecturer in divinity at Anchin College with a considerable salary. One of his pupils at Douay was John Pits. When the university of Douay became aware of his extraordinary qualifications, he was unanimously chosen public professor of divinity, and he and Allen completed the degree of D.D. on 10 July 1571. He also obtained a canonry in the collegiate church of St. Amatus at Douay. In 1576 Thomas proceeded to Rome, he returned to the college in 1577. In 1580 the wars in the Low Countries prompted William Allen to move the college to Rheims, Thomas remained behind.
Having resolved to join a religious order, Thomas resigned his canonry and professorship, and entered the Society of Jesus in the Belgian province in 1584, but he left the novitiate before pronouncing the vows (More, Hist. Prov. Anglicanæ Soc. Jesu, p. 29). Dodd says it was by Allen’s persuasion that he forsook the noviceship, but the ‘Douay Diary’ and Thomas’s metrical autobiography concur in stating that ill-health was the cause of his not continuing in it (Constable, Specimen of Amendments to Dodd’s Church Hist. pp. 119–22; Dodd, Apology for the Church Hist. p. 129). Thomas now returned to his canonry of St. Amatus, which he retained until 1590. Philip II, by letters patent dated 13 July 1590, conferred upon him the chair of holy scripture at Louvain, vacant by the death of Michael Baius, together with the canonry of St. Peter, which was annexed to the professorship. Shortly afterwards the king presented him to the deanery of Hilverenbeeck, in the diocese of Bois-le-Duc. The latter benefice was worth a thousand florins a year, and that sum, added to what he already possessed, and to the fees which he obtained as a private tutor to youths of good family, enabled him to render pecuniary assistance to his exiled fellow-countrymen (Paquot, Hist. Littéraire des Pays-Bas, ii. 526).
Thomas’s fame as a controversialist had spread all over Europe, and Pope Clement VIII esteemed his writings so highly that he ordered portions of them to be read publicly at his table. In 1596 the pontiff twice invited him to Rome: first, with an offer of residence in the household of Cardinal Aldobrandino, the pope’s nephew; and the second time with the promise of a chair in the Sapienza. Thomas declined both invitations; but in January 1596–7 he accepted from his holiness a third offer of an appointment as prothonotary apostolic. His friends believed that he would be created a cardinal, however Father Agazzari, rector of the English College at Rome, was alarmed at the prospect of Thomas’s promotion to the purple. He intended to set out for Rome in August 1597, but, either from illness or some other cause, remained at Louvain.
Thomas died at Louvain on 12 Oct. 1598, and was buried in the church of St. Peter, where a monument was erected to his memory with a long Latin inscription, which has been printed by Pits (De Angliæ Scriptoribus, p. 797). He left all his books and manuscripts to the English College at Douay. Anthony Wood calls Thomas ‘the most learned Roman catholic of all his time,’ Ath. Oxon., 1.669) and it is generally admitted that he was a most skilful controversialist. Even his chief adversary, William Whitaker, paid a willing tribute to his powers and erudition. Thomas attempted to introduce some moderation at least into the theory of the relations between the papal authority and civil governments. Thomas was one of the English writers on whose information Pius V mainly relied when he issued his famous bull against Queen Elizabeth. His principal polemical opponents were Dr. William Fulke, Dr. William Whitaker, Dr. John Rainolds, Bishop Jewell, and Dr. John Bridges, bishop of Oxford. His portrait, engraved by L. Gualtier and representing him in a doctor of divinity’s habit, forms the frontispiece of his collected works (Granger, Biogr. Hist. i. 224). It is reproduced in Richardson’s collection of ‘Engravings illustrating Granger’s Biographical History of England’ (vol. iii.). The portrait is now at the National Portrait Gallery, London.
Thomas’s other principal works are: 1. ‘The History of the Church of Englande. Compiled by Venerable Bede, Englishman. Translated out of Latin into English,’ Antwerp, 1565, 4to; St. Omer, 1622, 8vo. 2. A translation from the Latin of Frederic Staphylus’s ‘Apologie, intreating of the true and right vnderstanding of holy Scripture,’ Antwerp, 1565, 4to. To this is appended a ‘Discours of the Translatour vppon the doctrine of the protestants, which he trieth by the three first founders and fathers thereof, Martin Luther, Philip Melancthon, and especially Iohn Caluin.’ 3. ‘Of the express Word of God,’ Louvain, 1567, from the Latin of Cardinal Hosius. 4. ‘In Laudem Franc. Richardoti Atrebat. Episc. Oratio Funebris, Duaci habita MDLXXIIII mense Augusto,’ Douay, 1608, 4to. 5. ‘Orationes Funebres,’ Antwerp, 1577. 6. ‘Principiorum Fidei doctrinalium Demonstratio methodica, per controuersias septem in libris duodecim tradita,’ Paris, 1578, 1579, and 1582, with a thirteenth book. 7. ‘Speculum pravitatis hæreticæ per orationes quasi ad oculum demonstratæ,’ Douay, 1580. 8. ‘De Universa Justificationis Doctrina, hodie controversa, lib. xii.,’ Paris, 1581. 9. ‘Tres Thomæ; seu res gestæ S. Thomæ apostoli, S. Thomæ archiepisc. Cantuar. et martyris, et Thomæ Mori Angliæ quondam cancellarii,’ Douay, 1588, 8vo; Cologne, 1612, 8vo. The ‘Life of More’ was in 1689 printed both separately (Gratz [1689], 12mo), and as a preface to More’s collected Latin works [see under More, Sir Thomas]; and a French translation, by A. Martin, appeared at Paris (1849, 8vo), ‘avec une introduction, des notes et commentaires par M. Audin.’ 10. ‘Promptuarium Morale super Evangelia Dominicalia totius anni. Pars Hyemalis,’ Antwerp, 1591; Cologne, 1615; Paris, 1617, 8vo. ‘Pars Æstivalis,’ Venice, 1593, 1594; Mayence, 1610; Cologne, 1620; both parts, 2 vols. Antwerp, 1613, 8vo; Paris, 1 vol. 1627, 8vo. 11. ‘Promptuarium Catholicum in Evangelia Dominicalia totius Anni,’ Cologne, 1592, 1602; Paris, 1617, 8vo. 12. ‘Promptuarium Catholicum in Evangelia Ferialia totius Quadragesimæ,’ reprinted Paris, 1617, 8vo. 13. ‘Promptuarium Catholicum in Evangelia Festorum totius Anni,’ Cologne, 1592; Antwerp, 1608. 14. ‘Relectio Scholastica et Compendiaria Principiorum Fidei Doctrinalium,’ Antwerp, 1592; Louvain, 1596. 15. ‘Authoritatis Ecclesiasticæ circa S. Scripturarum approbationem … Defensio … contra Disputationem de Scriptura Sacra G. Whitakeri,’ Antwerp, 1592, 8vo (cf. Lambeth MS. 182: ‘De ecclesiæ autoritate ex dictatis eximii viri Thomæ Stapletoni’). 16. ‘Apologia pro rege catholico Philippo II Hispaniæ rege, contra varias et falsas accusationes Elizabethæ Angliæ reginæ, per edictum suum publicatas et excusas, authore Didymo Veridico Henfildano,’ Constance, 1592, 8vo (Letters and Memorials of Cardinal Allen, p. 339). The quaint pseudonym, being interpreted, seems to mean ‘Thomas the Stable-toned (or truth-speaking) Henfieldite.’ 17. ‘Antidota Evangelica in quatuor Evangelia,’ Antwerp, 1595. 18. ‘Antidota Apostolica in Acta Apostolorum,’ Antwerp, 1595. 19. ‘Antidota Apostolica in Epist. Pauli ad Romanos,’ Antwerp, 1595. 20. ‘Antidota Apostolica in duas Epistolas ad Corinthios,’ Antwerp, 1598, 1600. 21. ‘Orationes Catecheticæ, sive Manuale Peccatorum, de Septem Peccatis Capitalibus,’ Antwerp, 1598; Lyons, 1599. 22. ‘Verè admiranda: seu de Magnitudine Romanæ Ecclesiæ Libri duo’ (edited by Christopher ab Assonvilla, lord of Alteville), Antwerp, 1599, 4to; Rome, 1600, 8vo; Bruges, 1881, 8vo. 23. ‘Orationes Academicæ Miscellaneæ;’ some of these were published in 1602. 24. ‘Oratio Academica; an politici horum temporum in numero Christianorum sint habendi?’ Munich, 1608, 8vo.
His collected writings were published in four huge folio volumes under the title of ‘Opera omnia; nonnulla auctius et emendatius, quædam jam antea Anglice scripta, nunc primum studio et diligentia doctorum virorum Anglorum Latine reddita’ (Paris, 1620). Prefixed to the first volume is a curious autobiography of Thomas in Latin hexameter verse, and a brief sketch of his life by Henry Holland, licentiate of theology at Douay. See, Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Vol. 54, Stapleton, Thomas (1535-1598) by Thompson Cooper, pp. 101-104; Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, in Association with The British Academy, From the earliest times to the year 2000, H. C. G. Matthew and Brian Harrison, Oxford University Press, 2004, Stapleton, Thomas (1535-1598).
271. ?c. 1567 Netherbury, Dorset: Seventeenth-century compilation of sixteenth-century Yondover manor presentments mentions church ales at Whitsunday featuring Robin Hood and Little John, with the gentlemen of the parish as the chief participants [Reference courtesy of R. C. Hays and C. E. McGee].
272. 1567-70 Robin Hood mentioned by the character ‘Will’ (Act IV., Sc. I) in the anonymous play The Marriage of Wit and Science. The only known copy is in the Bodleian Library, Oxford (Malone 231.1), printed by Thomas Marshe, apparently in 1570, the date added in ink on the title-page. It appears to have been written in 1567-68, and recorded in the Stationer’s Register in 1569. This was reproduced in facsimile (The Tudor Facsimile Texts: The Marriage of Wit and Science, John S. Farmer, London and Edinburgh, 1909). There had been an earlier edition by John S. Farmer (Early English Dramatists: Five Anonymous Plays (Fourth Series), Comprising Appius and Virginia . . .’, London, 1908, pp. 47-100). There are fourteen players with names such as Wit, Will, Nature, Reason, Experience, Diligence and Shame. This play is indebted to, and follows closely (with similar players) The Play of Wit and Science by John Redford, which must have been written before 1547, the year of his death. Redford’s work, like the other, is a morality play, which presents each of the characters as being a personification of human characteristics. Like many moralistic dramas of the era, the story is in the form of a journey, which is only completed after the lead character has undergone a transformation, having grown in experience and understanding along the way. Another play in a similar vein has the title: The Interlude of a Contract of Marriage Between Wit and Wisdom (1579) in Early English Dramatists: Five Anonymous Plays (Fourth Series), Comprising Appius and Virginia . . .’ , John S. Farmer, London, 1908, pp. 257-298. See also, The Marriage of Wit and Science, John Redford, John Crow, F. P. Wilson and Arthur Brown (Malone Society, London, 1961); The Play of Wit and Science by John Redford, Ben Byram-Wigfield, 2004: http://www.ancientgroove.co.uk/books/PlayofWit.pdf.
273. 1568 Alexander Scott refers to Robin Hood and Little John in the poem Of May. One of thirty six poems attributed to him, they only survive in the Bannatyne Manuscript (National Library of Scotland, MS Advocates 1.1.6), which was compiled by the merchant George Bannatyne (1545–1607/08) in 1568, when the plague struck the city of Edinburgh, and he was confined to his house. A note at the end of the manuscript reads: ‘this buik writtin in tyme of pest / Quhen we fra labor was compeld to rest’ [this book was written in a time of plague / when we were compelled to rest from work]. In another part of the manuscript, Bannatyne describes the compilation as ‘ane ballit buik’ [a ballad book] made from ‘copies awld mankit and mvtillait’ [old copies that are grubby and mutilated]. The Bannatyne Manuscript contains works by important Scottish poets such as William Dunbar and Robert Henryson, and several texts which do not survive elsewhere. With over four hundred poems by Scottish and English authors, it is one of the most important manuscripts in the history of medieval Scottish literature. As Bannatyne explains in his address, the poems are arranged into five sections of religious, moral, merry, amatory and narrative. Bannatyne appears to have copied the texts from printed and manuscript sources. See The Bannatyne Manuscript, Compiled by George Bannatyne 1568, Glasgow, Printed for the Hunterian Club, 4 Vols., 1873-1900; The Bannatyne Manuscript, Written in Tyme of Pest 1568, W. Tod Ritchie, The Scottish Text Society, 4 Vols., Edinburgh and London, 1928-34; The Bannatyne Manuscript Facsimile, D. Fox and W. A Ringler, London, Scolar Press, 1980.
Little is known of Alexander Scott (1525?-1584?), but allusions in his poems show that much of his time was spent in or around Edinburgh, although he could have resided in Dalkeith. He may have been the son of one Alexander Scott, Prebendary of the Chapel Royal of Stirling, whose two sons John and Alexander were legitimated on 21st November, 1549 (Privy Council Register, xxiii. 50). Scott was married, but he tells us that his wife took up with ‘sum wantoun man,’ and left him ‘in pane and wo’. He is probably the ‘old Scot’ referred to by Alexander Montgomerie, in a sonnet dated about 1584. Two of his most notable works are ‘A New Yeir Gift to Quene Mary’ (1562), and ‘Ffollowis the Justing and Debait vp at the Drum betuix Wa Adamsone and Johne Sym’. His other works include psalms and love poems, often relating to sexual love or desire. Scott has been referred to as the most eminent of the early Minor Scottish poets, due to his skill in handling the old Scottish metrical forms, although he is considered to be below Montgomerie. Allan Ramsay first printed seven of Scott’s poems in ‘The Evergreen’ (1724). The same amount was printed by Lord Hailes in ‘Ancient Scottish Poems: Published from the Manuscript of George Bannatyne’ (1770). James Sibbald included fifteen poems in ‘A Chronicle of Scottish Poetry from the Thirteenth Century to the Union of the Crowns’ (4 vols. 8vo, Edinburgh, 1802). The first complete edition of Scott’s poems (with biography) was issued by David Laing in ‘Poems by Alexander Scott: From a Manuscript written in the Year 1568’(Edinburgh, 1821). Five poems appeared in ‘The History of Scottish Poetry’ by David Irving, edited by John Aitken Carlyle (Edinburgh, 1861). J. Ross included seven poems in ‘The Book of Scottish Poems: Ancient and Modern’ (Paisley, 1882). An Edition of Scott’s poems printed for private circulation appeared in ‘The Poems of Alexander Scott . . .’ (Glasgow, 1882). Twenty – five poems were modernised by William Mackean in ‘Poems by Alexander Scott’ (Paisley, 1887). George Eyre – Todd included five poems in ‘Scottish Poetry of the Sixteenth Century’ (Glasgow, 1892). An edition of Scott’s poems (with Biography) appeared in ‘The Poems of Alexander Scott’, James Cranstoun, Scottish Text Society, Edinburgh and London, 1896. See also, Dictionary of National Biography, 1897, vol. 51, Scott, Alexander by James Cranstoun.
274. c. 1568 Robin Hood referred to several times by the character Moros in the comedy The Longer Thou Livest the More Foole Thou Art (originally British Museum C. 34, e. 37, apparently now British Library C. 34. e. 14) by William Wager. Probably printed in about 1568, the Stationers Register recorded the following among the entries from July 1568 to July 1569: ‘Recevyd of Rychard Jonnes for his lycense for pryntinge of a ballet the lenger thou leveste the more ffoole thow iiij d.’ This comedy was reproduced in the Tudor Facsimile Texts under the supervision and editorship of John S. Farmer (London, 1910), and issued for subscribers by John S. Farmer (Amersham, 1913), and reproduced again by AMS Press (New York, 1970). Another edition appeared as The Longer Thou Livest and Enough Is as Good as a Feast, R. Mark Benbow, University of Nebraska Press, 1967. Later editions were published by Nabu Press ( 2010), Hardpress Ltd (2013), and Forgotten Books (2017).
Little is known of Wager, but he was apparently a major dramatist in the early years of Elizabeth’s reign. He appears to have been a grammar school governor who had lectured at the hospital of St. Mary Woolnoth, and his comedy may have originally been written for school boys, and performed by boy players in an academic hall. Other plays attributed to Wager include The Cruel Debtor, The Trial of Treasure and Enough Is as Good as a Feast. All four plays were apparently written between about 1558 and 1571. See, Interludes and Early Modern Society: Studies in Gender, Power and Theatricality, Peter Happé and Wim Hüsken: Staging the Reformation: Power and Theatricality in the Plays of William Wager, David Bevington, New York, 2007; Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Vol. 58, Wager, William by
275. 1568-69 Richard Grafton (c. 1511-73) chronicler and printer, gives an account of Robin Hood in his Chronicle at Large. This was reprinted (2 vols., London, 1809) and edited by Henry Ellis. A prosperous London merchant and member of the Grocer’s Company, Grafton arranged for the printing of the Bible in English (a modification of Myles Coverdale’s translation), in association with a fellow-merchant, Edward Whitchurch. Printed in 1537, probably at Antwerp, this became known as the Matthew’s Bible. Grafton presented copies to Thomas Cromwell who moved Henry VIII to licence the work, and in 1538 Grafton proceeded to Paris to reprint the English Bible. He was accompanied by Coverdale, and probably Whitchurch as well. In November 1538 Coverdale’s corrected English translation of the New Testament, with the Latin text, was ‘prynted in Paris by Fraunces Regnault … for Richard Grafton and Edward Whitchurch, cytezens of London,’ with a dedication to Cromwell. This is the earliest book bearing Grafton’s name. Grafton and Whitchurch focused their attention on the folio Bible, known as ‘the Great Bible’ which was near completion in Paris in 1538 (Coverdale corrected the proofs), when the officers of the inquisition raised a charge of heresy. The French government ordered the work to be stopped, and the presses and type were forfeited. Grafton escaped to England, but many of the printed sheets were destroyed by the French authorities. Cromwell later purchased the presses and types and they were brought to England, where the work was completed and published in 1539; Grafton and Whitchurch appear as the printers. A royal proclamation ordered every parish to purchase a copy before the Feast of All Hallows 1540, and a second edition with a ‘prologe’ by Archbishop Cranmer appeared in 1540. Several editions followed, some bearing the name of Grafton, and others with only Whitchurch named as printer.
Grafton’s printing office was, as early as 1540, within the precincts of the dissolved Grey Friars, afterwards Christ’s Hospital. A New Testament in English after Erasmus’s text appeared in 1540 with the imprint of both Grafton and Whitchurch, but the Psalter in both Latin and English was printed in the same year in London by Grafton alone. ‘The Prymer’ in both English and Latin (1540) was ‘printed in the House late the Graye Freers by Rychard Grafton and Edward Whytchurch.’ Grafton’s earliest official publication was a proclamation printed jointly with Whitchurch, dated 1541, directing the ‘Great Bible’ ‘to be read in every church.’ A proclamation of 1541 commanding certain sacred feasts to be kept as holy days, also bears the imprint of Grafton and Whitchurch. In 1542 Grafton printed such secular literature as an account of Charles V’s campaign in Barbary, ‘The Order of the Great Turckes Court,’ and Erasmus’s ‘Apophthegms.’ After Cromwell’s fall Grafton is said to have been sent to fleet prison in 1541, and again in 1543 with six others, including his partner Edward Whitchurch. He is also said to have been summoned before the council for resisting the Act of Six Articles; however he soon regained royal favour. In 1543-44 Grafton and Whitchurch received an exclusive patent for printing church service books (Rymer, Fœdera, xiv. 766), and in 1545 he and Whitchurch received an exclusive right to print primers in Latin and English. Grafton became Prince Edward’s printer and remained in that position throughout Edward’s kingship, being given the sole right of printing the statutes and acts of parliament. Grafton also printed ‘Hardyng’s Chronicle’ (with a continuation by himself), ‘An Abridgement of the notable woorke of P. Vergile,’ and in 1548 he reissued Edward Hall’s ‘Union of the Two Noble and Illustre Families of Lancastre and Yorke’ (see no. 200 above). Grafton was the printer of the first Book of Common Prayer in 1549, and of the edition of 1552. In 1552 and 1553 he printed ‘Actes of Parliament,’ and his general books include William Patten’s ‘Diary of the Expedition into Scotland,’ 1548. On the accession of Lady Jane Grey in 1553, Grafton printed her proclamation, describing himself as printer to the Queen, and for this act was deprived by Queen Mary of the office of royal printer. After a few weeks imprisonment he made his peace with Mary, but his position was given to John Cawood, which seems to have practically ended Grafton’s printing career.
Grafton was elected M.P. for London in 1553-54 and 1556-57, and in 1562-63 sat in parliament as M.P. for Coventry. He was warden of the Grocers Company in 1555 and 1556, and was a master of Bridewell Hospital in 1559 and 1560, and described as ‘chief master’ of Christ’s Hospital by Henry Machyn (see no. above) in 1560. His son-in-law Richard Tottell took over his printing stock in 1559, and he published the bulk of Grafton’s work in the following decades. Grafton turned to writing, and his ‘Abridgement of the Chronicles of England,’ printed by Tottell in 1562, was reissued in 1563, 1564, 1570, and 1572. In 1568 Grafton first published his ‘Chronicle at large and meere Historye of the Affayres of Englande,’ in two volumes, a second edition appeared in 1569, printed by Henry Denham for R. Tottle and H. Toye. Grafton had an ongoing dispute with John Stow (see no. 262 above), with each contesting the others scholarly credentials in the prefaces of their historical works, and accusing each other of plagiarism. Grafton died in 1573 and was buried in Christ Church, Newgate; his first wife had died in 1560. He had several children and his third son Richard was a lawyer. The administration of Grafton’s goods was granted to his son Edward on 16 May 1573. See, Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Vol. 22, pp. 310-13, by
Grafton gives us the most detailed account of Robin Hood since Walter Bower (see no. 17 above). He does quote from John Major’s Historia Majoris Britanniae (see no. 125 above) quite closely, but adds new information as well:
‘But in an olde and auncient Pamphlet I finde this written of the sayd Robert Hood. ‘This man (sayth he) discended of a nobel parentage: or rather beyng of a base stocke and linage, was for his manhoode and chivalry advaunced to the noble dignité of an Erle. Excellyng principally in Archery, or shootyng, his manly courage agreeyng therunto: But afterwardes he so prodigally exceeded in charges and expences, that he fell into great debt, by reason wherof, so many actions and sutes were commenced against him, wherunto he aunswered not, that by order of lawe he was outlawed, and then for a lewde shift, as his last refuge, gathered together a companye of Roysters and Cutters, and practised robberyes and spoylyng of the kynges subjects, and occupied and frequentede the Forestes or wilde Countries’.
What was this ‘olde and auncient Pamphlet’. Stephen Knight (Robin Hood: A Complete Study of the English Outlaw, p. 41) suggests it may have been ‘simply the Gest’, but this is unlikely – it contains no mention of Robin’s earldom. Knight goes further, implying that ‘Grafton, or perhaps his source, is reconciling two traditions for Robin’s advancement, and that some elements of gentrification had already occurred in an oral or lost written tradition’. Knight fails to mention the similarity between Grafton’s comments and the play The Downfall of Robert, Earl of Huntington by Anthony Munday (see no. 378 below). In this play Robin Hood is Robert, earle of Huntington, a contemporary of Richard I; the Earl is in debt to a Prior, his uncle Gilbert Hoode, and he is driven to ourlawry (see The Downfall of Robert, Earl of Huntington, Act 1). It is therefore possible that Grafton’s ‘olde and auncient Pamphlet’ was an earlier tale or play, which Munday used as a source for his Downfall of Robert, Earl of Huntington of c. 1598. It has been assumed that Munday was probably the first to make Robin Hood the Earl of Huntington (Dobson and Taylor, Rymes of Robyn Hood, p. 44), however my discovery shows that ‘Robyne’ was associated with Hu[n]tyngton in the time of Henry VIII. Curiously, Munday’s play (a play within a play) has John Skelton (see no. 111 above) playing the part of Friar Tuck, and Skelton introduces Robin Hood as the Earl of Huntington, and he ‘writes of Robin Hood’ (see The Downfall of Robert, Earl of Huntington, Act 1).
Grafton continues: ‘The which beyng certefyed to the King, and he beyng greatly offended therewith, caused his proclamation to be made that whosoever would bryng him quicke or dead, the king would geve him a great summe of money, as by the recordes in the Exchequer is to be seene: But of this promise, no man enjoyed any benefite. For the sayd Robert Hood, beyng afterwardes troubled with sicknesse, came to a certein Nonry in Yorkshire called Bircklies, where desirying to be let blood, he was betrayed and bled to deth. After whose death the Prioresse of the same place caused him to be buried by the high way side, where he had used to rob and spoyle those that passed that way. And upon his grave the sayde Prioresse did lay a very fayre stone, wherin the names of Robert Hood, William of Goldesborough and others were graven. And the cause why she buryed him there was for that the common passengers and travailers knowyng and seeyng him there buryed, might more safely and without feare take their jorneys that way, which they durst not do in the life of the sayd outlawes. And at eyther end of the sayde Tombe was erected a crosse of stone, which is to be seene there at this present.’
Firstly, Grafton is suggesting that the ‘King’ had offered a reward for Robin’s capture or death (in the closing verses of the Gest, Robin does not return to the king as promised), and a record of this is to be found in the ‘Exchequer’, the government department responsible for receiving and dispersing the public revenue. This would mean that Grafton knew of an official record of Robin Hood, but no such record has ever been found. Interestingly, Robert Hood fugitive was recorded in the Exchequer.
Secondly, Grafton refers to a sick Robin going to ‘Bircklies’ to be let of blood, where he is betrayed and bled to death, and the ‘Prioresse’ has him buried by the ‘high way side’. There are clear similarities to Grafton’s comments in the closing verses of the Gest: Robin goes to ‘Kyrkesly’ to be let of blood, where he is murdered by his relative the Prioress and her lover ‘Syr Roger of Donkestere’. There are further references to this in the ballad Robin Hood his death, and the later Robin Hoods death and burial. In Anthony Munday’s other play, Robin asks to be buried at Wakefield ‘underneath the abbey wall’ (see The Death of Robert, Earl of Huntington, Act 1).
Thirdly, Grafton refers to the ‘Prioresse’ laying a gravestone for ‘Robert Hood, William of Goldesborough and others’. This fits with the gravestone drawn by Dr. Nathaniel Johnston at Kirklees in 1665 (see Robin Hood’s Grave 7). Stephen Knight and Thomas H. Ohlgren (Robin Hood and Other Outlaw Tales, 1997) have suggested that Johnston’s drawing ‘looks suspiciously like an artist’s impression of Grafton’s remarks’ but this is unlikely – Johnston was physician to the wife of Sir John Armitage IV of Kirklees, and in addition to Robin Hood’s grave, he is credited with drawing ‘The Prospect of Kirklees Abbey’ (see Robin Hood’s Grave 10). Johnston drew what he saw, and his gravestone drawing must be what Grafton described.
Fourthly, Grafton tells us that ‘at eyther end of the sayde Tombe was erected a crosse of stone, which is to be seene there at this present.’ There are no such crosses in Johnston’s drawing, but it would appear that in Grafton’s day the gravesite contained two memorial crosses in addition to the gravestone. Also, Grafton does not mention an epitaph, but it does seem to be there next to the gravestone in Johnston’s drawing (see Robin Hood’s Grave 7).
Grafton turns to Little John: ‘Gerardus Marcator in his Cosmographie and discription of England, sayth that in a towne or village called little Morauie in Scotland, there are kept the bones of a great and mightie man, which was called little Iohn, among the which bones, the huckle bone or hip bone was of such largenesse, as witnesseth Boethus, that he thrust his arme through the whole thereof, and the same bone being conferred to the other partes of his body, did declare the man to be. xiiij. foote long’.
Grafton had obviously undertaken a fair amount of research, which includes his reference to Little John recorded in the ‘Cosmographie’ by the great cartographer, geographer and cosmographer Gerardus Mercator (1512-1594), and the description of Little John’s bones by the Scottish historian and humanist Hector Boethus, Boece or Boethius (c. 1465- c. 1536), which appears in his important Latin history, the Scotorum historiae a prima gentis origine of 1527 (see no. 138 above). This was translated from Latin into Scots by the Scottish writer John Bellenden or Ballentyne (fl. 1533–87), at the request of James V, and published as The History and Chronicles of Scotland in c. 1537 (see no. 170 above). There is a similar but expanded mention of Little John by Richard Stanihurst in the Chronicles of Raphael Holinshed (see no. 308 below).
276. 1568-69 Yeovil, Somerset: 2d. paid for a ribbon lace for Little John’s horn [REED: Somerset, 409].
277. 1569 Three mentions of Robin Hood by the Dutch writer and statesman Philip of Marnix, Lord of St. Aldegonde (1538-1598), commonly called ‘Marnix’ or ‘St. Aldegonde,’ or Marnix of St. Aldegonde. These appears in his ‘De Byencorf der H. Romische Kercke’ (The Beehive of the H. Roman Catholic Church). Three editions appeared in Dutch in 1569, 1572 and 1674 followed by a German translation in 1576, and an English version in 1578. At least three more English editions followed in 1580, 1623 and 1636, and several more in Dutch and German.
Born at Brussels, Marnix studied at the University of Louvain, and at Geneva under John Calvin and Theodore Beza. Returning to the Netherlands in 1560, he became devoted to the cause of the Reformation, and one of the leaders in the revolt against Spain. He defended the image-breaking of 1566 in Flanders by issuing a pamphlet, but had to flee the country in 1567 when the duke of Alva came to the Netherlands. He was in exile (1567–72), but was in the service of William, prince of Orange in 1570. In 1572 Marnix was his representative to the first meeting of the States-general assembled at Dordrecht. It was during his time in exile that he wrote ‘Wilhelmus van Nassauwe,’ the Dutch national anthem, and his famous satire against the Roman Catholic Church, ‘The Beehive’. Marnix was taken prisoner by the Spaniards at Maaslandsluys in the Netherlands in 1573, but was exchanged in the following year. He was sent to Paris and London as the representative of the insurgent provinces, and he attempted to gain the assistance of Elizabeth I of England without success. In 1578 he was at the diet of Worms, and in the same year tried to persuade the magistrates of Ghent to stop persecuting the Catholics in the city. He took part in arranging the Union of Utrecht, and in 1583 the Prince of Orange made him first burgomaster or governor of Antwerp. In 1585 after a 13 months siege, Marnix surrendered the city to the Spaniards. He retired to his estate at Sauburg in Zealand, and during the last years of his life, he moved to Leyden. He was appointed to prepare a new translation of the Bible by the States General, however this work remained largely unfinished at his death in Leyden in 1598.
A poet, diplomat, orator, soldier and theologian, Marnix also translated the Psalms of David into vernacular verse, first published in 1580. He is remembered for his part in the development of Dutch literature, and his ‘Beehive’ undoubtedly advanced the cause of Protestantism, not only on the Continent, but in Britain as well. His complete works were edited by Paul Lacroix and Edgar Quinet, and published at Brussels in 7 vols. (1855-1859), and his religious and theological writings, edited by Van Turenenbergen, at Paris, in 3 vols. (1871-1891). A modern edition of ‘The Beehive’ with revised text and notes by Martin B. Pigott III, was published by Lulu.com in 2008. See also, Holland’s Influence on English Language and Literature, Tiemen De Vries, published by C. Grentzebach, 1916, pp. 249-52; Encyclopædia Britannica, 1911, Volume 23, p. 1013; The Rise of the Dutch Republic, John Lothrop Motley, New York and London, 1898.
278. 1569-70 Yeovil, Somerset: £10 21¼d. received of John Tucker as Robin Hood [REED: Somerset, 409].
279. 1570 Arbuthnot, North Sea Coast: Seventeen men are accused of choosing a ‘Robert Hude and Abbot of Unreasoune’ [Robert Pitcairn, Ancient Criminal Trials in Scotland from A. D. MCCCCLXXXVIII to A. D. MDCXXIV (Edinburgh: Maitland Club, 1833), l. 15-16; Mill, Medieval Plays, 24].
280. 1570 Dumfries, Southern Lowlands: The town authorities authorize payment to Herbert Raning for taffetas received from him for the use of Robin Hood [Mill, Medieval Plays, 171].
281. 1570 Dumfries, Southern Lowlands: The town authorities levy a fine on Tom Trustre for his refusal at Easter to take on the office of Robin Hood and Little John [Mill, Medieval Plays, 172]. ? Dumbarton, Southern Lowlands: Robin Hood games in Dumbarton are mentioned by Mill [Medieval Plays, 24], but no details are given.
282. 1570 ‘your tales of little John: Your pagents playd of Robin Hood, are knowne to every one’ in An answer at large by Thomas Knell the younger. Its full title is: ‘An answer at large, to a most hereticall, trayterous, and Papisticall Byll, in English verse, which was cast abrode in the streetes of Northamton, and brought before the Judges at the last Assizes there.’ A copy of this work is in the library of St. John’s College, Cambridge, and it has been reprinted in the ‘Collection of Northamptonshire Reprints.’ Another edition, also issued in 1570, was in the Heber Library, which came into the possession of Mr. S. Christie Miller. The work is an answer to a Romish ballad ridiculing the marriage of the English clergy.
Thomas Knell the younger (1543/4-c. 1592) a clergyman and pamphleteer, was presumably the son of Thomas Knell the elder (d. 1576/7). Knell, junior, has been erroneously identified by John Payne Collier with the Knell (fl. 1586) mentioned (without a christian name) by Nashe in ‘Pierce Penilesse’ and by Heywood in his ‘Apology for Actors’ as a notable actor. Knell junior also wrote: 1. ‘An A B C to the Christian Congregation,’ 1560 (?), a broadside. 2. ‘An Epitaph, or rather a short Discourse made upon the Life and Death of Dr. Boner,’ London, 1569, 12mo, reprinted in vol. i. of the ‘Harleian Miscellany.’ 3. ‘A pithy Note to Papists all and some that joy in Felton’s Martyrdome,’ London, 1570, 12mo. A copy of this rare work is in the Lambeth Library. It has been reprinted by Collier in vol. i. of ‘Illustrations of Early English Popular Literature.’ 4. ‘An Historical Discourse of the Life and Death of Dr. Story,’ 1571, 12mo, in English verse. This has been attributed to the elder Knell. 5. ‘A Treatise of the Use and Abuse of Prayer,’ London, 1581 (Tanner), probably by the elder Knell as well. The younger Knell was also author of the ‘Epistle to the Christian Reader’ prefixed to Northbrook’s ‘Poore Man’s Garden,’ 1573. All the verses by Knell junior are characterised by a strong bias against the Roman catholics.
Knell the younger was ordained deacon on 24 June 1567 by Edmund Grindal, bishop of London, when he was living at Great Stambridge, Essex, stated that he had been born in Canterbury, and gave his age as twenty-three. Grindal ordained him priest on 17th April 1568, merely as ‘of London’. Therefore he was probably the ‘Mr’ Thomas Knell who was paid £4 per quarter for serving (presumably as curate) in the London parish of St. James Garlickhithe between Easter and Christmas 1568, and again for the quarter ending at Lady day 1570. Meanwhile he appears to have served as curate in St. Giles Cripplegate during 1569. In the will of an obscure London curate, Henry Holtbie, proved on 4 August 1568, he was bequeathed a copy of The palace of pleasure on condition that he restore to Holtbie’s wife all the other books that he had borrowed. After Knell’s ‘Epitaph, or rather a short Discourse made upon the Life and Death of Dr. Boner,’ (1569) there followed a flurry of anti-Catholic verse tracts. It is not known whether it was he or Thomas Knell the elder, who in March 1570 received letters patent for the vicarage of Dartford, Kent, from the lord keeper, Sir Nicholas Bacon. Knell the younger was present of 8 August 1570 at the execution of John Felton, condemned for setting up in the churchyard of St. Paul’s Cathedral Pius V’s bull excommunicating Elizabeth, and accordingly published ‘A pithy Note to Papists all and some that joy in Felton’s Martyrdome’.
Nothing more of any certainty is known of the younger Knell until the later months of 1573 when, in the wake of the Admonition to the parliament (1572) many Londoners suspected of nonconformity, both men and women, were required to sign a form of subscription to the English prayer book – Knell was one of them, and his signature is preserved among the Petyt MSS as ‘Thomas Knell Jnr’ – his nonconformity may have prompted him to retire from the capitol. The younger Thomas Knell may have been the ‘Mr Knell clerke’ who, along with his wife, was presented during Archbishop Parker’s episcopal visitation of 1573 for not receiving communion in the parish of St. Alphege, Canterbury, at Easter or since. It seems likely that the younger Knell died about 1592, since a probate record exists for one Thomas Knell, clerk, of the parish of Kenardington, Kent. See, Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Vol. 31, Knell, Thomas by William Arthur Jobson Archbold, pp. 239-40; Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, in Association with The British Academy, From the earliest times to the year 2000, H. C. G. Matthew and Brian Harrison, Oxford University Press, 2004, Knell, Thomas, the younger (1543/4-c. 1592).
283. 1570 ‘Then Robin hood was called for, and malkin ere they went’ in The pityfull histori[e] of two louing Italians, Gaulfrido and Barnardo le vayne, by John Drout (fl. 1570). The information concerning him is found in his only known work, a black-letter tract of thirty leaves, however he may have been the John Drowte recorded as having matriculated at Cambridge in 1567 as a sizar from Trinity College. The title-page tells us that he was an attorney of Thavies Inn. The dedication is to Sir Francis Jobson, knight, lieutenant of the Tower (d. 1573) who was apparently of Yorkshire descent. ‘I haue translated out of Italian into English verse’ says Drout, who mentions his parents as still living, and he expresses his own and their obligations to Jobson. Twenty-five copies were reprinted by John Payne Collier, and published by F. Shoberl, junior, printer, London, 1844; in the University of Michigan Library Repository.
Drout’s work was forgotten until the late eighteenth century when Edmond Malone in his preliminary remarks on Romeo and Juliet, incorrectly thought that Gaulfrido and Barnardo was a prose narrative of the story from which Shakespeare’s play was constructed (Malone, Shakespeare, ed. Boswell, vi. 4). Malone’s sole knowledge of Drout’s work was derived from its entry in the ‘Stationers’ Registers.’ It was not until 1844 when John Payne Collier reprinted twenty-five copies of the text (thought to be unique) lent to him by Charles Wycliffe Goodwin, fellow of St. Catharine’s, Cambridge, that it became apparent that the text was in verse – in the ordinary fourteen-syllable metre of the time, divided into lines of eight and of six syllables. Furthermore, the history of Romeo and Juliet comprises only a small part of it (Lowndes, 2.869; appendix, 250). Collier, in his 1844 edition, expresses doubt as to whether Drout really translated the story from Italian, and suggested that he describes it as a translation so that he might take advantage of the popularity of Italian novels (Drout, ii). Because Collier had earlier forged an entry in Henslowe’s diary about a non-existing play called ‘Galfrido and Bernardo’, and was then the first of discuss Drout’s work, the latter was long suspected of being a fake also. See, Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Vol. 16, Drout, John, by Gordon Goodwin, p. 21; Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Vol. 29, Jobson, Francis by Robert Dunlop, p. 395-6; Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, in Association with The British Academy, From the earliest times to the year 2000, H. C. G. Matthew and Brian Harrison, Oxford University Press, 2004, Drout, John (fl. 1570).
284. 1570 ‘A tale of Robin hood’ mentioned in A frendly larum, or faythfull warnynge to the true harted subiectes of England by John Phillips (fl. 1570–1591). Dedicated to Katherine Bertie, duchess of Suffolk, there is a copy in the Huntington Library and the Lambeth Palace Library. Author and the son of Robart Phillip, a clothworker and member of the London livery company, he was educated at Queens College, Cambridge (J. Phillips, Commemoration of the Right Noble and Vertuous ladye, Margrit Duglasis, title-page), but did not take a degree. He was a student of the classics, but in one place he describes himself as ‘student in divinitie’ and in another as ‘preacher of the Word of God.’
Phillip’s career as writer of prose and verse began in the mid-1560’s, and he evidently enjoyed the patronage of Lord Lumley, to whom he presented two works in manuscript (‘Christian and comfortable counsails’ and ‘A closet of counsell’). He also seems to have written on commission for various publishers in the capital. His oeuvre, which includes ballads, broadside epitaphs, religious admonitions, miniature books of prayers, and short patriotic and moralistic tracts, as well as a metrical romance and a play, is typical of the output of an emerging class of semi-professional pamphleteers, dramatists, and rhymesters. His first published work appears to have been The Commodye of Pacient and Meeke Grissill, a dramatization of the last novel of Boccaccio’s Decameron, entered in the Stationers register in 1565-6. The same year he also contributed verses to a series of reports about the trial of several witches at the Chelmsford assizes.
His other publications include: 1. ‘A Balad intituled “A cold Pye for the Papistes.” … Finis. Iohn Phillip,’ London (by William How for Richard Johnes), broadside; the only copy known was at the Britwell Library. 2. ‘A Fruitfull Exhortation given to all Godly and Faithfull Christians,’ London (by Thomas Dawson), n.d.; dedicated to Lettice, countess of Leicester. 3. ‘The Wonderfull Worke of God shewed upon a Chylde, whose Name is William Withers, being in the Towne of Walsam … Suffolk, who, being Eleuen Yeeres of Age, laye in a Traunce the Space of Tenne Days … and hath continued the Space of Three Weeks,’ London (by Robert Waldegrave), 1581, 8vo, with a long prayer appended; dedicated to Edward Denny (formerly Brit. Mus.). 4. ‘The Perfect Path to Paradice, containing divers most ghostly Prayers and Meditations for the Comfort of Afflicted Consciences … also a Summons to Repentance,’ London, 1590, 12mo; dedicated to the Earl of Essex; an edition, dated 1626, 12mo, was at the British Museum.
To ‘A Sermon of Calvin … upon Heb. xiii. 13’ (London, 1581), Phillips appended ‘An Answere to the Slanders of the Papistes against Christe’s Syllie Flock … quod J. P.,’ and to George Gascoigne’s ‘Dromme of Doomes Daye,’ he added ‘A Private Letter the which doth teach Remedies against the bitternesse of Death, by I. P. to his familiar Friend, G. P.’
On the ‘Stationers’ Registers’ appear entries of two books by Phillips, not otherwise known: ‘Precious Pearles of perfecte Godlines to be used of every faythfull Xpian, begonne by the Lady Fraunces Aburgavenny, and finished by John Phillip’ (7 Dec. 1577) (Lady Abergavenny was first wife of Henry Neville, lord of Abergavenny, and daughter of Thomas Manners, first earl of Rutland); and ‘The Rudimentes of Reason gathered out of the Preceptes of the worthie and learned Philosopher Periander, by John Philips, Student in Divinitie’ (26 April 1578). Abraham Fleming, in his ‘Bright Burning Beacon’ (1580), mentions ‘John Philippes’ among those who wrote on the earthquake of 6 April 1580, but no book by Phillips on this topic is accessible.
Phillips was equally energetic as a writer of elegiac verse, and he is responsible for the four epitaphs, published in single folio sheets, all extant in unique exemplars, which respectively celebrated the wife (d. 7 July 1570) of Alexander Avenon, lord mayor of London (London, by Richard Johnes), formerly in the Huth Library; Alderman Sir William Garrat (d. 27 Sept. 1571), London (by Richard Johnes), formerly at Britwell; Margaret Douglas, countess of Lennox (d. 9 March 1577–8), London (for Edward White), formerly at Britwell; Henry Wriothesley, earl of Southampton (d. 30 Nov. 1581), formerly in the Huth Library.
More ambitious memorials of the dead were modelled by Phillips on the poems in the ‘Mirrour for Magistrates;’ in each the ghost of the person commemorated is made to relate his or her own achievements. The title of the earliest is ‘A Commemoration of Margaret Douglas, Countess of Lennox,’ London (by John Charlewood), 1578, in seven-line stanzas; copies were in the British Museum and Britwell. The countess’s ghost introduces into her biography an elaborate panegyric on Queen Elizabeth. ‘The Life and Death of Sir Phillip Sidney, late Lord Gouernour of Flushing. His Funerals solemnized in Paules Churche, where he lyeth interred; with the whole Order of the Mournfull Shewe as they marched throwe the Citie of London on Thursday, the 16 of February 1587,’ London (by Robert Waldegrave), was dedicated to the Earl of Essex. The poem, in seven-line stanzas, is somewhat uncouth. It opens with the line (Sidney’s ghost is speaking)
You noble brutes, bedeckt with rich renown
(brutes = Britons). A unique copy was in the British Museum. It is reprinted in Butler’s ‘Sidneiana.’ A like ‘Commemoration of Sir Christopher Hatton,’ in six-line stanzas, appeared in 1591, London (by Edward White), and was dedicated to Sir William Hatton. The only copy known, formerly at Lamport, in the possession of Sir Charles Isham, was at Britwell. It was reprinted in ‘A Lamport Garland,’ edited for the Roxburghe Club by Charles Edmonds, 1881. A slightly less lugubrious romance in fourteen-syllable ballad metre by Phillips is ‘A rare and strange Historicall Nouell of Cleomenes and Sophonisba surnamed Juliet. Very pleasant to reade,’ London (by Hugh Jackson), 1577, 8vo; dedicated to George Fiennes, lord Dacre. Arthur Broke had published in 1562 his ‘Historie of Romeus and Juliet,’ in which the name Juliet is first introduced into English literature. There was another John Philip (fl. 1566), and also another John Phillips (d. 1640), who was a graduate of Cambridge (M.A. and B.D.), and vicar of Faversham, Kent, from 1606 till his death in 1640. See, Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Vol. 45, Phillips, John (fl.1570-1591), by Sidney Lee, pp. 202-203; Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, in Association with The British Academy, From the earliest times to the year 2000, H. C. G. Matthew and Brian Harrison, Oxford University Press, 2004, Phillips [Phillip], John (d. 1594×1617).
285. 1570 ‘Robin Hood, Gie of Warwike, Beuis of Hampton, and the Knightes of the round table’ mentioned in A very Comfortable, and necessary Sermon in these our dayes, made by the right reuerend father, and faithful seruaunt of Iesus Christ Martin Luther (translated out of Latin into English by Thomas Becon). This copy from the British Library has John Payne Collier’s signature at the top of the title page. There is another copy in the University of Illinois.
Thomas Becon (1511-12–1567), English cleric and Protestant reformer was born in Norfolk, as he expressly states in the general preface to the folio (1564) of his works. There is no record of his birth, however from the age inscribed upon his successive portraits which accompanied his ‘Governance of Virtue,’ 1566, ‘Ætatis suæ 41, anno Domini 1553,’ and in the folio and collected edition of his works, ‘Anno ætatis suæ 49, 1560,’ he must have been born in 1511-12. He seems to have graduated B.A. in 1530-31 at St. John’s College, Cambridge. During his residence at the university he was a ‘diligent hearer’ of Hugh Latimer, with whom he communicated with over the years; and he also names gratefully George Stafford, ‘reader of divinity.’ In 1532 he was ordained as exorcist and acolyte in the Norwich diocese. Thereupon he joined the College of St. John the Evangelist at Rushworth—now Rushford—near Thetford. For some years he was probably engaged as a tutor in the family of one or other of the gentry of East Anglia, among whom he doubtless became known as an advocate of reform and a supporter of King Henry’s rejection of the Papal Supremacy. One account after another of Becon’s life repeats the claim that he was ordained in 1538 and preferred to the living of Brenzett, Kent. The evidence for this statement, almost certainly incorrect, cannot be traced. The succession of vicars of Brenzett is on record and leaves no place for him. He held no parish living in Kent until the days of Queen Elizabeth.
To divert attention, Becon adopted the pseudonym of Theodore Basille, and under this name began to pour out material for the press. Not less than eight works were published during the years 1541 to 1543 and Theodore Basille became markedly popular as a writer. Becon was ‘presented’ in London in 1540-41, along with Robert Wisdom, and made at ‘Paul’s cross to recant and to revoke’ his doctrine, and ‘to burn his books’ (Foxe, Acts and Mon. 1684, ii. 450; and Strype’s Eccles. Mem. 1721, i. 367). He retired, before June, 1541, to seclusion in Kent. He was again compelled to renounce his opinions at St. Paul’s Cross in 1543. Once more he sought safety in the provinces. After visiting his family in Norfolk, he moved on to Derbyshire and passed the rest of Henry’s reign among friends in the Midlands. He was poor, and supported himself by teaching, while continuing to write voluminously. Meanwhile the authorities had not forgotten him. In the proclamation against books of July 8th, 1546, thirteen named publications of Theodore Basille alias Thomas Becon were ordered to be burnt. The death of Henry VIII in January, 1547, completely changed Becon’s prospects. He was appointed to a chaplaincy in Protector Somerset’s household; and Archbishop Cranmer made him a Six Preacher at Canterbury and one of his Chaplains. On March 24th, 1547/8, he was presented by the Grocers’ Company to the living of St. Stephen Walbrook. He doubtless entered into the controversies which were agitating ecclesiastical circles in England at this time—on such matters as clerical marriage, sitting or kneeling at Holy Communion; and he continued to write with enthusiasm upon the achievements of the Reformation.
On July 6th, 1553, Edward VI died, and another sudden change befell. Within a few weeks Becon was committed to the Tower of London. At Canterbury he was declared contumacious and deprived of his preachership, and as a married priest he was in due course ejected from his London living. In March, 1553/4, in circumstances which are obscure, he escaped from confinement, and, making his way to the Continent, reached Strasbourg; and here and at Frankfurt and Marburg he spent the years of Queen Mary’s reign. Groups of exiles gathered together. Among them was fierce doctrinal contention. Episcopacy or Calvinism were debated; Becon seems to have been a supporter of the middle-of-the-way party with some leanings to puritanism. He was still active with his pen, comforting the victims of Marian persecution and attacking their persecutors. In his absence, by the proclamation of June 13th, 1555, his works were again proscribed.
The accession of Elizabeth in November, 1558, led to yet another reversal of his circumstances. He was soon back in England, and in 1559 was appointed a canon of Canterbury, where he followed the ardent Marian, Nicholas Harpsfield, in the Fourth Prebend. For a short time in 1560 he held the Rectory of Buckland, Herts. In March, 1560/1, he became Vicar of Christ Church, Newgate. For a few months in 1563 he reoccupied St. Stephen Walbrook, until in August, 1563, he was instituted as Rector of St. Dionis Backchurch, which living together with that of Christ Church, Newgate, he held until his death. He continued to write and was particularly engaged on the revision and republication of his collected works; and he was an acceptable popular preacher. His latter years were spent at his prebendal house at Canterbury, and here he died on June 30th, 1567. Woodcuts of Becon are prefixed to his ‘Reliques of Rome’ and to his own collected edition of his works.
Becon’s literary output was remarkable. He is credited with over sixty works some no longer extant, or known only by single copies. His collected works in three volumes, prepared under his own supervision, were issued in 1560-64 by the well-known printer, John Day. The Parker Society printed most of Becon’s works in three volumes (1843-44). These are admirably edited by the Rev. John Ayre, whose biographical notice of Becon is the foundation of the Dictionary of National Biography account. Both these are now superseded by Dr. Bailey’s study.
Becon is thought to have married shortly after the legalization of clerical marriage in 1549. Of his wife, who survived him, nothing has come to light, not even her name. Five children, two of whom had died, are known to have been born before 1560; and since Becon was in exile from 1553 to the end of 1558 it may be assumed that his wife accompanied him and that some of his children were born on the Continent. His nuncupative will, dated June 29th, 1567 (Cant. Consist. 30/495) made when he was ‘sicke of body’ (he died the next day) leaves all his property to his wife subject to earlier reservations to his surviving children who were a daughter Rachel and sons Theodore and Basil. See, Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Vol. 04, Becon, Thomas by Alexander Balloch Grosart, pp. 92-94; Archaeologia Cantiana, Vol. 69, 1955, Thomas Becon, Canon of Canterbury, H. B. Thomas, pp. 159-166.
286. 1571 Saint Edmund Campion (1540-1581), English Jesuit and martyr, mentions another variant of the well-known proverb (see no. 193 above) in his Historie of Ireland. Campion was born in London to a Catholic family, and his father was a bookseller. He was first sent to a London grammar school, then afterwards attended Christ’s Hospital School. On 3rd of August 1553 he was chosen to make a welcome speech when Queen Mary visited the city. He went to Oxford and became fellow of St John’s College in 1557, and in 1564 on the occasion of his degree, he took the Oath of Supremacy, recognising Queen Elizabeth as head of the Church of England. Campion had become a well known orator and Latin scholar, and in 1566 he welcomed Elizabeth to Oxford university. The queen expressed her admiration of Campion’s speech and directed Robert Dudley, now Earl of Leicester and Chancellor of the University, to patronize the young scholar. Campion acknowledged Dudley’s kindness in his dedication of his Historie of Ireland to the earl in 1571.
Religious problems began, although holding Catholic doctrines, Campion took deacon’s orders in the English Church at the persuasion of Edward Cheyney, bishop of Gloucester, but he was less than certain in his new faith. Rumors of his opinions began to spread, and he found himself no longer in favour. Giving up the office of proctor, Campion left Oxford in 1569 and went to Ireland. He lodged with James Stanihurst, the Recorder of Dublin and Speaker of the local House of Commons, who was also the father of his ex-pupil Richard Stanihurst (see no. 308 below) at Oxford. Campion had a friend in Sir Henry Sidney, Lord Deputy of Ireland, but because of his support for the Papacy, he went into hiding for some three months in the home of Sir Christopher Barnewall, where he produced a Historie of Ireland in manuscript in 1569[?], which he revised in an initial version of 1571. Before he left Ireland, Campion gave a copy to Richard Stanihurst. Campion’s work was first published in Raphael Holinshed’s Chronicles in 1577 (see no. 308 below). Other publications of Campions ‘Historie’ include: Two Bokes of the Histories of Ireland (1571); The first and second volumes of chronicles … now newlie augmented and continued … 1586, by John Hooker, alias Vowell Gent. and others, 3 vols. [at the expenses of John Harrington] [2nd edn.] (London 1587/88) Marsh’s Library, STC 13569]; Ancient Irish Histories, Sir James Ware, 1633; Scholars Facsimiles & Reprints, New York, 1940; Lightning Source Incorporated, 2009; Forgotten Books, 2018.
Campion left Ireland in 1571 and escaped to Douai, now in northern France, where he entered the English College founded by William Allen, another Oxford religious refugee. After obtaining his degree in divinity, Campion was ordained sub-deacon. He later walked as a pilgrim to Rome, becoming a Jesuit in 1573. He spent some years at Brünn, Vienna and Prague, and was ordained a priest in 1578. He returned to London in 1580 as part of a Jesuit mission, crossing the Channel disguised as a jewel merchant. Campion led a hunted life, preaching and ministering to Catholics in Berkshire, Oxfordshire, Northamptonshire, and Lancashire. At this time also he wrote his Decem Rationes (‘Ten Reasons’) against the Anglican Church, four hundred copies of which found their way to the benches of St Mary’s, Oxford, in 1581. This caused a sensation and the search for Campion was stepped up. He was arrested by a spy while at Lyford in Berkshire and was taken to the Tower of London. He spent more than four months imprisoned there, during which time he was offered freedom should he renounce his faith and, when he refused, was tortured on the rack. He was tried in court and found guilty of treason. As punishment for his crime, Campion, together with two other priests, was hanged, drawn and quartered before a crowd on 1st of December 1581. He was beatified in 1886 and canonised as one of the Forty Martyrs of England and Wales in 1970. See, Edmund Campion: A Biography, Richard Simpson, London and Edinburgh: Williams and Norgate, 1867; Blessed Edmund Campion, Louise Imogen Guiney, New York, Cincinnati, Chicago: Benziger Brothers, 1908; Encyclopædia Britannica, 1911, Volume 5, pp. 136-37; Mere Irish and Fior-Ghael, Joseph Th. Leerssen (Amsterdam and Philadelphia: John Benjamins, 1986); Edmund Campion: A ScholarlyLife, Gerard Kilroy, Ashgate Publishing Ltd, 2015.
287. 1571-72 Honiton, Devon: St. Michaels churchwardens accounts include money paid for a pound of gunpowder ‘when Robarte hode of collyton came in’ [REED: Devon, 207].
288. 1572 Edinburgh, Lothian: ‘Thair wes in this foirsaid moneth greit penuritie and scant of vivaris within the burgh of Edinburgh, sua that all wes at ane exceiding darth. Nochttheles the remaneris thairin abaid patientlie, and wer of good comfort, and vsit all plesouris quhilkis wer wont to be vsit in the said month of Maij in ald tymes, viz. Robin Hude and Litill Johne.’ [A Diurnal of Remarkable Occurrents that have Passed within the Country of Scotland since the Death of King James the Fourth till the Year MDLXXV, ed. Thomas Thomson. Bannatyne Club 43 (Edinburgh: Bannatyne Club, 1833), 263].
289. 1572-73 Yeovil, Somerset: £13 8s. 2½d. received of William Beck as Robin Hood [REED: Somerset, 409]. Also 10s. 5d. paid for 12½ yards of Normandy canvas delivered to Robin Hood to make two tablecloths; 4d. paid for a green silk ribbon for the Sheriff; 8d. paid to Robin Hood for drink for the bellringers on Ascension Day; and 4d. paid for feathering Robin Hood’s arrows [REED: Somerset, 409-10].
290. An. 1573 ‘a tale of Robin hood’ referred to in THE WHOLE workes of W. Tyndall, Iohn Frith, and Doct. Barnes. Another mention of Robin Hood by William Tyndale (see no. 141 above) in this work, with contributions by Robert Barnes (1495-1540), John Frith (1503-1533), and John Foxe (1516-1587). The editor’s preface is signed ‘Iohn Foxe’ – with the life of each author extracted from Foxe’s ‘Book of martyrs’ (see no. 197 above). The colophon is dated 1572; the date is changed to 1573 in MS. Identified as STC 24436+ on UMI microfilm reel 340. There is a copy in the Huntington Library.
291. 1573 Robin Hood, little Iohn, Frier Lucke, and mayde Marian mentioned in The Supremacie of Christian Princes, ouer all persons throughout their dominions, by John Bridges (1535/6-1618). There is a copy in the British Library.
Bishop of Oxford and controversialist, Bridges is said to have been born in London, but there is some suggestion he came from Devon. He matriculated pensioner of Peterhouse, Cambridge, in 1554, migrating in 1556 to Pembroke Hall as fellow. In 1557 he graduated BA, then spent some years in Italy translating in about 1558, three of Machiavelli’s discourses into English, which were not published. He proceeded MA at Cambridge in 1560 and on 24 November was ordained deacon by Bishop Richard Cox in Ely Cathedral. In 1562 he received a benefice at Herne in Kent, resigning by 5 september 1590. From 1565 to 1610 he was prebendary of Winchester. He preached a sermon at Paul’s Cross in 1571, which was printed, and published in 1572, a translation from the Latin of Rudolph Walther’s 175 ‘Homilies on the Acts of the Apostles.’ In the following year he replied to two catholic treatises—Thomas Stapleton’s ‘Counterblast’ and Nicholas Sanders’s ‘Visible Monarchie of the Romaine Church’ in ‘The Supremacie of Christian Princes ouer all persons throughout their dominions.’ Bridges was elected dean of Salisbury in 1578. In 1581 Bishop Aylmer directed him, with other divines, to reply to Edmund Campion’s ‘Ten Reasons’ in favour of the church of Rome. In 1582 he was a member of a commission appointed to hold a conference with some papist dialecticians.
But his most important contribution to polemical literature was ‘A Defence of the Government established in the Church of Englande for Ecclesiasticall Matters’ (London, by John Winder, 1587). It is a quarto of 1412 pages, directed against Calvinism. It undertakes especially to answer two books—Thomas Cartwright’s ‘Discourse of Ecclesiastical Government,’ or a ‘briefe and plaine declaration,’ 1574 (a translation from the Latin of Walter Travers), and Theodore Beza’s ‘Judgment,’ which had been published in an English translation in c. 1580. Bridges’s ponderous volume was immediately answered in the three tracts, ‘A Defence of the Godlie Ministers against the Slaunders of D. B.,’ 1587; ‘A Defence of the Ecclesiastical Discipline ordayned of God. … Against a Replie of Maister Bridges,’ 1588; ‘A Dialogue, wherein is … laide open the Tyrannicall Dealing of L. Bishopps … (according to D. B., his “Judgement”),’ 1588 (?). The chief interest attaching to Bridges’s book lies in the fact that it was the immediate cause of the great Martin Mar-Prelate controversy (see nos. 344 and 345 below). About a year after the publication of Bridges’s ‘Defence’ there was issued the earliest of the Mar-Prelate tracts, with the title of ‘Oh read ouer D. John Bridges, for it is a worthy worke,’ an introductory epistle to a promised ‘Epitome of the fyrste Booke of that right worshipfull volume, written against the Puritanes in the defence of the noble cleargie by as worshipful a prieste, Iohn Bridges, presbyter, an elder, Doctor of Diuillitie, and Deane of Sarum.’ Scathing criticisms are here made on Bridges’s literary incapacity: ‘A man might almost run himselfe out of breath before he could come to a full point in many places in your booke.’ The satirists state doubtfully that he was the author of ‘Gammer Gurton’s Needle,’ usually attributed to Bishop Still (formally Brit. Mus. MS. Addit. 24487, if. 33-7), and add that he had published ‘a sheet in rime of all the names attributed to the Lorde in the Bible.’ In February 1588-9 the promised epitome of Bridges’s first book duly appeared, as the second Martin Mar-Prelate tract. Four bishops who were specially attacked here replied in an ‘Admonition,’ drawn up by Thomas Cooper, bishop of Winchester; but Bridges does not seem to have been connected with the later development of the controversy.
Bridges took part in the Hampton Court conference of 1603, and on 12 Feb. 1604 was consecrated bishop of Oxford at Lambeth by Archbishop Whitgift. He attended the king on his visit to Oxford in 1605, when he was created M. A., and took part in the funeral of Henry, prince of Wales, in 1612. Bridges died at the bishop’s residence in 1618. Unlike his predecessors in the see of Oxford, he lived in his diocese—at March Baldon (Marshalll, Diocese of Oxford, p. 121). His last published work was ‘Sacrosanctum Novum Testamentum … in hexametros versus … translatum,’ 1604. See, Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Vol. 06, Bridges, John (d.1618), by Sidney Lee, pp. 320-21; Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, in Association with The British Academy, From the earliest times to the year 2000, H. C. G. Matthew and Brian Harrison, Oxford University Press, 2004, Bridges, John (1535/6-1618).
292. 1573-74 St. Breock, Cornwall: Parish receives income from Robin Hood and his company [Reference courtesy of Evelyn Newlyn and Sally L. Joyce].
293. 1573-74 Woodbury, Devon: Parish accounts record that ‘Willyam Downham beynge Robyn Hoode and Water Holwill lytle Iohn made an ale and gatheringe and brought yn redie monye, xl s’ [REED: Devon, 285].
294. 1573-74 Yeovil, Somerset:£16 2s. 5½d. received from James Everdon as Robin Hood [REED: Somerset, 410].
295. 1574 ? Penshurst, Kent: Payments for Robert Sidney (aged 11) and his sisters include 3s. given to those that played Robin Hood [Historical Manuscripts Commission, Report on the Manuscripts of Lord De L’Isle and Dudley Preserved at Penshurst Palace, ed. C. L. Kingsford (London: HMSO, 1925), l.268].
296. 1574-75 Woodbury, Devon: Parish accounts record 20s. 10d. paid for 35 yards of canvas, and 16d. paid to Andrew Pierce ‘for maken of Roberte Hoodes Howse’ [REED: Devon, 285].
297. 1575 St. Andrews, North Sea Coast: It is decreed that none shall ‘presume nor tak upon hand to violat the Sabbat day, be using of playis and gemmis publiclie as they war wont to do, contrafating the playis of Robein Huid’ [Mill, Medieval Plays, 286].
298. 1575 St. Andrews, North Sea Coast: The General Assembly sends a delegation to the minister of St. Andrews ‘to inquir quhat is the caus that at that tyme Robin Huidis playes wes sufferit to be playit, and thairthrow prophanand the Fasting.’ The minister replies ‘concernyng the suffering of Robine Huidis playis, certane servandis and young childering plaid thame certane days . . . alwayis the kirk bayth prevatlie in thair assemblie, and I publictlie in tyme of preching dischargeit the samin as it is notoriouslie knawin, and desyrit the magistrattis to tak ordour thairwith’ [Miscellany of the Maitland Club Consisting of Original Papers and Other Documents Illustrative of the History and Literature of Scotland (Edinburgh: Maitland Club, 1834), l. ll4-15].
299. 1575 Maid Marian mentioned by Robert Laneham or Langham (fl. 1575), in his letter on the Kenilworth festivities of 1575. A native of Nottinghamshire, he attended St. Antholin’s and St. Paul’s schools in London, where at the latter he apparently reached the fifth form. On leaving school be was apprenticed to a mercer of London named Bomsted, and later began his own business. He travelled abroad for the business of trade, especially in France and Flanders, and he become a competent linguist in Spanish and Latin or Italian, as well as in French and Dutch. Laneham seems to have been taken into the service of the Earl of Leicester, who was attracted by his linguistic ability, and he helped Laneham and his father to secure a patent for supplying the royal mews with beans. Later, Laneham was appointed door-keeper of the council chamber, and seems to have accompanied the court on its various travels. He was present at the great entertainment given by Leicester to Queen Elizabeth from 9 to 27 July 1575, and wrote a description of the festivities in a letter to his ‘good friend, Master Humphrey Martin,’ another mercer of London; there is some belief that the letter was written by William Patten, but this appears unlikely. The letter, which was dated ‘at Worcester 20 August 1575,’ was published by 1580, without name or place with the title ‘A Letter: whearin part of the entertainment untoo the Queens Majesty at Killingwoorth Castle, in Warwik Sh’eer in this Soomerz Progress, 1575. It is signified: from a freend officer attendant in the Coourt (Ro. La. of the coounty Nosingham untoo hiz freend a citizen and merchaunt of London.’ At the close Laneham describes himself as ‘mercer, merchant, adventurer, clerk of the council chamber door, and also keeper of the same.’ Copies are in the British and Bodleian Libraries. Laneham’s spelling is quaint and unconventional, and towards the close of the tract he gives an interesting account of himself. He claims to be a good dancer and singer, and an expert musician with the guitar, cithern, and virginals. He delights in stories, especially when they are ancient and rare, and a very valuable part of his ‘Letter’ deals with the ballads and romances in the library of his supposed friend Captain Cox of Coventry (see no. 300 below). The work was reissued at Warwick in 1784 and was reprinted in Nichols’s ‘Progresses of Queen Elizabeth.’ Sir Walter Scott quoted from it in his novel of ‘Kenilworth’ (1821), which led to it’s republication in London in that same year. Subsequent reprints include George Adlard’s ‘Amye Robsart’ (1870), in the Reverend E. H. Knowles’s ‘Kenilworth Castle’ (1871), and in the publications of the Ballad Society (ed. F. J. Furnivall), 1871, and another edition by Furnivall (New York and London, 1907). A modern critical edition of Laneham’s letter appears in Medieval and Renaissance Texts, John Norton-Smith and Douglas Gray: Robert Langham: A Letter, with an Introduction, Notes, and Commentary by R. J. P. Kuin, (Leiden, E. J. Brill, 1983). See also, Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Vol. 32, Laneham, Robert by Sidney Lee, pp. 81-82; Text/Events in Early Modern England: Poetics of History, Sandra Logan, Ashgate Publishing, 2007.
300. 1575 Texts such as ‘Robinhood,’ ‘Adambel, Clim of the clough, and William of Cloudesley,’ ‘King Arthurz book,’ and ‘Beuys of Hampton,’ in the library of Captain Cox, as well as ‘a bunch of ballets & songs, all auncient: and a hundred more, he hath, fair wrapt vp in Parchment, and bound with a whipcord.’ Little is known of Cox’s life, and the main source of information concerning him is found in Robert Laneham’s letter (see no. 299 above). According to Laneham, the captain was a mason from Coventry, and apparently well read in Philosphy, Poetry, Astronomy and other sciences. Laneham records that on July 17, 1575, the second Sunday of Queen Elizabeth’s visit, she was shown some of the characteristic sports of the country, including the old historical Hock-Tuesday play of the men of Coventry, commemorating the massacre of the Danes by King Ethelred, on St. Brice’s Night, November 13, 1002. In this play Captain Cox makes an appearance ‘marching on valiantly before, cleen trust, and gartered aboue the knee, all fresh in a veluet cap’.
Sixty-two texts that are said to be in Cox’s library are named by Laneham, and a listing and discussion of each of the entries in Cox’s library is given by F. J. Furnivall, in order to give modern readers a view of the literature read by the English middle class in Elizabeth’s time. Furnivall elaborates on each text and suggests manuscripts and editions that may refer to the ones in Cox’s possession. Concerning the text or texts that may have been ‘Robinhood,’ Furnivall describes the editions of Robin Hood ballads and plays that existed before 1575, and also the ones listed in W. Carew Hazlitt’s Handbook (1867). Of these Robin Hood texts, Furnivall notes the various editions of A Gest of Robyn Hode, and suggests that since William Copland’s edition of 1560 is nearest to Laneham’s time ‘Captain Cox had it’. Other possible contenders offered by Furnivall include the plays Robin Hood and the Friar and Robin Hood and the Potter, the ballads found in the Percy Folio including ‘Robin Hood his Death,’ and Edward Hall’s account of Henry VIII and his court participating in Robin Hood festivities and pastimes (see nos. 95, 107, and 200 above). Like other antiquarians, Furnivall believed that the Captain’s existence is doubtful, and suggests that Robert Laneham portrayed himself under the name of Captain Cox. Furnivall’s argument is that there are many examples of giving catalogues of books known to the writer of a later book. The Cursor mundi, many romances, Chaucer, Lydgate, and others practiced it before Laneham. Citing J. P. Collier’s Bibliographical Account as the latest example of this listing, he illustrates how many of the books in Collier’s catalogue are also found in Cox’s. However, he contends, one striking omission in Cox’s library is ‘Guy of Warwick,’ an almost unbelievable omission for a Warwickshire collector like the Captain, and this fact ‘lends colour to the supposition that the list is as much one of Laneham’s own books as Capt. Cox’s.’
Captain Cox’s appearances in later literature always contains references to his famous library. In 1626, a year after Charles I ascended the throne, the Kenilworth pageants were revived, and for this occasion Ben Johnson wrote his ‘Masque of Owls,’ in which the ghost of Captain Cox appeared on his hobbyhorse and acted as chief presenter of the entertainment: ‘This Captaine Cox, by St. Mary, Was at Bullen with King Hary; And (if some doe not vary) Had a goodly library, By which he was discerned To be one of the learned, To entertaine the Queene here, When last she was seene here’. In 1821, Sir Walter Scott (in his Kenilworth) described the festivities on the occasion of Elizabeth’s visit in 1575, referring to Captain Cox as ‘that paragon of Black-Letter Antiquaries,’ ‘that celebrated humourist of Coventry whose library of ballads, almanacks, and penny histories.. . remains still the envy of antiquaries.’ The Captain’s dramatic ability was outstanding; he performed ‘like the heroes of chivalry whose exploits he studied in an abridged form.’ Whether or not Captain Cox was an actual person, he seems to have taken his place with Selden, Pepys, Bagford, Wood, and others as one of the great antiquaries and collectors of ballads and books. His library, real or not, has given us an important picture of Elizabethan times, not usually found in more formal historical accounts. See, Captain Cox, his Ballads and Books; or, Robert Laneham’s Letter, Frederick J. Furnivall (printed for the Ballad Society, London, 1871), pp. xii-xv, li-liv, 26-32; Robert Laneham’s Letter: describing a Part of the Entertainment unto Queen Elizabeth at the Castle of Kenilworth in 1575, F. J. Furnivall, (New York and London, 1907), pp. xii-xv, li-liv, 26-32; Robin Hood in Outlaw/ed Spaces: Media, performance, and other new directions, Lesley Coote and Valerie B. Johnson: Strange genealogies, Robin Hood’s Courtship with Jack Cade’s Daughter and the creation of a fraudulent text, Alexander L. Kaufman (Routledge, Oxfordshire and New York, 2017), pp. 70-87; University of Rochester Library Bulletin: Captain Cox, Ballad and Book Collector Extraordinary, John L. Mahoney, Vol. XIV, Spring 1959, Number 3; Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Vol. 12, Cox, Captain, by
301. 1575 The proverb ‘Yea Robyn Hoode’ (similar to John Skelton’s, see no. 127 above) mentioned by George Gascoigne (c. 1530-1577) in ‘The Posies’. The son of Sir John Gascoigne who inherited the estates of Cardington (Bedfordshire), the young George is said to have attended Trinity College, Cambridge. After leaving the university he appears to have joined the Middle-temple (one of the four Inns of Court whose members were entitled to become barristers), and was probably at Gray’s Inn by 1555. A lawyer with his name was in custody in 1548, charged with being ‘a dicer and a confederate of one Allen, a disreputable conjurer.’ George was a reckless youth, he was imprisoned for debt and Sir John Gascoigne threatened to disinherited his son on account of his spending. George went to court and he tried to establish himself as a courtier, something he never achieved. A member of the Parliaments of 1557-8 and 1558-9 as burgess for his native county of Bedford, he amassed so much debt that he was forced to sell his inheritance. In 1566 two of his dramatic works were staged at Gray’s Inn — The Supposes, the first English play adapted from an Italian comedy I Suppositi (1509) by Ludo-vico Ariosto, and (along with Francis Kinwelmersh) Jocasta, apparently the first English adaptation from a classical Greek tragedy of Euripides. Before 1568 he married the wealthy widow of William Breton, and therefore became stepfather to the poet, Nicholas Breton (see no. 310 below). George’s application as burgess of Midhurst was refused in 1572, and in that year he sailed for the low countries to become a soldier in the Netherlands. In Holland a ‘loving letter’ from a lady at the Hague caused him to be accused of treason but he was acquitted with the help of William, Prince of Orange under whom he served. He was captured by the Spanish and imprisoned for several months, an experience that produced poems such as The Fruites of Warre and Gascoigne’s Voyage into Holland. George returned to England in 1574 and it is believed that an anonymous edition of his early poetry, A Hundreth Sundrie Flowres Bounde vp in One Small Poesie . . . . (1573), had been published without his permission, although he may have permitted its release; this work was deemed offensive, and it was attacked and censored. In 1575 he issued the authorized and revised edition The Posies of George Gascoigne Esquire . . . ., which contained The Fruites of Warre, but once more it was banned; this was reprinted in Cambridge English Classics: The Complete Works of George Gascoigne in Two Volumes, Vol. 1, John W. Cunliffe (Cambridge, 1907).
George was one of the contributors who produced the masques (a form of festive courtly entertainment) for the extravagant entertainment presented to Elizabeth I at Kenilworth by Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester, during the summer progress of 1575. In the following year, George’s account of these entertainments was published by Richard Jones as The Princely Pleasures at Kenilworth Castle. Also in 1575, his only original play, the tragedy entitled The Glasse of Government was published. In the following year were published works such as his well known satire The Steele Glasse, and The Spoyle of Antwerpe (probably written by George), an eyewitness account of the Spanish sack of Antwerp in 1576; George apparently went to Paris and Antwerp in 1576 as an agent in the royal service. In May 1576, he had described himself as ‘in weake plight for health,’ and on Oct. 7, 1577, after an illness of some months, he died near Stamford in Lincolnshire, recommending his wife and son to the Queen’s favour. An edition of his works was published posthumously in 1587. His work was highly praised by his contemporaries which included the poets George Whetstone, George Turberville, and Edmund Spenser. He has been described as a pioneer of the English Renaissance, and his innovative use of verse narrative was later adopted by William Shakespeare, who also drew upon Gascoigne’s The Supposes for part of the plot of The Taming of the Shrew. See, The Complete Poems of George Gascoigne, William Carew Hazlitt (2 Vols., Roxburghe Library, 1869); The Life and Writings of George Gascoigne, with Three Poems Heretofore not Reprinted: Series in Philology Literature and Archaeology, Felix E. Schelling (Vol. II, No. 4, Boston, 1893); Gascoigne’s Princely Pleasures, with the Masque, Intended to Have Been Presented Before Queen Elizabeth at Kenilworth Castle in 1575 (Printed for J. H. Burn, ect., London, 1821); Supposes and Jocasta . . . ., The Belles-Lettres Series, Section III, The English Drama, John W. Cunliffe (Boston and London, 1906); Historical Dictionary of the Elizabethan World: Britain, Ireland, Europe, and America, John A, Wagner (Routledge, 1999, p. 120); George Gascoigne, Gillian Austen (Cambridge, 2008).
302. 1575-76 Yeovil, Somerset: £17 2s. received from William Forde as Robin Hood [REED: Somerset, 410].
303. 1576 Robin Hood mentioned by Claudius Hollyband (1534?- 1597) in The Frenche Littelton, his English-French phrase book printed by his fellow-Huguenot Thomas Vautroullier. The date of 1566 on the title page is a mistake, which was pointed out by A. W. Pollard: ‘Claudius Hollyband and His French Schoolmaster and French Littelton’. Transactions of the Bibliographical Society, XIII (1915), 253-72 (Library, III. vi. 77-93). Further editions of The Frenche Littelton appeared in 1578, 1579, 1581, 1583, 1591, 1593, 1597, 1602, 1607, 1609, 1616, 1625, 1626, 1630, and a facsimile by Scolar Press in 1970, and a reproduction by Proquest, Eebo Editions in 2010.
An instructor of English, French, Italian and Latin, Hollyband was also the author of several books and treatises concerning language, including one of the earliest French-English dictionaries ‘A Dictionarie French and English’. His final revision of this work was published in London by Thomas Woodcock in 1593, and a reprint by Scolar Press in 1970. All of his books were first printed in London, and his other works include: The French Schoolmaster (1573), Arnalt and Lucenda (1575), The Treasury of the French Tongue (1580), A Treatise for Declining of Verbs (1580), Campo di Fior (1583), and The Italian Schoolmaster (1583). Claudius Hollyband (his English name, and in Latin Claudius a Sancto Vinculo) was born Claude Desainliens or de Sainliens, probably in Moulins, in the Bourbonnais, France. He left there in about 1562 when the Huguenots were driven out, and arrived in London by 1564 or 1565. His books show that he was teaching in 1573 ‘hard by the Church’ at Lewisham in Kent, where the Queen spoke with him in French, and from 1575 on in Paul’s Churchyard, near the sigh of the Lucrece, where he taught Latin in the morning and French in the afternoon till five, and then at the Golden Ball in 1580 and 1581. In the 1593 edition of The French Littelton he describes himself as no longer teaching in Paul’s Churchyard but as ‘Gentilhomme Bourbonnois’.
Hollyband was married twice to Englishwomen, Elyzabethe Wylliams in 1567 (who died in 1578), and Anne Smithe in 1578. He had at least nine children, was a lover of wine, and travelled abroad between 1586 and 1593, during which time he may have been involved in espionage. A Puritan who wrote a treatise against dance, Hollyband warned his readers against certain practices deemed to be demonic, such as drama, and he was made fun of by William Shakespeare in some of his plays. Buried in London on 15 November 1597, Hollyband was the most famous French Huguenot teacher in Elizabethan England. See, Ashgate Critical Essays on Early English Lexicographers, Volume 3: The Sixteenth Century, Chapter 22, Mark Eccles ‘Claudius Hollyband and the Earliest French-English Dictionaries’, Studies in Philology, 83, pp. 51-61, The University of North Carolina Press, 1986; Claude de Sainliens, un huguenot bourbonnais au temps de Shakespeare, Laurent Berec (Orizons, Paris, 2012). See also, La vie et les oeuvres de Claude de Sainliens alias Claudius Holyband, Lucy E. Farrer, Paris, 1908, reprinted in Geneva, 1971; ‘The Italian Pedagogy of Claudius Hollyband.’ Studies in Philology 49, (1952), R. C. Simonini, Jr., pp, 144-54.
304. 1576-77 Honiton, Devon: Parish accounts include 17s. profit from Robin Hood [REED: Devon, 208].
305. 1576-77 Woodbury, Devon: Parish accounts include 40s. ‘receaued of William Dounom and Water Holwill the monye that they made with ale when he was Roberte Hood & c’ [REED: Devon, 285].
306. 1577 Scotland: General Assembly resolves to ask the Regent ‘that his Grace wald discharge playes of Robin Hood, King of May, and sick vthers, on the Sabboth day’ [Acts and Proceedings of the General Assemblies of the Kirk of Scotland, ed. Thomas Thomson (Edinburgh: Bannatyne Club, 1839-45), l.388].
307. c. 1577 A reference to Robin Hood’s plays, the Morris and the fool, the Maypole, and ‘Marian about the poll to daunce’, in The practise of the Diuell by the minor poet Laurence Ramsay or Ramsey (fl. 1550–1588). The poem consists of eighty-two seven-line stanzas in the form of a long speech by Satan, in which the Catholics and other forms of religion are criticized. Its full title is ‘The practise of the Diuell. The auncient poisened practises of the Diuell, in his Papistes, against the true professors of Gods holie worde, in these our latter dayes. Newlie set forth by L. Ramsey’. (Imprinted at London, for Tymothie Rider, 4to, Bodleian Library). A reproduction was published by EEBO Editions, ProQuest in 2010. In 1550 Ramsay was apparently among a congregation of Sectaries who had a meeting at Faversham in Kent where the practices of Anabaptism and Pelagianism were supported. This was a separation from the Church of England, which caused some of the congregation to be brought before the ecclesiastical court. Tymothie Rider also issued in 1578-79, a broadside by Ramsay ‘A short Discourse of mans fatall end, with an unfayned Commendation of the worthinesse of Syr Nicholas Bacon, Knight, Lord Keeper of the great Seale of England: Who disceased the xx day of February 1578.’ On 5 August 1583 Edward White obtained a license for the publication of Ramsay’s ‘Wishinge and Wouldinge,’
In later life Ramsay seems to have been attached to the household of the Earl of Leicester, who was sympathetic towards the puritans. After Leicester’s death, Edward Aggas obtained on 15 Oct. 1588, a license for the publication of ‘Ramsies farewell to his late lord & master therle of Leicester, whiche departed this worlde at Cor’burye the 4 Sept. 1588.’ See, Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Vol. 47, Ramsay or Ramsey, Laurence by
308. 1577 References to Robin Hood and Little John in Raphael Holinshed’s Chronicles of England, Scotland, and Ireland, a large work in about 1548, when the London printer and bookseller Reyner (or Reginald) Wolfe decided to produce a universal history and cosmography of the world. He had inherited John Leland’s notes (see no. 156 above) and he himself began the compilation of the English, Scottish, and Irish portions. Early in Elizabeth’s reign Holinshed was a translator in the London printing office of Wolfe, and he took over the project after Wolfe’s death in 1573, but it was not yet ready for publication. Three well-known publishers, George Bishop, John Harrison, and Luke or Lucas Harrison, decided to continue with it, and Holinshed laboured in their service. It was decided to limit the work to histories and descriptions of England, Scotland, and Ireland only. Holinshed had hired other writers such as William Harrison, who was engaged to assist Holinshed in the descriptions of England and Scotland, and Richard Stanihurst to continue from 1509 to 1547 the history of Ireland, which Holinshed had compiled, chiefly from a manuscript by Edmund Campion, who had given a copy to Wolfe – Campion had also given a copy to Stanihurst (see no. 286 above). Holinshed names several other ‘authours’ as a source for his Chronicle, such as Giraldus Cambrensis, John Major, John Fordun, Edward Hall, Richard Grafton, John Stow, and many others – he sourced several chronicles and official records. Robin Hood and Little John appear in The description of Irelande (where Stanihurst elaborates on Hector Boece’s mention of Little John) and The Historie of Scotlande. Robin Hood’s Bay is mentioned in The description of Britaine. In 1578 a license for publishing ‘Raphael Hollingesheds Cronycle’ was issued to John Harrison and George Bishop, and a fortnight later the widow of Luke or Lucas Harrison, the third publisher interested in the venture, was allowed to sell her copies to Thomas Woodcock. Some copies bear the imprint of John Harrison, others of George Bishop, Luke or Lucas Harrison, and John Hunne. All copies were printed by Henry Bynneman. The work appeared in a two-volume folio edition, illustrated with numerous woodcuts. The first contained the descriptions of Britain, Scotland, and Ireland, along with the histories of Scotland and Ireland, and the history of England up to 1066; the second contained the chronicles of England from 1066 to 1576. A few passages in the ‘Historie of Ireland’ offended the queen and her ministers, and were ordered to be cancelled and replaced by others.
Little is known of the chronicler Raphael Holinshed (died 1580?), who is said to have been the son of Ralph Holinshed or Hollingshed of Cophurst in the township of Sutton Downes, Cheshire. Unfortunately the pedigree of the Holinsheds or Hollingsheds of Cophurst cannot be traced with any certainty. Holinshed may have been educated at Cambridge, and appears to have taken holy orders. His Chronicle was a success, but he did not live long after its publication. He made his will on 1 Oct. 1578, and there describes himself as steward to Thomas Burdet of Bramcote, Warwickshire. Holinshed may have died at Bramcote at about the end of 1580. By his will, which was proved on 24 April 1582, all his property passed to his master, Burdet, who may have taken possession of Holinshed’s notes, collections, books, and manuscripts. The only manuscript of Holinshed’s known to exist is a translation prepared for the ‘Chronicle,’ of Florence of Worcester (MS. Harl. 563). After Holinshed’s death the publishers of his ‘Chronicle,’ Harrison and Bishop, joined with Ralph Newberie, Henry Denham, and Thomas Woodcock to prepare a new edition. They employed John Hooker, alias Vowell, as editor. He continued the work till 1586, inserting many new passages and he employed Francis Thynne on the Scottish continuations, and Thynne, Abraham Fleming, and John Stow (see no. 262 above) on other portions of the book. The new edition, which was printed in 1586, appeared in three folio volumes in January 1586–7, and was without illustrations. After it’s publication, the privy council ordered several pages to be removed, so original unaltered copies are very rare. See also, Miscellaneous. In February 1722–3 three London booksellers (Mears, Gyles, and Woodman) published in a thin black-letter folio the removed pages, which was edited by John Blackbourn. Another folio volume containing the removed sheets is said to have been edited by Dr. Drake, and to have appeared in 1728. An edition of the complete, unexpurgated text of 1587, edited by Henry Ellis and titled Holinshed’s Chronicles of England, Scotland, and Ireland, was published in six volumes (London, 1807–08), and reissued in 1976. Both editions of the Chronicles were collaborations and contributors such as Holinshed and Hooker were Protestants, whereas Stanihurst and Campion were Catholics. The result was a varied view of British history, which came from the contrasting choices of style and source material, but also from the contributors responses to the politics and religion of their age.
Many scholars have cast doubt on the credibility of Holinshed’s work, and it has been described as loose and dull. In any case it was a principal source for many literary writers of the Renaissance, including Marlowe, Spenser, Daniel and Shakespeare, who used Holinshed as a source for more than a third of his plays. These include Macbeth, King Lear and the English history plays such as Richard III. Shakespeare sometimes followed the text of the Chronicles closely, even using its words and phrases, and at other times using it as an inspiration for plot details. On other occasions he deviated from its account altogether, either preferring other sources or his own imagination. It is widely believed that Shakespeare used the 1587 edition of Holinshed, based on similarities between some of Shakespeare’s text and passages which only appear in the later edition. See, Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Vol. 27, Holinshed, Raphael by pp. 130-32; Reading Holinshed’s Chronicles, Annabel Patterson, Chicago and London, 1994; The Oxford Handbook of Holinshed’s Chronicles, Paulina Kewes, Ian W. Archer, Felicity Heal, Oxford University Press, 2013.
309. c. 1577 Robin Hood and Maid Marion appear in the dialogue of the play Misogonus, which was announced as a ‘MS. of recent discovery’ by John Payne Collier in 1831 (The History of English Dramatic Poetry to the Time of Shakespeare, Vol. 2, p. 464). Collier summarized the action of the play and wrote briefly on the questions of authorship and date. The MS. was in the Duke of Devonshire’s collection, but is now in the Huntington Library, San Marino (MS. HM 452). A complete transcript was made for Collier (which was bound with the MS. itself) and it has the following note in Colliers handwriting – ‘N.B. This transcript was made by a person not very competent to read the original and it therefore contains errors. J. P. C.’ — however as R. Warwick Bond tells us, the transcriber (whoever he was) produced a reasonably accurate copy of the MS., and it preserves some words or letters that have since disappeared from the original due to wear and decay (Early Plays from the Italian, Oxford, 1911, p. 163). Misogonus was first published in 1898 by Alois Brandl in Quellen des weltlichen Dramas in England vor Shakespeare. Brandl used a second transcript (made by a Miss A. F. Parker at the Bodleian) as the basis for his edition. This transcript is accurate and Parker even corrects errors made in the former transcript, and solves several puzzles, especially in cases where the MS. had been altered by a corrector. Unfortunately the same cannot be said of Brandl, as his edition contains several errors. A modern-spelling text of Misogonus was edited by J. S. Farmer, and appeared in the second series of his Six Anonymous Plays (Early English Drama Society, London, 1906). Farmer’s edition relies on and repeats nearly every error in Brandl’s text, and he rarely offers any suggestions of his own, and makes no further attempts to fill in the numerous gaps. The next edition by R. Warwick Bond (1911) is an almost exact printed transcription of the MS, and in his footnotes, he offers an opinion on readings for all but the most difficult lost passages. The next edition was by Lester E. Barber (Misogonus: Edited with an introduction, New York, 1979, reissued by Routledge, 2018) who used Bond’s edition as a reference against which he checked his own transcription of the MS. Barber’s edition contains a detailed introduction and he decided to produce a version with modernized spelling.
Misogonus has been described as a Prodigal Son play, one of many that were based on the parable in the New Testament. In this case the wayward son is Misogonus, who is eventually reunited with his father Philogonus. It is clear that the Prodigal Son tradition in English drama is indebted to the ‘Christian Terence’ movement in Contential drama, Roman Comedy, and the native English dramatic tradition. Although the play is set in Italy, it is undoubtedly an English production. Six names appear in different places throughout the MS., so it is likely that one or more of those named was the author: Anthony Rudd, misread as ‘Rice’ until 1930 (A Note on Misogonus, Samuel A. Tannenbaum, Modern Language Notes, Vol. 45, No. 5, May, 1930, p. 308-10) and Laurentius Bariωna (the fifth letter of the surname being the Greek omega) whose real name may have been Laurence Johnson (‘Misogonus and Laurence Johnson’, G. L. Kittredge, printed in The Nation, New York, March 16th, 1899), appear on the title-page, Thomas Rychardes and Thomas Warde on the prologue page, and W. Wyll m¯ and John York in the margins of later MS. pages. Either Anthony Rudd, Laurentius Bariωna, or Thomas Rychardes (or a combination of them) could have been the author/authors: Rudd’s name is written just below the title of the play, Rychardes signs the prologue, and Bariωna signs the play as a whole. There is some belief that Rychardes was the scribe and not necessarily the author, and to make matters worse, a second writer, and possibly a third, has corrected the MS. Rudd, Rychardes and Bariωna (assuming that he was Laurence Johnson) all appear to have matriculated at Cambridge, so Misogonus could have been written there during the thirteen years, 1564-1577, or it could have been written about 1571, when Rudd and Rychardes were fellow students at Trinity College, Cambridge. Written on twenty-four folio sheets, there is one sheet missing, that which immediately followed the sixth and contained the greater part of Act I, sc. v. The play breaks off abruptly in the course of Act IV, sc. iv, so at least one sheet is missing at the end. Although Misogonus follows a well known theme, it is considered to be one of the most elaborate and original of the Prodigal Son comedies. See, The History of English Dramatic Poetry to the Time of Shakespeare, J. Payne Collier, Vol. 2, pp. 464-481, London, 1831 (a new edition in 1879); Quellen des weltlichen Dramas in England vor Shakespeare, Alois Brandl, Strassburg, 1898; ‘Misogonus and Laurence Johnson’, G. L. Kittredge, printed in The Nation, New York, March 16th, 1899; Six Anonymous Plays, John S. Farmer, Second Series, Early English Drama Society, pp. 133-243, London, 1906; Early Plays from the Italian, R. Warwick Bond, pp. xci-cxviii, 161-258, Oxford, 1911; A Note on Misogonus, Samuel A. Tannenbaum, Modern Language Notes, Vol. 45, No. 5, May, 1930, pp. 308-10; Renaissance Drama, New Series, Vol. 6, Essays on Dramatic Antecedents, Terence Improved: The Paradigm of the Prodigal Son in English Renaissance Comedy, Ervin Beck, pp. 107-22, University of Chicago Press, 1973; Misogonus: Edited with an introduction, Lester E. Barber, New York, 1979, (reissued by Routledge, 2018).
310. 1577 Robin Hood mentioned in the eighth poem in Nicholas Breton’s book The Workes of a Young Wyt, which is made up of ‘The Letter to the Reader’, a ‘Primordium’ in verse, and twenty-nine poems, most of which have explanatory or introductory prose titles. The title of the book which ends with ‘Done by N. B. Gentleman’ is undated, and below this ‘The Letter to the Reader’ ends with ‘From my lodgyng this .xiiii. of May./Anno Domini. 1577./Your poore Countreyman,/N. B.’ — at the end of the book the colophon reads: ‘Imprinted at London, nigh vnto the/three Cranes in the Vintree, by Thomas/Dawson, and Thomas Gardyner.’ — it was entered on the Stationers Register in June 1577. This book is extremely rare, and does not appear to have ever been reprinted. Although the author is not named, the style, vocabulary, and subjects are unmistakably those of Nicholas Breton’s acknowledged works, and no challenge of his authorship has ever been made. The ‘Workes’ appears to have been largely forgotten until 1801, when George Ellis included two poems — number eight, and the last poem, number twenty-nine (which he did not complete), — in his Specimens of the Early English Poets, (Vol. 2, pp. 240-48). Hyder E. Rollins (Studies in Philology, Vol. XXXIII, no. 2, April, 1936, pp. 132-33) tells us that there are two copies in existence. George Steevens was an early owner of one copy, to which he added (along with Joseph Ritson and Thomas Park), some bibliographic notes. At Steeven’s sale in 1800 it was auctioned, along with other rare books, and at the Roxburghe sale it passed into the collection of Richard Heber, then to Britwell Court. Finally in 1919, Sotheby’s auctioned the contents of the Christie-Miller Library from Britwell Court, and the copy passed to Henry E. Huntington, the American railroad magnate and collector of art and rare books — it is now in the Huntington Library, San Marino. Richard Heber owned another copy which later remained for a number of years in the library of W. A. White, of Brooklyn, before going to the private collection of the American collector, scholar, and seller of rare books and manuscripts, A. S. W. Rosenbach. This copy is not listed in the catalogue of the Rosenbach Museum and Library, but mysteriously, there is a copy in the British Library. The ‘Workes’ was reproduced in the Text Creation Partnership, 2004-03 (EEBO-TCP Phase 1), Ann Arbor, MI ; Oxford (UK).
The English poet Nicholas Breton, Britton or Brittaine (1545?–1626?), belonged to an old family settled at Layer-Breton, Essex. Nicholas was probably born at the ‘capitall mansion house’ in Red Cross Street, in the parish of St Giles without Cripplegate, mentioned in his father’s will. His father William Breton (died 1558-59), had amassed a fortune from trade in London. Before 1568 the widow of William Breton (née Elizabeth Bacon) became the wife of George Gascoigne (see no. 301 above), the poet, who died in 1577, and therefore was Nicholas Breton’s stepfather for more than nine years; there can be no doubt that Gascoigne influenced the young Nicholas. Incidentally, Gascoigne’s publisher was Richard Jones, and he printed several of Breton’s earlier works. From his ‘Floorish vpon Fancie’ (see no. 311 below) we know that in 1577 Nicholas was settled in London and had lodgings in Holborn. The Rev. Richard Madox, chaplain to a naval expedition in 1582, whose unpublished diary is in Sloane MS. 1008, records under the date 14 March 1582[-3] that while on the continent, apparently at Antwerp, he met ‘Mr. Brytten, once of Oriel Colledge’ (Oxford). No university document supports the statement that Nicholas was educated at Oriel College, but in ‘The Toyes of an Idle Head,’ the appendix to his first published book, ‘A Floorish vpon Fancie,’ he refers to himself as ‘a yong gentleman who . . . had spent some years at Oxford.’ He also dedicates the ‘Pilgrimage to Paradise’ (1592) ‘to the gentlemen studients and scholers of Oxforde.’ Nicholas found a patron in Mary, countess of Pembroke, and wrote several works in her honour, but she seems to have withdrawn her favour after 1601. A Poste with a Packet of Mad Letters (1603, enlarged 1637) consists of letters from persons in a variety of situations, several of which are signed ‘N. B.,’ and read like extracts from the author’s actual correspondence. One letter (Let. ii. 19) of this kind, ‘To my dearest beloved friend on earth, H. W.,’ tells the story of a life of sorrows, which has been assumed to be auto-biographical. Nicholas married Ann Sutton in 1592-93, at St. Giles’s Church, Cripplegate and had a family. He is supposed to have died shortly after the publication of his last work, Fantastickes (1626). He himself tells us (in the ‘Primordium’) that The Workes of a Young Wyt was his first composition. Nicholas’s work consists of religious and pastoral poems, satires, and a number of miscellaneous prose tracts. Francis Meres in his ‘Palladis Tamia,’ 1598, ranks him with the greatest writers of the time, and although he was popular with his contemporaries, he was largely forgotten after the first half of the seventeenth century. See also, Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Volume 06, pp. 275-81, Breton, Nicholas by
311. 1577 Another mention of Robin Hood by Nicholas Breton in the poem ‘The Forte of Fancie,’ in his book A Floorish upon Fancie (printed at London by Richard Jones in 1577), the title of which includes ‘Compiled by N. B. Gent,’ the initials that also appear in the title of The Workes of a Young Wyt (see no. 310 above). The ‘Floorish’ was entered on the Stationers Register on 2 April 1577, and was Breton’s first published book, although it was probably composed just after the ‘Workes’. Following the title, the ‘Floorish’ has a heading ‘To all younge Gentilmen, that delight in trauaile to forreine Countreis’, which is followed by a section addressed to ‘You gallant youthes’. Below this is ‘From his Chamber, in Holbourne, this .xx. of February’. This is followed by the ‘The Preface’ in verse, then several poems: ‘The Schoole of Fancie’, The Forte of Fancie’, ‘In Dispight of Fancie’, ‘A Foole, Dame Fancies man, speakes in defence of his Mistris’, ‘The Lamentation of Fancie’, and ‘A Farewell To Fancie’. This is followed by a page with a separate title ‘The Toyes of an Idle Heade: Contayninge many pretie Pamphlets, for plea∣sant heads to passe away idle time withal.’ Then ‘The Preface’ in verse is followed by several poems (some referred to as ditties or toyes) which have explanatory or introductory prose titles — one of these ‘ditties’ contain another mention of Robin Hood. There is no colophon at the end of the book. A copy of this first edition was in the possession of James Bindley. It then followed the same fate as the Workes of a Young Wyt, when it passed into the collection of Richard Heber, then to Britwell Court, then acquired by Henry E. Huntington from the auction at Sotherby’s in 1919. The copy in the Huntington Library is not unique, there is another in the British Library. The ‘Floorish’ was reproduced in the Text Creation Partnership, 2004-03 (EEBO-TCP Phase 1), Ann Arbor, MI ; Oxford (UK). Another edition of the ‘Floorish’ appeared in 1582 (also printed by Richard Jones) which was included in Thomas Park’s Heliconia: Comprising a Selection of English Poetry of the Elizabethan Age, Vol. I, pp. i-vii, 1-238 (London, 1815), and in A. B. Grosart’s The Works in Verse and Prose of Nicholas Breton, Vol. I, pp. 1-62 (Edinburgh University Press, 1879). Park had used a copy of the 1582 edition that was ‘the property of two gentlemen and scholars, whose names I am not privileged to mention’. Grosart had used a copy which belonged to Henry Huth of London, and he corrected ‘the all-two-many negligences and corruptions of words and orthography in ‘Heliconia’ — including restoration of so many as four lines and more at a time in three places’. The title of the book differs from that in the 1577 edition as it includes ‘The Toyes of an Idle Head,’ as can be seen in Park and Grosart, and there is no separate title-page and no preface. At the end the colophon reads ‘Imprinted at London by Richard Ihones, dwelling at the Rose and Crowne, neere Holburne Bridge. 1582’. See also, Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Volume 06, pp. 275-81, Breton, Nicholas by
312. 1577?-1626? Another mention of Robin Hood by Nicholas Breton (see no. 311 above) in his rustic poem, first printed in 1879. It was thought to be written during the early Elizabethan period, and printed again in 2016.
313. 1577-78 Yeovil, Somerset: John Dyer as Robin Hood pays the parish £18 3s. 10d. ‘made by kepinge the Churche ale.’ Dyer was a churchwarden that year. Also 6d. paid for refeathering Robin Hood’s arrows [REED: Somerset, 410-11].
314. 1578 Scotland: General Assembly resolves to make ‘a supplicatioun to his Grace and Counsell to discharge be opin proclamation, all kynd of insolent playis as King of May, Robin Hood, and sick vthers, in the moneth of May, played either be bairnes at the schools or others’ [Acts and Proceedings of the General Assemblies, 2.407.
315. 1578-79 Yeovil, Somerset: 4d. paid ‘for mending Robyn Hoods bar and a new key,’ perhaps used for securing the substantial sums gathered in the Yeovil games [REED: Somerset, 411].
316. 1579 Edinburgh, Lothian: The provost, baillies, council, and deacons order a proclamation ‘that na inhabitant within this burgh presume to accompany any sic as ar of mynde to renew the playes of Robene Hude’ [Mill, Medieval Plays, 224].
317. 1579 ‘Tales of Robin hoode’ referred to by Laurence Tomson (1539–1608), in the first English translation of John Calvin’s Sermons de Iean Calvin sur les deux Epistres S. Paul a Timothee et sur l’Epistre a Tite. First published in French by Conrad Badius in Geneva, 1561, the reference to Robin Hood does not appear in Calvin’s work, it is an addition by Tomson. A politician, author, and translator, he was an interesting figure among Elizabethan MPs, although his parentage is obscure and the details of his later life are sparse. Tomson was admitted a demy of Magdalen College, Oxford, in 1553, and soon became proficient in logic and philosophy. He graduated B.A. in 1559, was elected a fellow of his college, and commenced M.A. in 1564. In May 1565 his college granted Tomson permission to study on the Continent for a year, his leave later being extended until July 1567. It is possible that he spent part of his time in Geneva, but in March 1568 he and three other Englishmen matriculated at Heidelberg. Tomson had accompanied Sir Thomas Hoby on his embassy to France in 1566; and in 1569 he resigned his fellowship of Magdalen College. By November 1572 he was living in Leicester, a puritan stronghold under the protection of the 3rd Earl of Huntingdon. Between 1575 and 1587 he represented Weymouth and Melcombe Regis in the House of Commons, and he was member for Downton in 1588–9. In 1582 he was in attendance at court at Windsor (Cal. Hatfield MSS. ii. 529). Tomson was a Calvinist who was employed in political affairs by Sir Francis Walsingham, principal secretary to Queen Elizabeth I. After his death, Tomson retired from public life, spending his last 18 years at Laleham. On the 29th March (or the 4th of April) 1608, Tomson died there having made his will on 18th March. His lands were to be held by his son-in-law Thomas Stapley, pending the payment of his debts. Stapley proved the will on 18 Apr. 1608, and Tomson’s widow received £100 a year. He was buried in the chancel of the church at Chertsey, Surrey, where a black marble epitaph was erected to his memory with a curious Latin inscription which suggests an impressive list of achievements; he could speak 12 languages; had travelled in Sweden, Russia, Denmark, Germany, Italy and France; was versed in theology and ‘literaturae politioris scientiae’; and had lectured on the Hebrew tongue in Geneva. Tomson’s revised and ‘Englished’ edition of the Genevan version of the New Testament (dedicated to Sir Francis Walsingham) appeared in 1576, and again in 1580, 1587, and 1596. His other works include: ‘An Answere to certeine Assertions and Obiections of M. Fecknam,’ London [1570], ‘Mary, the Mother of Christ: her tears,’ London, 1596, and ‘Brief Remarks on the State of the Low Countries’ (Cottonian MS., Galba D vii. f. 163). See, Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Volume 57, p. 22, Tomson, Laurence by
318. 1580 Burnley, Lancashire: Letter of Edmund Assheton to William Farington, 12 May: ‘I am sure (Righte worshippfull) youe haue not forgotten the laste yere sturres att Brunley, aboute Robyn hoode and the May games; Nowe consideringe that itt is a Cause that bringeth no good effecte, beinge Contrarie to the beste, Therfore a Numbre of the Iustices of peace herein in Sallforde hundrethe haue Consulted with the Commyssioners to suppresse those Lewde sportes tendinge to no other ende but to stirre vpp our ffrayle Natures to wantonnes’ [REED: Lancashire, 6].
319. 1580 Scotland: James VI and his Privy Council issue enforcements of the acts which forbade such pastimes as the Robin Hood plays throughout Scotland: . . . . that thairfoir publicatioun be maid thairof be oppin proclamatioun at all places neidfull, dischargeing all and sindrie his Majesteis liegis of using of Robene Hude and uther vane and unlesum gammis in the said moneth (April), and specialie upoun the Sabboith dayis thairof, under the panis contenit in the Actis of Parliament maid thairanent: certifeing thame, and they failyie, the panis contenit in the saidis Actis salbe execute upoun thame with all rigour and extremitie [Medieval & Renaissance Drama in England, Vol. 12 (1999): Keely Fisher, The Crying of ane Playe: Robin Hood and Maying in Sixteenth-Century Scotland, p. 31, and n. 59]; D. Masson, The Register of the Privy Council of Scotland, vol. iii (Edinburgh, 1880), p. 277.
320. 1580 Another reference to the well known Robin Hood proverb by John Lyly, Lilly, or Lylie (c. 1553-1606), in Euphues and His England (Imprinted at London: [By T. East] for Gabriell Cawood, dwelling in Paules Church-yard, 1580). A contemporary of Shakespeare, Lyly was born in Kent in 1553 or 1554 and became a student of Magdalen College, Oxford. He obtained his bachelor’s degree in 1573 and in 1574 he applied to Lord Burghley ‘for the queen’s letters to Magdalen College to admit him fellow.’ The fellowship was not granted, however in June 1575 he proceeded M.A. at Oxford. Anthony à Wood (Athenae Oxonienses, 1691–1692) states that Lyly was “always averse to the crabbed studies of logic and philosophy. For so it was that his genie being naturally bent to the pleasant paths of poetry … did in a manner neglect academical studies.’ Lyly went to London, where for many years he tried to secure a place at court. As early as 1578 he had attempted literary work, and found a patron in Edward Vere, earl of Oxford. His prose work ‘Euphues, the Anatomy of Wit’ (licensed to Gabriel Cawood, on 2 Dec. 1578) was published in London in 1579, and this brought him fame. In the same year the author was incorporated M.A. at Cambridge. A second part ‘Euphues and his England’ followed in 1580, and his literary success apparently brought him to the notice of Lord Burghley, who gave him some employment. For a time Lyly was the most successful and fashionable of English writers, whose popular prose fictions told of a prodigal Greek scholar named Euphues, which introduced Euphuism, the highly patterned prose style in which the adventures of Euphues are narrated. Euphuism became immediately fashionable and much imitated as a mode of courtly, witty expression, and shaped the prose style deployed by Lyly in his subsequent works for the stage. Before 1584 he began a series of plays to be performed at court by the children’s acting companies connected with the Chapel Royal and St. Paul’s Cathedral; some of the plays were repeated before a popular audience at the Blackfriars Theatre. The performance date of his plays are: Campaspe and Sapho and Phao, 1583–84; Gallathea, 1585–88; Endimion, 1588; Midas, 1589; Love’s Metamorphosis, 1590; Mother Bombie, 1590; and The Woman in the Moon, 1595. His ambition to obtain a place at court seems to have been partly realised by his appointment as ‘vice master’ of the St. Paul’s and the Savoy companies of child actors.
The scandalous Marprelate pamphlets were fliers written under the pseudonym Martin Marprelate by radical Puritans making attacks on the clerical hierarchy of the established church (see no. 344 below). The bishops enlisted writers such as Lyly and Thomas Nashe to try to defeat ‘Martin Marprelate’ at ‘his’ own game. The result in Lyly’s case was Pappe with an Hatchet, Alias, a Fig for my Godson (1589). With ‘Pappe’, Lyly’s career as a prose writer largely ended. Some of his other writings are his famous petitionary letters to Queen Elizabeth of 1598 and 1601. Elizabeth had apparently led Lyly to believe that he was going to be granted the reversion of the post of Master of the Revels, but this never happened. Lyly sat in parliament as member for Hindon in 1589, for Aylesbury in 1593, for Appleby in 1597 and for Aylesbury a second time in 1601. In 1593 Lyly married Beatrice Browne, an heiress, and had children, however he apparently died poor and neglected and was buried in London at St Bartholomew the Less on the 20th of November, 1606. ‘Euphues and his England,’ was twice issued in 1580, and was dedicated to Edward de Vere, earl of Oxford. A unique copy of the first 1580 edition is in the Bodleian Library. Later editions are dated 1582, 1585, 1597, 1603, 1613, 1617, 1623, 1631, and 1636; it’s appearance in later works include: John Lyly: Euphues, The Anatomy Of Wit; Euphes And His England. Collated With Early Subsequent Editions, Edward Arber, London, 1868; The Complete Works of John Lyly. 3 vols., R. Warwick Bond, Oxford: Clarendon, 1902; Euphues: The Anatomy of Wit, Euphues & His England by John Lyly, Morris William Croll and Harry Clemons, London and New York, 1916, and Euphues: the Anatomy of Wit and Euphues and His England: An Annotated, Modern-Spelling Edition,
Lyly is considered a pioneer of English literature who helped make prose a vehicle of art on the same level with poetry, and Lyly’s dramatic comedies marked an important change in English drama, mixing the pastoral tradition of lyric poetry with elements of classical myth. His references to Greek and Roman classical literature attained great popularity in the pre-Shakespearean Elizabethan court. He influenced writers of his time, as well as later writers including Shakespeare himself. See also, Athenae Oxonienses: An Exact History of All the Writers and Bishops Who Have Had Their Education in the University of Oxford . . . ., Anthony à Wood: A New Edition, with Additions, and a Continuation by Philip Bliss, vol. 1, London, 1813, pp. 676-78; Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Vol. 34, Lyly, John by
321. 1580 The second mention of Robin Hood and Little John as outlaws in the time of Richard I (by John Stow) in ‘The Chronicles of England from Brute unto this present yeare of Christ, 1580. Collected by J. Stow, citizen of London,’ (London, by R. Newberie at the assignement of H. Bynneman). There is a copy in the Folger Shakespeare Library, Washington, D. C. This is a repeat of the entry in Stow’s Summarie of Englyshe Chronicles of 1565 (see no. 262 above), but to ‘The Chronicles of England’ he adds the earliest known story of King John and Mawde (or Matilda), translated from its source, the Latin ‘Chronicle of Dunmow’ by Nicholas de Bromfield (1259 – after 1326), canon of Little Dunmow, Essex. The very short fragment of the Dunmow Chronicle is apparently preserved only in Stow’s transcript*, which was a source for some of Anthony Munday’s plays, including those of Robin Hood (see no. 378 below).
* The surviving fragments of the Dunmow Chronicle (BL MS Cotton Cleopatra C. III (s. xvi/xvii), fols. 281r-290v), comes from the collections of Francis Thynne (1545-1608), an associate of Stow. This suggests that Stow must either have lent Thynne the manuscript which Thynne never returned, or that Thynne came into possession of it at some point after Stow’s death (see King John (Mis) Remembered: The Dunmow Chronicle, the Lord Admiral’s Men, and the Formation of Cultural Memory, Igor Djordjevic, p. 44, n. 5, Ashgate Publishing, 2015, and Routledge, 2016).
323. 1581 ‘A tale of Robin Hood’ mentioned in The Stage of Popish toyes attributed to Henri Estienne, or Étienne (1531–1598). The dedication is to ‘the right honorable, Sir Christopher Hattō, Knight, Captaine of hir Maiesties Garde, Vizchamberlaine to hir highnesse, and of hir Maiesties most honorable priuie Counsaile.’ It is signed by George North, who ‘compyled’ this work from Estienne’s Apologie upon Herodot. The well-known saying ‘A man’s home is his castle’ first appears in this work, and it was subsequently quoted with the force of legal authority by English judge Sir Edward Coke in 1644. There is a copy in the Huntington Library. It was reproduced by the Text Creation Partnership in partnership with ProQuest’s Early English Books Online, Gale Cengage’s Eighteenth Century Collections Online, and Readex’s Evans Early American Imprints.
A printer, lexicographer, and traveller, Henri Estienne was also called Henri II, or Henri the Younger. He belonged to a family of scholars and printers – the French form of the name being anglicized to Stephens, and latinized to Stephanus. Henri was the eldest son of Robert Estienne, the second son of Henri Estienne (d. 1520), who descended from a noble family of Provence. He came to Paris in 1502, and soon afterwards set up a printing establishment at the top of the rue Saint-Jean de Beauvais, on the hill of Saint-Geneviève opposite the law school. After his death, his son Robert acted as assistant to his stepfather, and in this capacity superintended the printing of a Latin edition of the New Testament in 1523.
In the preface to his edition of Aulus Gellius (1585), Henri the younger gives an interesting account of his father Robert’s household, in which, owing to the various nationalities of those who were employed on the press, Latin was used as a common language. Henri thus picked up Latin as a child, but by his own request he was allowed to learn Greek as a serious study before Latin. At the age of fifteen he become a pupil of Pierre Danès, at that time the first Greek scholar in France. Two years later he began to attend the lectures of Jacques Toussain, one of the royal professors of Greek, and in the same year (1545) was employed by his father Robert to collate a MS. of Dionysius of Halicarnassus. In 1547 Henri went to Italy, where he spent three years in hunting for and collating MSS. and mixing with learned men. In 1550 he visited England, where he was favourably received by Edward VI, and then Flanders, where he learnt Spanish. In 1551 he joined his father Robert at Geneva, which henceforth became his home. In 1554 he gave to the world, as the first fruits of his researches, two first editions, viz. a tract of Dionysius of Halicarnassus and the so-called ‘Anacreon.’ In 1556 he discovered at Rome ten new books (xi.-xx.) of Diodorus Siculus. In 1557 he issued from the press which in the previous year he had set up at Geneva three first editions, viz. Athenagoras, Maximus Tyrius, and some fragments of Greek historians, including Appian’s Ἀννιβαλική, and Ἰβηρική and an edition of Aeschylus, in which for the first time the Agamemnon was printed in entirety and as a separate play. In 1559 he printed a Latin translation from his own pen of Sextus Empiricus, and an edition of Diodorus Siculus with the new books. With his father Robert dying in the same year, Henri became under his will owner of his press, subject, however, to the condition of keeping it at Geneva. In 1566 he published his best-known French work, the Apologie pour Hérodote, or, as he himself called it, L’Introduction au traité de la conformité des merveilles anciennes avec les modernes ou Traité préparatif à l’Apologie pour Hérodote (the source for The Stage of Popish toyes). Some passages being considered objectionable by the Geneva consistory, he was compelled to cancel the pages containing them. The book became highly popular, and within sixteen years twelve editions were printed. In 1572 he published the great work upon which he had been labouring for many years, the Thesaurus Graecae linguae, in 5 vols. fol. The publication in 1578 of his Deux Dialogues du nouveau françois ilalianizé brought him into a fresh dispute with the consistory. To avoid their censure he went to Paris, and resided at the French court for a year. On his return to Geneva he was summoned before the consistory, and, proving contumacious, was imprisoned for a week. Thereafter he lived an itinerant existence in cities such as Basel, Heidelberg, Pest, and Vienna, rarely returning to Geneva – these journeys being undertaken partly in the hope of procuring patrons and purchasers – for the large sums that he had spent on such publications as the Thesaurus and the Plato of 1578 had almost ruined him. His press stood nearly at a standstill. A few editions of classical authors were brought out, but each successive one showed a falling off. Such value as the later ones had was chiefly due to the notes furnished by Isaac Casaubon, who in 1586 had married his daughter Florence. Late in 1597 he visited his daughter and her husband in Montpellier, and on the return journey, in January 1598, he died in Lyon.
For over thirty years the amount that he produced, whether as printer, editor or original writer, was enormous. Eighteen first editions of Greek authors and one of a Latin author are due to his press. His reputation as a scholar and editor increased over the years, and his familiarity with the Greek language was quite exceptional. The work, however, on which his fame as a scholar is most surely based is the Thesaurus Graecae linguae. After making due allowance for the fact that considerable materials for the work had been already collected by his father Robert, and that he received considerable assistance from the German scholar Sylburg, he is still entitled to the very highest praise as the producer of a work which was of the greatest service to scholarship and which in those early days of Greek learning could have been produced by no one but a giant. See, Encyclopædia Britannica, 1911, Vol. 9, Estienne, by Arthur Augustus Tilley, pp. 798-800; The Oxford Dictionary of the Renaissance, Gordon Campbell, Oxford University Press, 2003, p. 261.
324. 1581-82 Woodbury, Devon: 8s. received from William Rider for two green coats. [REED: Devon, 286].
325. 1582 Dalkeith, Lothian: The Presbytery gives order for measures to suppress ‘abbott of vnressones playis or robene hudis’ [Mill, Medieval Plays, 168-69].
326. 1582 A reference to the May games and ‘maymarrions’ (i.e., Maid Marian) in A Dialogue agaynst light, lewde, and lasciuious dauncing by the author, translator, and editor, Christopher Fetherston or Fetherstone. Little is know of his life, he was apparently a student in divinity, which is mentioned in the title of his other work: The commentaries of M. Iohn Caluin vpon the Actes of the Apostles, faithfully translated out of Latine into English for the great profite of our countrie-men, by Christopher Fetherstone student in diuinitie (Londini: [Printed by Thomas Dawson] impensis G. Bishop, 1585). He is described as a minister of the word of God in An abridgement of the Institution of Christian religion, written by M. Ihon Caluin. VVherein briefe and sound answers to the obiections of the aduersaries are set downe: By William Lawne minister of the word of God. Faithfully translated out of Latine into English by Christopher Fetherstone minister of the word of God (Printed at Edinburgh [i.e. London]: By Eliot’s Court Press, 1586). Other works that bear his name include: A harmonie vpon the three Euangelists, Matthew, Mark and Luke with the commentarie of M. Iohn Caluine: faithfully translated out of Latine into English, by E.P. Whereunto is also added a commentarie vpon the Euangelist S. Iohn, by the same authour, Eusebius Pagit (1547?-1617); Christopher Fetherston (Londini: Printed by Thomas Dawson impensis Geor. Bishop, 1584); The Lamentations of Ieremie, in prose and meeter, with apt notes to sing them withall: Togither with Tremelius his annotations, translated out of Latin into English by Christopher Fetherstone, for the profit of all those to whom God hath giuen an in-sight into spirituall things (London: Iohn Wolfe, 1587), and A Christian and wholesom admonition directed to the Frenchmen, which are reuolted from true religion, and haue polluted themselues with the superstition and idolatrie of poperie, Léonard Constant (d. 1610); Christopher Fetherston (London: Printed by Iohn Wolfe, dwelling in Distaffe Lane, neere the signe of the Castle, 1587). See, Fetherston, Christopher, WorldCat Identities; Centered on the Word: Literature, Scripture, and the Tudor-Stuart Middle Way, Daniel W. Doerksen and Christopher Hodgkins, Newark: University of Delaware Press, 2004, pp. 144-45, n. 27.
327. 1582 Another mention of the proverb Robin Hood’s pennyworths (see no. 260 above) in An Heptameron of Civil Discourses, by the dramatist and author George Whetstone (1544?-1587). Few details of his life are known, and even fewer can be verified. Most of the information regarding his life is based on information from an inquisition post mortem after the death of his father Robert Whetstone, who died in 1557; from the will of Robert Whetstone; and from a few references in the Calendar of State Papers. Further information can be found, less certainly, in George’s supposedly autobiographical writings. According to Sidney Lee in the Dictionary of National Biography, George tried his fortune at court, wasted his patrimony by reckless living, then subsequently denounced the depravity of London, declaring that he was fraudulently deprived of his property, left England for France, entered the army, apparently joining in 1572, an English regiment on active service in the Low Countries against Spain, seems to have made the acquaintance of George Gascoigne and Thomas Churchyard in Holland, returned to London in 1574, and as a last resort turned to literature to earn his living, first appeared in print as author of lines ‘in praise of Gascoigne and his posies,’ which were prefixed to Gascoigne’s ‘Flowers,’ 1573? (see no. 301 above), was present when Gascoigne died in 1577, produced several works, but literature proved to be an uncertain support, accompanied Sir Humphrey Gilbert on his voyage to Newfoundland, returned to Plymouth in 1579, visited Italy in 1580, returned to England, produced several more works, temporarily resumed his military career, accompanied the English forces to Holland, was present at the battle of Zutphen, when Sir Philip Sidney received his fatal wound (see no. 322 above), returned to England, produced several more works, and died around 1587. Thomas C. Izard produced the first scholarly work that attempted to separate historical data from unsupported hearsay in George Whetstone: Mid-Elizabethan Gentleman of Letters (New York, 1942).
George’s father Robert was a haberdasher who owned property in London and York, as well as in the counties of Essex, Leicester, Stafford, Kent, Somerset and Middlesex, and according to Izard, George was born in 1551. His education is not documented, but his brothers Bernard and Francis matriculated from St. John’s College at Cambridge, and Francis was admitted to Gray’s Inn in 1578. George probably received a similar education, and in the epistle prefacing The Rocke of Regard, his first published work, he refers to his lodgings in Holborne, a district near the Inns of Court, where his fellow writers and associates George Gascoigne, Thomas Watson, and Thomas Churchyard had been law students. After publishing The Rocke of Regard, George appears to have travelled abroad, and his later writings reveal a marked indebtedness to French literary works, especially to Marguerite de Navarre’s Heptameron and to the translations of ‘Mexia’ by Antoine du Verdier and Claude Gruget. In 1578, George participated in one of Sir Humphrey Gilbert’s voyages, but there is no record of George’s life between 1578 and his military career after 1585, but he did publish several works, including the Heptameron and sections of The English Myrror, at this time, and he claims to have made a journey to Italy in 1580. In the Heptameron, George’s epistle to Sir Christopher Hatton states that he wrote the book to acknowledge ‘many received favours, of a right noble Italian Gentleman’. There is a copy in the George and his brother Bernard served in Leicester’s campaign in the Low Countries sometime after 1585, but there has been some confusion as the whether George actually witnessed Sidney’s death (see no. 322 above), which he describes in his poem, Sir Phillip Sidney, His Honorable Life, His Valiant Death, and True Vertues (1587). The Sidney elegy was printed in the fall of 1587, and in a letter prefacing the poem, the publisher Thomas Cadman refers to the death of George in the Low Countries. His death can be reconstructed from entries in the Calendar of State Papers, and Mark Eccles (‘Whetstone’s Death,’ Times Literary Supplement, 27 August, 1931) showed that in 1587, George quarrelled with one of the English captains (Edmund Udall), and in the ensuing duel, George was fatally wounded; this happened outside the garrison town of Bergen-op-Zoom. George left a widow, Anne — but the date of his marriage is unknown and the identity of his wife remains a mystery.
George’s published works include: The Rocke of Regard (1576), A Remembraunce of George Gaskoigne (1577), Promos and Cassandra (a play in two parts, 1578), A Mirour for Magestrates of Cyties (1584); published with A Touchstone for the Time (1584), The Honorable Reputation of a Souldier (1585), The English Myrror (1586), and Sir Phillip Sidney, His Honorable Life, His Valiant Death, and True Vertues (1587). Shakespeare apparently used ‘Promos and Cassandra’ for the plot of Measure for Measure. See also, Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Vol. 60, Whetstone, George by
328. 1582 Two mentions of Robin Hood in The Hould of Humilitie by the poet James Yates (fl. 1582). He describes himself in the dedication of his only known volume as a ‘serving man,’ and no further details of his biography have been discovered. There is a copy in the British Library. Thomas Park (1759–1834) the antiquarian, bibliographer, and literary editor, suggested that Yates came from Suffolk, on the ground that ‘he addressed verses to “Mr. P. W.” who visited Ipswich and wrote an epitaph on Mrs. Pooley of Badley.’ Mrs. Pooley was ‘sister to my lady Wentworth,’ who may have been one of the wives of Thomas, second baron Wentworth, though there were many knights in the Wentworth family. Most of them, however, belonged to Suffolk, and it is possible that ‘Mr. P. W.’ may have been Peter or Paul Wentworth. Yates has also been associated with Warwickshire on the grounds that he dedicates his work to one Henry Reynolds, who is assumed to be identical with Henry Reynolds (fl. 1630), and that Michael Drayton, who was a Warwickshire man, also dedicated his epistle ‘Of Poets and Poesie’ to Reynolds. Upon this flimsy evidence is also based the theory that the ‘verses written at the departure of his friend W. S. when he went to dwell in London’ included in Yates’s volume refer to Shakespeare. It is more probable that Yates’s patron was the Henry Reynolds of Belstead who married Elizabeth, daughter of Edmund Withipol of Ipswich, and that ‘Mr. P. W.’ was Edmund’s brother, Paul Withipol (Davy, Suffolk Collections, vol. xciii. f. 341).
All Yates’s poems are included in one volume, which was entered on the ‘Stationers’ Register’ on 7 June 1582 (Arber, Stationers’ Reg. ii. 412), and published at London in the same year (black letter, 4to) ‘by John Wolfe, dwellinge in Distaffe lane, neere the signe of the Castle.’ The title is given by Thomas Corser as ‘The Castell of Courtesie. Whereunto is adioyned the Holde of Humilitie; with the Chariot of Chastitie thereunto annexed. Also a Dialogue between Age and Youth, and other matters herein conteined.’ In John Payne Collier’s ‘Extracts from the Register of the Stationers’ Company’ (ii. 166) and in the ‘Gentleman’s Magazine’ (1840, i. 385) the order of the first two titles is reversed, and Collier states that the ‘Castell of Courtesie’ is a ‘separate publication of which we have no copy nor any other record.’ This is apparently an error, for, though each of the three parts has a separate title-page, all three titles are given in the entry in the ‘Stationers’ Register’ of 7 June 1582 – however the ‘Castell of Courtesie’ is listed as a seperate edition. The volume is chiefly interesting by reason of its rarity; George Steevens possessed an imperfect copy which he believed to be unique, and refused on that account to lend to Thomas Park. This copy was eventually bought for 9l. by the English bishop Reginald Heber (1783 – 1826), who secured another imperfect copy and from the two made up a complete copy, which is now at Britwell. Thomas Corser also possessed two imperfect copies, and these were bought at the sale of his books in 1871 by Mr. W. C. Hazlitt, who, however, was unable to make up a complete copy from them. No other copies are known to be extant. The poems included in the volume are distinguished more by their religious and moral tone than by any poetic excellence. Besides the extracts printed by Collier and in the ‘Gentleman’s Magazine’ (1840, i. 385–7), others are given in the ‘Shakespearean Repository’ (ed. James Hamilton Fennell, January 1823), in ‘Select Poetry’ (Parker Soc. ii. 450–1), and in Corser’s ‘Collectanea Anglo-Poetica’ (xi. 432–5).
Samuel Egerton Brydges gives the title as: The Castell of Courtesie. whereunto is adjoyned the Holde of Humilitie; with the Chariot of Chastitie thereunto annexed. Also a Dialogue between Age and Youth; and other matters herein conteined. By James Yates, Servingman. 1582. He records the second title, after fol. 8, as: The Hould of Humilitie: adjoyned to the Castle of Courtesie. Compiled by James Yates Servingman. Captious conceipts good reader doe dismiss: And, friendly weigh the willing minde of his, Which more doth write for pleasure then for praise, Whose worthlesse workes are simplie pend alwaies. London. Imprinted (as above.) Brydges records a third title near the middle of the book as: The Chariot of Chastitie, drawne to publication by dutiful Desire, GoodWill, and Commendation. Also a Dialogue between Diana and Venus. With Ditties devised at sundrie idle times, for recreation sake: set downe in such wise as insueth by James Yates. London. Imprinted (as above) 1582. Brydges also mentions that a copy of this book was licensed to John Wolfe, in 1581, and the copy that Brydges had obtained ‘appears to have been preserved from utter demolition by Mr. T. Martin of Palgrave, the Suffolk antiquary, and to have descended from the curious collection of Major Pearson to the select library of Mr. Steevens, in whose sale-catalogue it will be found briefly designated at No. 1134.’ See, Censura Literaria Containing Titles, Abstracts, and Opinions of Old English Books, Samuel Egerton Brydges, Volume III, London, 1807, pp. 175-76; Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Vol. 63, Yates, James (fl.1582), by Albert Frederick Pollard, pp. 294-95.
332. 1584 ‘Telling a tale of Robin hoode’ in the dialogue of the character ‘Sincerity’, in The Three Ladies of London, a play attributed to Robert Wilson (ca. 1550-1600). A second edition appeared in 1592 ‘Printed by Iohn Danter, dwelling in Ducke Lane, neere Smithfield’. It was reproduced by Nabu Press in 2010, HardPress Publishing in 2013, Andesite Press in 2015, and Franklin Classics in 2018. The play itself was probably written in 1581. A playwright and actor, Wilson was one of only nine actor-authors of his day, including William Shakespeare. Nothing is known of Wilson’s early life, but he performed as a comic actor with the Earl of Leicester’s Men in 1572, 1574, and 1581. This was the earliest organized Elizabethan acting company, formed in 1559 from members of the Earl of Leicester’s household. In 1583 Wilson joined the newly created troupe of actors known as the Queen’s men, formed at the command of Queen Elizabeth. This became the most famous of all the London companies during the decade of the eighties. Wilson was a close friend of the noted actor Richard Tarlton (see no. 355 below), another of the twelve founding members of the Queen’s men, whose death is referred to in The Three Lords and Three Ladies of London, published in 1590, a companion and sequel to The Three Ladies of London. It would appear that at or before the virtual break-up of the Queen’s men in the plague of 1592-3, Wilson gave up acting and devoted himself mainly to writing. He was probably the ‘Robert Wilson, Gent,’ who wrote The Cobbler’s Prophecy published in 1594.
Wilson was co-author of several plays for the Admiral’s Men, another theatrical company, whose chief actor was Edward Alleyn. Their manager and effectively their employer until his death in 1616 was Philip Henslowe, whose Diary covering the years 1592 to 1603, documents the Elizabethan theatre and its organization. Henslowe built the Rose Theatre on the Bankside near Southwark Bridge in 1587, and under his financial management, various companies (including the Queen’s Men and the Admiral’s Men) acted there. Henslowe and Alleyn owned and operated the most financially successful theatre businesses of the period, which included the Rose, the Fortune playhouse (built in 1600), and the Bear Garden (rebuilt in 1613 as the Hope playhouse). (See, no 393 below).
There are sixteen separate plays for the Admiral’s men (recorded in Henslowe’s diary) in which Wilson had a share, these include: Earl Godwin and his Three Sons, in two parts with Henry Chettle, Thomas Dekker, and Michael Drayton, March-June 1598; Pierce of Exton, with Chettle, Dekker, and Drayton, April, 1598, but apparently unfinished; Funeral of Richard Coeur-de-Lion, with Chettle, Drayton, and Anthony Munday, June 1598; Chance Medley, with Chettle or Dekker, Drayton, and Munday, August 1598, and Owen Tudor, with Drayton, Hathaway, and Munday, January, 1600, but apparently not finished. As can be seen, Wilson was associated with Anthony Munday (see no. 373 below). The decline of the Admiral’s Men began with the rise of the Lord Chamberlain’s Men (eventually located at the Globe Theatre), a theatrical company which Shakespeare was associated with for most of his professional career as a dramatist. In his Palladis Tamia of 1598, Francis Meres a churchman and author mentions ‘our wittie Wilson, who for learning and extemporall witte in this facultie is without compare or compeere’. The sudden disappearance of Wilson’s name from Henslowe’s diary in 1600 makes it almost certain that this is the ‘Robert Wilson, yoman (a player)’ who was buried at St. Giles’s Cripplegate, on 20 November 1600. See, The Elizabethan Stage, E. K. Chambers, 4 vols., Oxford, 1923; Thomas Creede and the Repertory of the Queen’s Men 1583-1592, G. M. Pinciss, Modern Philology, Vol. 67, No. 4, University of Chicago Press (May, 1970), pp. 326-28; Tudor England: An Encyclopedia, Arthur F. Kinney, David W. Swain, Eugene D. Hill, William B. Long, Garland Publishing, Inc., New York and London, 2001, pp. 341-42; Encyclopedia of British Writers: 16th and 17th Centuries, Alan Hager, Book Builders LLC, 2005, p. 428.
333. 1584 Robin Hood, Robin good fellowe, Hudgin, and Frier Rush referred to in ‘The Discouerie of Witchcraft, wherein the Lewde dealing of Witches and Witchmongers is notablie detected, in sixteen books … whereunto is added a Treatise upon the Nature and Substance of Spirits and Devils.’ London: [Henry Denham for] William Brome, 1584. The book was twice reissued in London in 1651 (with a different title to that of 1584) in quarto by Richard Cotes; the two issues slightly differ from each other in the imprint on title-page. Another reissue was dated 1654. A third edition in folio, dated 1665, included nine new chapters, and added a second book to ‘The Discourse on Devils and Spirits.’ Dr. Brinsley Nicholson edited a reprint of the first edition of 1584, with the additions of that of 1665, with the title The Discoverie of Withcraft by Reginald Scot, Esquire, London, 1886. A translation into Dutch, edited by Thomas Basson, an English stationer living at Leyden, appeared there in 1609. It was undertaken on the recommendation of the professors, and was dedicated to the university curators and the burgomaster of Leyden. A second edition, published by G. Basson, the first editor’s son, was printed at Leyden in 1637.
Reginald or Reynold Scott or Scot (1538?–1599), was a writer who produced England’s first major work on demonology and witchcraft. One of the chief sceptics of witchcraft, he had studied the superstitions respecting witchcraft in courts of law in country districts, where the prosecution of witches was constant, and in village life, where the belief in witchcraft flourished. He appears to have been a justice of the peace or a magistrate and therefore he may have participated in the interrogation of suspected witches. While he does not mention this in his book, Scot does detail some local cases with which he was familiar. He set out to prove that the belief in witchcraft and magic was wrong, rejected alike by reason and religion, and that spiritualistic events were fraudulent or illusions due to mental disturbance in the observers.
Scot’s writings had the aim of stopping the cruel persecution of the poor, aged, and simple persons, who were popularly credited with being witches, and he laid the blame to a large extent, on the Roman catholic church; he strongly critized catholic writers like Jean Bodin (1530–1596), author of ‘Démonomie des Sorciers’ (Paris, 1580), and Jacobus Sprenger, joint-author of ‘Malleus Maleficarum’ (Nuremberg, 1494). Scot adopted the liberal views of Cornelius Agrippa (1486–1535) and John Wier (1515–1588), author of ‘De Præstigiis Demonum’ (Basle, 1566).
The son of Richard Scot, second son of Sir John Scot (d. 1533) of Scots Hall in Smeeth, Kent, the young Scot entered Hart Hall, Oxford, but left the university without a degree. Marrying in 1568, he seems to have spent the rest of his life in his native county of Kent, where he was an active country gentleman, managing property which he inherited from his kinsfolk about Smeeth and Brabourne. He found a generous patron in Sir Thomas Scot, his first cousin in whose house of Scots Hall he often stayed. He was undoubtedly the Reginald Scot who acted in 1588 as a captain of untrained foot-soldiers at the county muster, and he was returned to the parliament of 1588–9 as member for New Romney. Scot married a second time and he died at Smeeth on 9 Oct 1599. His small properties about Brabourne, Aldington, and Romney Marsh were left to his widow. The last words of his will run: ‘Great is the trouble my poor wife hath had with me, and small is the comfort she hath received at my hands, whom if I had not matched withal I had not died worth one groat.’
In his ‘Discovery of Witchcraft’ Scot numbers no less than 212 authors whose works in Latin he had consulted, and twenty-three authors who wrote in English. The names in the first list include many Greek and Arabic writers; among those in the second are Bale, Fox, Sir Thomas More, John Record, Barnabe Googe, Abraham Fleming, and William Lambarde. Abraham Fleming, one of the editors of the 1587 posthumous edition of Holinshed’s Chronicles (see no. 308 above), was a significant contributor to the ‘Discovery’, he translated much poetry from Latin into English. It was to Holinshed’s Chronicles that Scot was to contribute a long account of the rebuilding of Dover Harbour. Scot’s ‘Discovery’ attracted widespread attention, and he received some praise from Gabriel Harvey in his ‘Pierce’s Supererogation,’ 1593. After George Gifford (d. 1620) in two works published respectively in 1587 and 1593, and William Perkins (1558–1602) had sought to confute Scot, James VI of Scotland repeated the attempt in his ‘Dæmonologie’ (1597), where he described the opinions of Wier and Scot as ‘damnable.’ According to tradition, on his accession to the English throne James went a step further, and ordered all copies of Scot’s ‘Discovery’ to be burnt (Gisbert Voet, Selectarum Disputationum Theologicarum Pars Tertia, Utrecht, 1659, p. 564). John Rainolds in ‘Censura Librorum Apocryphorum’ (1611), Richard Bernard in ‘Guide to Grand Jurymen’ (1627), Joseph Glanvill in ‘Philosophical Considerations touching Witches and Witchcraft’ (1666), and Meric Casaubon in ‘Credulity and Uncredulity’ (1668) continued the attack on Scot’s position, which was defended by Thomas Ady in ‘A Treatise concerning the Nature of Witches and Witchcraft’ (1656), and by John Webster in ‘The Displaying of Supposed Witchcraft’ (1677).
It is interesting to note that Shakespeare drew from his study of Scot’s book hints for his picture of the witches in ‘Macbeth.’ Known to his contemporaries as a scholar and bibliophile, Scot also pursued his own horticultural interests, publishing the first printed book on the cultivation of hops in 1574 entitiled ‘Perfect Platform of a Hop-garden, and necessary instructions for the making and maintainance thereof, with Notes and Rules for Reformation of all Abuses.’ A second edition, ‘now newly corrected and augmented,’ appeared in 1576, and a third in 1578. See Dictionary of National Biography, Vol. 51, 1885-1900, Scott, Reginald by Sidney Lee, pp. 63-65; Strange, Incredible and Impossible Things: The Early Anthropology of Reginald Scot, Roland Littlewood, Sage Publications (Article), 2009; England’s First Demonologist: Reginald Scot & ‘The Discoverie of Witchcraft’, Philip C. Almond, I. B. Tauris & Co Ltd, 2011.
334. 1585 Dirleton, Lothian: ‘The King remained at Dirleton twelve dayes. There were in companie with him Arran, Sir Robert Melvill, Secretar Matlane, Phairnihirst, Colonell Stewart, and the Maister of Gray. They passid the time with the play of Robin hood’ [David Calderwood, The History of the Kirk of Scotland, ed. Thomas Thomson (Edinburgh: Wodrow Society, 1842-49), 4.366].
335. 1587 ‘Robyn Hoods Baye’ mentioned in the second edition of Britannia by William Camden (1551-1623), a survey, county by county, of the antiquities of Britain, a successor to Leland (see no. 156 above). ‘Robyn Hoods Baye’ is repeated in the edition of 1590, however the subsequent editions of 1594, 1600, and 1607 (the last with Camden’s authorship) include a mention of Robin’s grave at Kirklees. Each edition is an expansion of the previous, with added text and illustrations, but the outlaw does not appear in Camden’s first edition of 1586. Copies of the 1590, 1594, and 1600 editions are in the Huntington Library, San Marino, California, and copies of the 1587 and 1607 editions in the Folger Shakespeare Library, Washington, DC. Written in Latin, the first English translation of Britannia came in 1610 at the hand of Philemon Holland (with Camden’s collaboration), with a revised edition in 1637. The next translation was published by Edmund Gibson in 1695, with enlarged and revised editions in 1722, 1730?, 1753 and 1772. This was superseded by Richard Gough in his edition of 1789, followed by a second in 1806.
The antiquary and historian William Camden was born in London, the son of Sampson and his wife Elizabeth. He received his early education at Christ’s Hospital and St Paul’s school, and in 1566 went to Magdalen College, Oxford. Moving to Broadgates Hall (afterwards Pembroke College), and later to Christ Church, he was soon engaged in controversy, as he failed to secure a fellowship at All Souls College, probably due to his to his hostility towards the Roman Catholics. In 1570 he applied for the degree of B.A., which was refused, and although a renewed application was granted in 1573 it is doubtful if he ever took a degree. In 1571 he went to London and devoted himself to antiquarian studies, and he travelled to various parts of England to collect material for his Britannia. Camden was made second master of Westminster school in 1575, and headmaster in 1593. The vacations which he enjoyed as a schoolmaster left him time for study and travel. In 1589 he was granted the prebend of llfracombe, and in 1597 he resigned his position at Westminster on being made Clarenceux king-at-arms, an appointment which caused some ill-feeling. The York co-herald, Ralph Brooke, led an attack on the genealogical accuracy of the Britannia, to which Camden answered in an appendix to the fifth edition; his reputation came through the ordeal undamaged. Camden compiled a Greek grammar, Institutio Graecae Grammatices Compendiaria, which became very popular, and he published an edition of the writings of Asser, Giraldus Cambrensis, Thomas Walsingham and others, under the title, Anglica, Hibernica, Normannica, Cambrica, a veteribus scripta, published at Frankfort in 1602, and again in 1603. He also drew up a list of the epitaphs in Westminster Abbey, which was issued as Reges, Reginae, Nobiles et alii in ecclesia collegiata Beati Petri Westmonasterii sepulti. This was enlarged and published again in 1603 and 1606. In 1605 he published his Remains concerning Britain, a book of collections from the Britannia, which quickly passed through seven editions; and he wrote an official account of the trial of the Gunpowder Plot conspirators as Actio in Henricum Garnetum, Societatis Jesuiticae in Anglia superiorem et caeteros. In 1607 he began his work on a history of the reign of Queen Elizabeth, urged by his patron Lord Burghley. The first part of this history dealing with the reign down to 1588 was published in 1615 under the title Annales rerum Anglicarum et Hibernicarum regnante Elizabetha. The second part of this work, finished in 1617, was published, after the author’s death, at Leiden in 1625 and in London in 1627. Some controversy arose over Camden’s treatment of Mary, queen of Scots, and it was believed that he had altered his original narrative in order to please James I. Lord Burghley and Fulke Greville were Camden’s chief patrons, and he was on good terms with Queen Elizabeth herself. He also had the advantage of a well placed web of former pupils, which included politicians such as Sir Robert Cotton, Dudley Carleton, Richard Neile (later Archbishop of York), and the playwright Ben Jonson.
Camden was a founding member of the Society of Antiquaries and worked closely with, and was influenced by, other antiquaries in England at this time, such as Richard Carew, Sampson Erdeswicke, William Lambarde, George Owen, and John Stow (see no. 262 above). Camden spent the latter years of his life in retirement, mainly at his home in Chislehurst, Kent, where he suffered from poor health. He died there on the 9th of November 1623, and was buried in Westminster Abbey, his monument of white marble (the inscription gives an incorrect age) still stands. Before his death he founded a chair of history at the University of Oxford, and in 1838 the Camden Society was founded at Cambridge in his honour; this was merged with the Royal Historical Society in 1897.
Camden’s Britannia met with great success, nothing of the kind had been attempted since the days of Leland, and by him only in less outline. Although he did not become a household name, Camden stands out as one of the founding fathers of English Local History, with Britannia his chief claim to fame. See Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Vol. 08, Camden, William by Edward Maunde Thompson, pp. 277-85; Encyclopedia Britannica, 1911, Vol.5, Camden, William, p. 101; William Camden and the Re-Discovery of England, R.C. Richardson, Transactions of the Leicestershire Archaeological and Historical Society, 2004, Vol. 78, pp. 108-23 [PDF] le.ac.uk; Encyclopedia.com, J. A. Cannon, 2019; Westminster Abbey, Dean and Chapter of Westminster, 2020 (online).
336. 1587 Another mention of Robin Hood by Thomas Churchyard (see no. 266 above) in The Worthines of Wales. This poetic work was produced in his later years, he went ‘sundry times of purpose’ through Wales in order to write his description of that country. There is a copy in the Huntington Library, San Marino, California. A reprint for Thomas Evans in the Strand (London, 1776), was followed by another for the Spenser Society (Manchester, 1876).
337. 1587-88 St. Ives, Cornwall: Money paid to the Robin Hood of St. Columb Minor [Reference courtesy of Evelyn Newlyn and Sally L. Joyce].
338. 1587-88 Chagford, Devon: The ‘Young Men’s or Hoodsmen’s Accounts’ list assets including ‘the siluer arrow’ [REED: Devon, 56].
339. 1588 Haddington, Lothian: Town authorities promise ‘to abolische and remoue . . . . maj plaijs of roben hude, litle Iohne, abitis of vnresoun’ [Mill, Medieval Plays, 253].
340. 1588 St. Columb Major, Cornwall: Churchwardens accounts record money received ‘for the lont of the Robbyn hoodes clothes’ [J. Charles Cox, Churchwardens Accounts from the Fourteenth Century to the Close of the Seventeenth Century (London: Methuen, 1913), 280; Jane A. Bakere, The Cornish Ordinalia. A Critical Study (Cardiff: University of Wales Press, 1980), 18].
341. 1588 Robin Hood, Little John, Frier Tuck and Maid Marian mentioned in A discoursiue probleme concerning Prophesies by John Harvey. There is a copy in the British Library, and another in the Huntington Library.
John Harvey (1564–1592), astrologer and physician, was baptised at Saffron Walden, Essex, 13 Feb. 1564, the son of John Harvey, master ropemaker, and younger brother of Gabriel Harvey and of Richard Harvey (see nos. 354 and 367 below). He matriculated as a pensioner of Queens’ College, Cambridge, in June 1578 (B.A. 1580 and M.A. 1584). In 1587 the university granted him a license to practise physic, and he became a practitioner at King’s Lynn in Norfolk, where, according to his brother Gabriel, he was highly respected among the Norfolk gentry. Robert Greene’s contemptuous reference to Harvey and Harvey’s father and two brothers in his ‘Quippe for an Upstart Courtier’ (see no. 364 below) led to Gabriel Harvey’s well-known defence of his family in his ‘Foure Letters’ (1592). Gabriel describes John as ‘a proper toward man,’ ‘a skilful physician,’ and a M.D. of Cambridge, and mentions that he died, aged 29, shortly after returning to Lynn from Norwich in July 1592. He supplies a Latin epitaph. ‘John Harvey’s Welcome to Robert Greene’ is the title of a sonnet included in Gabriel Harvey’s ‘Foure Letters.’ Harvey also published: 1. ‘An astrologicall addition or supplement to be annexed to the late discourse [by his brother Richard Harvey] upon the Great Conjunction of Saturn and Jupiter, together with the Learned Worke of Hermes Trismegistus intituled Iatromathematica, that is his Physical Mathematiques. … Lately englished by Iohn Harvey at the request of M. Charles P.,’ London, 1583 (by Richard Watkins), 8vo. The last portion of the book, the ‘Learned Worke,’ was alone in the British Museum Library. 2. ‘An Almanacke or annuall Calendar, with a Compendious Prognostication for … 1589,’ London, 1588, 8vo, was at the Lambeth Palace Library. See, Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Vol. 25, Harvey, John (1563?-1592) by Sidney Lee, pp. 89-90; Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, in Association with The British Academy, From the earliest times to the year 2000, H. C. G. Matthew and Brian Harrison, Oxford University Press, 2004, Harvey, John (bap. 1564, d. 1592).
342. 1588-89 Bridgnorth, Shropshire: Chamberlain’s accounts include 2s. 6d. ‘Paied at Roger Harleis by the commaundment of Mr. Bailiff upon them which plaied Robin Hood’ [REED: Shropshire, 19].
343. c. 1588-89 An allegory ‘A Tale of Robin Hoode: The Overthrowe of the Abbyes’. This poem was mentioned by Joseph Ritson in the notes and illustrations to his life of Robin Hood, in the various editions of ‘Robin Hood: a collection of all the ancient poems, songs, and ballads, now extant, relative to that celebrated English outlaw’ – and it was printed in the work of John Mathew Gutch and Frederick J. Furnivall. Two words stand out in the heading – ‘Puritan’ which probably originated in the 1560s, and ‘politician’ (recorded in the Oxford English Dictionary) is from 1588; also, I have noticed that ‘overthrow’ in relation to the church, appears in the titles of the first two Marprelate tracts, ‘The Epistle’ and ‘The Epitome’, all of which suggests that the poem was written during the Marprelate period (see no. 344 below). The poem’s two characters are written as ‘Wat’ and ‘Ief’ in Furnivall’s edition, and the same names appear in the stinging satire against Cardinal Wolsey, written by William Roy and Jerome Barlow (see no. 142 above). The author of the poem appears to have been familiar with the work of Mantuan (1448-1516), the Italian Carmelite reformer, humanist, and poet; his Ecloga VIII, lines 13-14: Unde fluunt amnes? . . . / Fulgens ubi nascitur aurum?, has a familiar ring to lines 67, 68, and 72 of the poem: On two mounteynes hee thee planted / ffull of springs which never scanted / ffull of pretious stones and goold. Other traces of Mantuan are the idea of the ‘loves storye’, line 17, and the description of the ruined abbeys lines 101-6, may owe something to Mantuan X.151 and IX. 205-11. See, Pastoral: mediaeval into Renaissance, Helen Cooper, Ipswich : Brewer ; Totowa, N.J. : Rowman & Littlefield, 1977, pp. 195-96, and notes, pp 232-33; Robin Hood in Outlaw/ed Spaces: Media, Performance, and Other New Directions, Lesley Coote, Valerie B. Johnson, Routledge, 2017, p. 194.
344. 1589 Robin Hood mentioned in the Marprelate tract Hay any worke for Cooper. The Marprelate controversy was essentially a war of words fought with the use of printed tracts, a war between Puritans and the protectors of the established Church. The so-called Marprelate tracts were a milestone in the literary history of England, the quality of satire is among the best of the Elizabethan period. They were produced at the time of the ongoing struggle between the forces of conformity and nonconformity in the post-Reformation Church of England. The Puritans were English Protestants who regarded the Reformation of the Church under Elizabeth I as incomplete, and they sought to simplify and regulate forms of worship. On the other hand the Episcopacy, who had the support of Elizabeth, were determined to maintain their structure – the church governed by bishops. In 1586, Archbishop Whitgift obtained from the Court of Star Chamber a decree which banned the publication of books, pamphlets, or tracts not authorized by himself or the Bishop of London. This gave Whitgift control over the Stationers’ company and the printing presses, and therefore the power to repress literature he considered slanderous or seditious. In effect, this decree allowed Whitgift to repress Puritan writings, which he considered heretical. In 1587 John Bridges, Dean of Salisbury (who is mentioned in the titles of the first two Marprelate tracts, ‘The Epistle’ and ‘The Epitome’), published a 1,401-page book entitled A Defence of the Government established in the Church of England for Ecclesiastical Matters, which was criticized in books published by two leading Presbyterians, Dudley Fenner and (probably) Walter Travers (see no. 291 above).
Another critic was John Penry, a Welsh Puritan who was arrested in consequence of Whitgift’s opposition to his first book A Treatise containing the Aeqvity of an Humble Svpplication. Penry appeared before the Court of High Commission, but was later released. In 1588 and 1589 there appeared several Puritan tracts, seven of which have survived, that criticized Whitgift, the bishops, and the Church of England; the authors used the fictitious names of Martin Marprelate, Martin Junior, and Martin Senior. The bishops fought back with An Admonition to the People of England (1589), authored by Thomas Cooper, Bishop of Winchester (ridiculed in Hay any worke for Cooper). The church also hired professional writers to attack Marprelate, among them were John Lyly who wrote Pap with a Hatchet (1589), Thomas Nashe wrote An Almond for a Parrot (1590), and Richard Harvey wrote Plain Percival (1590) and A Theological Discourse of the Lamb of God (1590). John Penry was undoubtedly involved with ‘Marprelate’, but his precise relation has never been satisfactorily explained. At the beginning of 1588 he became interested in Robert Waldegrave’s secret printing press. Penry’s second book, An Exhortation vnto the Gouernours, and people of hir Maiesties countrie of Wales …, appeared from this press in April 1588. Attempts to apprehend the author failed. A third book by Penry, A Defence …, was published in August 1588. The search for the secret press was intensified after the issue of The Epistle …, the first of the Marprelate Tracts. At various times the press was in London, at Fawsley, and at Coventry, and besides printing more Marprelate tracts produced Penry’s Supplication in 1589. Waldegrave now broke his connection with the press and John Hodgkins took his place. The press was moved to Wolston Priory, but Hodgkins was arrested and in 1589 Penry fled to Scotland. In 1590 he produced A Briefe Discovery in answer to the attacks of Richard Bancroft on the Scots Church. Penry re-entered England in September 1592, and allied himself with the London Separatist followers of Henry Barrow. The vicar of Stepney betrayed Penry’s whereabouts and he was arrested at Ratcliff, and imprisoned in the Poultry Compter. At the time of the preliminary examinations Penry wrote his ‘Declaration of Faith and Allegiance.’ The public examination took place in the Old Bailey before sundry magistrates on 5 April 1593, followed on 10 April by an examination before Henry Fanshawe and Richard Young. His first appearance before the King’s Bench took place on 21 May but he was returned to prison. He made a hasty appeal to Lord Burghley and obtained an interview with him, but to no effect. Penry’s trial at the King’s Bench opened on 25 May 1593 when he was indicted under the Act of Uniformity (1 Eliz. cap. 2). His private papers as well as his public writings were used in evidence against him. He was condemned to death and executed at S. Thomas a Watering on 29 May 1593. He left a widow and four young daughters.
Although Penry is thought to have been instrumental in the authorship and printing of the Marprelate tracts, there were undoubtedly others. Penry appears to have lodged with Job Throckmorton, a parliamentarian who had Puritan Sympathies, and he apparently financed Penry and his friends to some degree. The last Marprelate tract and parts of others may have been printed at Throckmorton’s home in the village of Haseley. Throckmorton was implicated, and although he was never punished, he is now thought to have been one of the principal authors of the tracts. More than twenty other possible authors have been proposed over the years, including John Udall, John Field, Eusebius Paget, George Carleton, and Sir Roger Williams. William Pierce published An Historical Introduction to the Marprelate Tracts (London, 1908), and a modern spelling edition of The Marprelate Tracts 1588, 1589 (London, 1911). Joseph L. Black published a version of the tracts designed for student use, The Martin Marprelate Tracts: A Modernized and Annotated Edition (Cambridge, 2008), and an article online (The Martin Marprelate Press: A Documentary History, University of Massachusetts Amherst). See also, Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Vol. 56, Throckmorton, Job by Sidney Lee, pp. 329-30; ‘Dictionary of Welsh Biography’ (online), Penry, John (1563 – 1593), Puritan author, Reverend Principal Robert Tudur Jones, 1959; The Concise Cambridge History of English Literature, George Sampson (third edition, revised by R. C. Churchill) Cambridge, 1970, pp. 137-39; Luminarium Encyclopedia Project, Anniina Jokinen, ‘Martin Marprelate Controversy’, 1996-2010; The Great Ejectment of 1662: Its Antecedents, Aftermath, and Ecumenical Significance, Alan P. F. Sell, Pickwick Publications, 2012, pp. 3-20; Richard Bancroft and Elizabethan Anti-Puritanism, Patrick Collinson, Cambridge, 2013, Chapter 5.
345. 1589 ‘Played the Potter’s part’ mentioned in the Marprelate tract The Just Censure and Reproofe of Martin Junior, obviously derived from the character who fights Robin with the quarter-staff, represented in the early ballad Robin Hood and the Potter, William Copland’s play, and Robin Hood’s Garland: Containing his merry Exploits, and the several Fights which he, Little John, and Will. Scarlet had, upon several occasions (London, Coles, Vere, Wright, 1670). The parson of Stepney (the main village in an area east of the tower of London) who is mentioned in the tract, has been identified as Anthony Anderson. In addition to bearing the potter’s part in Buckinghamshire or Bedfordshire, Anderson was also (according to the marginal note in the tract), guilty of robbing the poor box at Northampton, and getting his maid with child in Leicestershire. This suggests that ‘Martin’ knew intimate details of Anderson’s life. Also John Bridges, Dean of Sarum (or Salisbury), is presented as the Morris fool (see no. 291 above). See also, ‘Marprelate Tracts: The Just Censure’ (www.oxford-shakespeare.com), Nina Green, 1992-2002, p. 19, n. 215.
Thomas Nashe, or Nash (1567–c. 1601), the author of plays, poems, pamphlets and prose, was born in Lowestoft and educated at St John’s College, Cambridge. After graduating B. A. in 1585-6, he became one of the ‘University Wits’, a circle of writers who came to London in the reign of Elizabeth I. By 1588 he had settled in London and he fell in with the playwrights who were providing plays for the London Theatres of Shakespeare’s era. He became friends with the prose writer and dramatists Robert Greene (see no. 364 below) and was also acquainted with Thomas Lodge, Samuel Daniel, and Christopher Marlowe. In 1589 Nashe’s preface to Robert Greene’s Menaphon was published. The preface attacked contemporary writers who plagiarized from classical authors, and it praised Spenser and Greene. The Anatomie of Absurditie, also published in 1589, satirized contemporary literature, especially romances. Nashe also took part in a violent literary controversy with the poet Gabriel Harvey and his brother Richard (see no. 341 above) who had been critical of Nashe’s preface to Greene’s Menaphon. Nashe retaliated in Pierce Penniless, His Supplication to the Devil (1592). The work, a prose satire, was in part an attack on the Harveys, as well as on Nashe’s opponents in the Marprelate controversy; it also protests against the public’s neglect of worthy writers. Gabriel Harvey wrote an unpleasant account of Greene’s final days in his Four Letters the same year, and Nashe responded by writing Four Letters Confuted to defend his dead friend’s memory. The latter was published in 1593, and is also known as Strange Newes of the Intercepting of Certain Letters. Nashe may have tried to make peace in Christs Teares over Jerusalem (1593), a prose work warning Londoners (during one of the country’s worst outbreaks of bubonic plague), that unless they reformed, London would suffer the same fate as Jerusalem. Gabriel Harvey further attacked Nashe’s Pierce Penniless in Pierce’s Supererogation (1593), which Nashe in turn countered with Have with You to Saffron Walden (1596). This ‘war’ was finally ended in June 1599, when Archbishop Whitgift and Bishop Bancroft decreed that ‘all Nasshes bookes and Doctor Harveyes bookes be taken wheresoever they maye be found and that none of theire bookes bee ever printed hereafter’. Nashe left London when he and Ben Jonson were prosecuted as a result of their satirical play The Isle of Dogs, performed in 1597 (see no. 384 below). Nashe’s best-known work, the novel The Unfortunate Traveller, or The Life of Jack Wilton (1594) is now thought to have been the first picaresque novel in English. It is a loosely connected account of adventures real and fictional on the Continent. Important among Nashe’s other writings are Summer’s Last Will and Testament, a masque (1600); The Terrors of the Night, an attack on demonology (1594); and Lenten Stuffe (1599). Nashe apparently died in 1601, aged 34, but the details of his death are uncertain. The Works of Thomas Nashe was edited from the original texts by R.B. McKerrow, 5 vol. (London, 1904–10), and reprinted and re-edited by F.P. Wilson, 1958. See Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Vol. 40, Nash, Thomas by Sidney Lee, pp. 101-109;
347. 1589 Halstead Essex: ‘A boy in the Church, hearing either the sommer Lord with his Maie game, or Robin Hood with his Morrice daunce going by the Church, out goes the boye. Good Gliberie, though he were in the pulpit. . .finished his matter presently, saying ha, ye faith boie, are they there, then ha with thee. . . and so came down and among them hee goes.’ (Found in Hay any worke for Cooper).
348. 1589 Haddington, Lothian: Presbytery complains of ‘ϸe insolence of ϸe ȝouth in chasing robene hui[d and] vϸer prophane playis vsit vpone the saboth day’ [Mill, Medieval Plays, 254].
349. 1589 Haddington, Lothian: ‘Ϸe ȝouth of the toun of hadingtoun’ apologize for ‘pasche playis, abbot of onresone, robene houd & sic vϸer prophane playis’ [Mill. Medieval Plays, 254].
350. 1589 Haddington, Lothian: The Presbytery resolves to ask ‘ϸat ane mair substantious act may be maid aganis peace playis, robene huid ect.’ [Mill, Medieval Plays, 255].
351. 1589 Another mention of the well-known Robin Hood proverb in The Arte of English Poesie, usually attributed to the writer and critic George Puttenham (c. 1529-1590/91). The book was entered at Stationers’ Hall in 1588, and published in the following year with a dedicatory letter to Lord Burghley written by the printer Richard Field, who claimed to be ignorant of the author’s name. There is no contemporary evidence for the authorship, and the name of Puttenham is first definitely associated with it in the Hypercritica of Edmund Bolton, published in 1722, but written in the beginning of the 17th century, perhaps as early as 1605. In this he states that ‘The Arte of English Poesie’ was the work, ‘as the fame is, of one of the queen’s gentlemen pensioners, Puttenham.’ There is no direct evidence beyond Bolton’s ascription to identify the author with George or Richard Puttenham, the sons of Robert Puttenham and his wife Margery, the sister of Sir Thomas Elyot. The marriage also produced a daughter Margery, who married Sir John Throckmorton of Feckenham, Worcestershire.
The writer of the ‘Arte’ supplies certain biographical details. He was educated at Oxford, and at the age of eighteen he addressed an eclogue entitled Elpine to Edward VI. In his youth he had visited Spain, France and Italy, and was better acquainted with foreign courts than with his own. In 1579 he presented to Queen Elizabeth his Partheniades (printed in a collection of MSS. Ballads by F. J. Furnivall), and he wrote the treatise in question especially for the delectation of the queen and her ladies. He mentions nine other works of his, none of which are extant. Richard Puttenham is known to have spent much of his time abroad, whereas George may have left England only once. However, if the statement that he addressed Elpine to Edward VI. when he was eighteen years of age, is to mean literally that the poem was written after Edward VI’s accession to the throne in 1547, it is clear that the author, if only eighteen when he composed it, was not born before 1529. Richard Puttenham, when he succeeded to the property of his uncle, Sir Thomas Elyot, in 1546, was about twenty-six years old. Also, George Puttenham received two leases in reversion from the queen in 1588, which is further evidence that George was the author of the ‘Arte’. Both brothers had unhappy marriages, they were constantly engaged in litigation, and were frequently in disgrace. In April 1561 Richard was convicted of rape and he was in prison when the book was licensed to be printed, and when he made his will in 1597 he was in the Queen’s Bench Prison. He was buried, according to John Payne Collier, at St Clement Danes, London, on the 2nd of July 1601.
With the deposit of the Jervoise Herriard papers at the Hampshire Record Office during the 1960s, a new source of biographical information about the Puttenham family has come to light. These records create a portrait of George Puttenham which includes spousal abuse, sexual slavery, and mutiple excommunications from the Church of England. If the records are correct, he seems to have followed his brother Richard in having a child with his maidservants; one he took to Flanders and abandoned. Another story tells of George having his servant kidnap a seventeen year old girl in London. She was brought to his farm at Upton Grey, where George raped her and kept her locked up for three years. George, matriculated from Christ’s College Cambridge in November 1546, at age sixteen, but he did not take a degree. He was admitted to the Middle Temple in 1556, an important event in regards to his career. His membership was probably influenced by the fact that both his uncle, Sir Thomas Elyot, and brother-in law, Sir John Throckmorton, were Templars. George was well-versed in English law, a skill he undoubtedly acquired during his years at the Middle Temple, and this allowed him to initiate and persue his many lawsuits. By early 1560 he had married the twice widowed Lady Elizabeth Windsor, a local heiress, widow of William, second Baron Windsor, but they seperated in the mid 1560s. She spent more than a decade trying to obtain the maintenance awarded to her by the Court of Arches. In 1570 George was said to be implicated in an alleged plot against William Cecil, Lord Burghley’s life (Cal. State Papers, Dom. 1547–80, pp. 363–4), and at the close of 1578 he was involved in a furious quarrel with his wife’s family. Summoned before the council, he replied that he was intimidated from obeying, and in December 1578 he was apprehended with difficulty by the sheriffs of London and imprisoned. Throckmorton, his brother-in-law, petitioned for George’s release, although he denounced him as ‘careless of all men, ungrateful in prosperity, and unthankful in adversity’. Richard, on his return to England, joined in the attack on his brother, but in 1579 a settlement was arrived at. George, however, continued to petition the queen to redress the wrongs he suffered at the hands of his relations, and in February 1584–5, having convinced the Privy Council that he had suffered injustice, he was granted 1,000l. (Cal. State Papers, Add. 1580–1625, p. 139; Notes and Queries, 2nd ser. xii. 143). Lady Windsor later lamented to the Privy Council that she had agreed to marry George ‘onlye by the perswasion of Sr Iohn Throckmorton.’ George’s will is dated the 1st of September 1590, and he died in London in late 1590 or early 1591.
The ‘Arte’ has been described as ‘the most systematic and comprehensive treatise of the time on its subject’ and ‘the central text of Elizabethan courtly poetics’. Ben Jonson (1572-1637) owned a copy which is now in the Grenville collection at the British Library. The work was reprinted by Joseph Haslewood in his ‘Ancient Critical Essays’ (1811–16, 2 vols.), and by Dr. Edward Arber in 1869, and there is a critical edition by Frank Whigham and Wayne A. Rebhorn (Cornell University Press, 2007). Of secondary importance is George’s other work A Justification of Queene Elizabeth in Relacion to the Affaire of Mary Queene of Scottes, undertaken at the queen’s request. See also, Dictionary of National Biography, Vol. 47, 1896, Puttenham, George by Sidney Lee, pp. 64-7; Encyclopedia Britannica, 1911, Vol. 22, Puttenham, George; ‘George Puttenham’s Lewd and Illicit Career’, Steven W. May, Texas Studies in Literature and Language, University of Texas Press, Vol. 50, Number 2, 2008, pp. 143-176.
352. 1589 Robin Hood, Little John, Friar Tuck and Marian mentioned in the second (and subsequent editions) of Albion’s England by William Warner (1558?–1609). Robin is referred to as a ‘mal-content’ and a ‘County’, and is associated with Richard I. There is also a mention of Sherwood and the Morris (dance) and the May Games. The first edition (with no reference to the Robin Hood legend) is very rare, and appeared in 1586. The second edition of 1589, is followed by those of 1592, 1596, and 1602. ‘A Continuance of Albion’s England, by the first Author, W. W.,’ appeared in 1606. Finally a new edition was issued after Warner’s death in 1612. 1. The first edition of 1586 in four books, has the title: ‘Albion’s England. Or Historical Map of the same Island: prosecuted from the Lives and Acts and Labors of Saturne, Jupiter, Hercules, and Æneas: Originalles of the Bruton, and the Englishman, and occasion of the Brutons their first aryvall in Albion. Containing the same Historie vnto the Tribute to the Romaines, Entrie of the Saxones, Invasion by the Danes, and Conquest by the Normaines. With Historicall Intermixtures, Inuention, and Varietie profitably, briefly and pleasantly, performed in Verse and Prose by William Warner’ (London, by George Robinson for Thomas Cadman). Warner dedicated the work to Henry Carey, first lord Hunsdon. A pirate-publisher, Roger Ward, had been detected setting the manuscript in type in the previous October (Ames, Antiq. ed. Herbert, p. 1190). At the close of the volume is a prose ‘Breviate of the true historie of Aeneas,’ which reappeared in all later editions except the second. 2. The second edition of 1589, which included six books, was called ‘The First and Second parts of Albion’s England. The former reuised and corrected, and the latter newly continued and added, containing an Historical Map’ (London). 3. The third edition of 1592 extended the work to nine books, and concluded with the accession of Queen Elizabeth; this edition bore the title ‘Albion’s England; the Third time Corrected and Augmented. Containing an History of the same Countrey and Kingdome, from the Originals of the inhabitants of the same. With the chief Alterations and Accidents therein happening, until her nowe Majesties most blessed Raigne. …,’ (London). 4. The fourth edition of 1596 ‘now revised and newly inlarged,’ contained twelve books (some title-pages bear the date 1597). 5. The fifth edition of 1602, has the addition of a thirteenth book and a prose ‘Epitome of the whole Historie of England.’ 6. ‘A Continuance of Albion’s England, by the first Author, W. W.,’ supplied three additional books (xiv, xv, xvi) in 1606. 7. The new edition of 1612 ‘with the most chief Alterations and Accidents … in the … Raigne of … King James. … Newly revised and enlarged. With a new epitome of the whole Historie of England,’ was issued after Warner’s death. Here the books number sixteen, and the chapters one hundred and seven with the two prose appendices (the ‘Breviate’ and the ‘Epitome’).
The poet, William Warner, as he himself tells us, was born in London, and his father was one of those who sailed with Chancellor to Muscovy, in 1555; this he says, was before he was born. Warner was educated at Magdalen Hall, Oxford, but he did not take a degree. In London he followed the profession of an attorney, and acquired a reputation in the court of common pleas. He later managed to secure a more prominent position as a man of letters. Warner was acquainted with Christopher Marlowe and other writers of his day in London; Michael Drayton claimed him as an old friend. Henry Carey, first lord Hunsdon, lord chamberlain, and his son George, second lord Hunsdon, who was also lord chamberlain, were encouraging patrons. Warner died suddenly on 9 March 1608–9 at Amwell in Hertfordshire, and was buried there. The entry in the parish register runs: ‘1608–9. Master William Warner, a man of good yeares and of honest reputation; by profession an attornye of the common pleas, author of “Albion’s England,” diynge suddenly in the night in his bedde without any former complaynt of sicknesse on Thursday night, beinge the 9th daye of March; was buried the Saturday following, and lyeth in the church at the corner under the stone of Walter Ffader.’
Tanner mentions that an English translation of the ‘Novelle’ of Bandello was issued by a writer who only used his initials ‘W. W.’ in 1580. No such work is now known, but it may possibly be a first venture by Warner in the field of romance (cf. Warton, Hist. of English Poetry, 1824, iv. 312). Warner’s earliest extant publication is a collection of tales in prose, somewhat in the manner of Heliodorus’s ‘Æthiopica,’ entitled ‘Pan his Syrinx, or Pipe, compact of seuen Reedes; including in one, seuen Tragical and Comicall Arguments, with their diuers Notes not impertinent. Whereby, in effect, of all thinges is touched, in few, something of the vayne, wanton, proud, and inconstant course of the World. Neither, herein, to somewhat praiseworthie, is prayse wanting. By William Warner. At London, by Thomas Purfoote’ [1585], 4to. This was dedicated to Sir George Carey (afterwards second Lord Hunsdon). The seven tales are entitled respectively: ‘Arbaces,’ ‘Thetis,’ ‘Belopares,’ ‘Pheone,’ ‘Deipyrus,’ ‘Aphrodite,’ and ‘Opheltes.’ Another edition, in 1597, bore the title ‘Syrinx, or a Seauenfold Historie, handled with Varietie of pleasant and profitable both comicall and tragicall argument. Newly perused and amended by the first Author, W. Warner,’ London, 1597, 4to. This edition is dedicated to George Carey, second lord Hunsdon.
Warner also translated several plays of Plautus, but of these only one was published. This was ‘Menæchmi. A pleasant … Comedie, taken out of … Plautus … Written in English by W. W. London, by T. Creede,’ 1595, 4to (without pagination). Shakespeare’s ‘Comedy of Errors,’ which was probably composed in 1592, owes much to Plautus’s ‘Menæchmi,’ and Shakespeare may have had access to William’s translation before it was published. It was reprinted in John Nichols’s ‘Six Old Plays,’ 1779, i. 109 seq., and in J. P. Collier’s ‘Shakespeare’s Library,’ 1844 (new edit. by W. C. Hazlitt, 1875, pt. ii. vol. i. 1 et seq.). Warner’s chief work and his earliest experiment in verse was Albion’s England, which was very popular in it’s day. This long episodic poem in fourteen-syllable lines, which in its original shape contained legendary or imaginary incidents in British history, from the time of Noah, till the arrival in England of William the Conqueror, was continued in successive editions until it reached the reign of James I. In its episodic design it somewhat resembled Ovid’s ‘Metamorphoses.’ Historical traditions are mingled with fictitious verse tales. It was among the sources William Shakespeare used for his great tragedy King Lear. Warner was praised by Thomas Nash in his preface to Greene’s ‘Menaphon’ (1589), by Francis Meres in his ‘Palladis Tamia’ (1598), and by Michael Drayton in his ‘Epistle of Poets’.
The finest passage in ‘Albion’s England’ recites the pastoral story of ‘Argentile and Curan.’ It was plagiarised without acknowledgment by William Webster in a poem in six-line stanzas, entitled ‘The most pleasant and delightful Historie of Curan, a Prince of Danske, and the fayre Princesse Argentile’ (London, 1617, 4to). Warner’s tale also formed the plot of the ‘Thracian Wonder,’ a play attributed to John Webster and William Rowley (London, 1661, 4to). It was subsequently converted into a ballad entitled ‘The Two Young Princes on Salisbury Plain,’ published in ‘A Collection of Old Ballads’ (3 vols. 1726–38, 12mo). The whole poem was reprinted in Alexander Chalmers’s ‘Collection of the English Poets’ (1810). See, Sketches of the History of Literature and Learning in England, Geo. L. Craik, Vol. III., London, 1845, pp. 128-42; Dictionary of National Biography, Vol. 59, 1885-1900, Warner, William by Sidney Lee, pp. 405-7; Encyclopædia Britannica, 1911, Volume 28, Warner, William p. 327; Encyclopedia of British Writers, 16th, 17th, and 18th Centuries, Dr. Alan Hager (General Editor), Book Builders LLC, 2005, p. 418.
353. 1589 Robin Hood twice referred to in The Portraiture of Hypocrisie by John Bate. The beginning of the dedication reads: ‘To the vertuous and right worshipful Sir Anthonie Therold knight, his duetifull and dayly Oratour John Bate, wisheth health and prosperitie with increase of godlinesse, full perfection of all Christian knowledge and happinesse, euerlasting in Christ Iesus’. The dedication ends with: ‘Your humble Orator. Iohn Batt’. The work begins with: ‘A DIALOGVE no lesse pleasant than profitable, betwixt the good Christian Philoxenus, and the carnall Autophilus, wherein such worldlings are perfectlie depainted, as hide their hypocrisie vnder the colour of falselie chalenged Christianitie. By John Bat Master of Aries, and student in Diuinitie’. There are two copies in the British Library, and another in the University of Chicago Library. Nothing more is known about John Bate.
The Sir Anthonie Therold mentioned in the dedication appears be the Anthony Thorold of Marston and Blankney, Lincolnshire. Anthony was born by 1520, his father William was a merchant of the staple, sheriff of Lincolnshire in 1558-9, and a leading figure at Grantham. Anthony was educated at Gray’s Inn, being admitted in 1537, and was appointment as recorder of Grantham soon after 1550. He became a Member of Parliament in 1558 with the support of the 2nd Earl of Rutland, who procured him a seat for Lincoln in the following Parliament as well as the recordership of the city. In August 1558, Anthony was named an executor by Thomas Grantham who had just completed his year as mayor of Lincoln. Other offices held include: Queen’s attorney in the north 1561-70, Sheriff of Lincolnshire 1571-2, and Steward of Edward, 1st Earl of Lincoln in 1582. Anthony was knighted in 1585, and he was to remain active in Lincolnshire until his death on 26 June 1594. See, THOROLD (THARROLDE), Anthony (by 1520-94), of Marston and Blankney, Lincs., The History of Parliament: the House of Commons, 1509-1558, S. T. Bindoff, 1982. Online as, ‘The History of Parliament’, THOROLD (THARROLDE), Anthony (by 1520-94), of Marston and Blankney, Lincs., T. M. Hofmann, 1964-2020.
354. 1590 Maid Marian and the May Games mentioned in Plaine Percevall the Peacemaker. Signed on A4r: P.P.P., i.e. Plain Percevall Peace-maker, i.e. Richard Harvey, sometimes attributed to Thomas Nashe. The imprint is fictitious; printed in London in 1590 at Eliot’s Court Press for G. Seton (STC). There is a copy in the Huntington Library, San Marino, California. An edition by EEBO Editions, ProQuest, appeared in 2010.
The astrologer Richard Harvey (1560-1623?) was born at Saffron Walden in north-west Essex, where his father, John Harvey, was a ropemaker. Richard had two brothers, Gabriel and John, and all three were involved in the bitter dispute with Thomas Nashe (see no. 341 above). Richard entered as a pensioner at Pembroke Hall, Cambridge, on 15 June 1575; proceeded B.A. 1577–8; commenced M.A. 1581, and was elected fellow of his college. His brother Gabriel says that he read a philosophical lecture at Cambridge, and Richard’s first book was called ‘An astrological discourse vpon the great and notable coniunction of the tvvo superiour planets, Saturne & Iupiter, which shall happen the 28 day of April, 1583. With a briefe declaration of the effectes, which the late eclipse of the sunne 1582. is yet heerafter to woorke. / Written newly by Richard Harvey: partely, to supplie that is wanting in cõmon prognostications: and partely by prædiction of mischiefes ensuing, either to breed some endeuour of preuention by foresight, so farre as lyeth in vs: or at leastwise, to arme vs with pacience beforehande.’ (At London: Imprinted by Henrie Bynneman, Anno Domini 1583, two editions, dedicated to John (Aylmer), bishop of London). In this work, in reply to his brother Gabriel, Richard used judicial astrology, the art of forecasting events by calculation of the planetary and stellar bodies in their relationship to the Earth; he predicts that on Sunday, 28 April 1583, ‘about high noone there shall happen a conjunction of two superior planets, which conjunction shall be manifested to the ignorant sort by many fierce and boysterous winds then sodenly breaking out,’ and ‘will cause great abundance of waters and much cold weather, much unwonted mischiefes and sorow.’ With this work Richard printed ‘A Compendious Table of Phlebotomie or Bloudletting,’ of eight pages, containing an ‘auncient commendation of Phlebotomie.’ The prediction failed, and Richard was ridiculed; his brother Gabriel’s enemy, Thomas Nashe (Pierce Penniless, 1592), wrote ‘Tarleton at the Theater made jests of him.’
At Cambridge, probably in 1586, Richard was singled out in a play at Peterhouse called Duns furens: Dick Harvey in a frensie. An infuriated Richard broke the windows of the college, and he was sent to the stocks for punishment. In 1590 Richard published, with a dedication to the Earl of Essex, ‘A Theologicall Discovrse of the Lamb of God and his enemies.’ The work comprised the substance of sermons which, according to Nashe, had been preached three years earlier. Richard announced that he ‘newly published’ the volume to explain his attitude to the Martin Marprelate controversy (see no. 344 above). Having denounced ‘Martinisme’ and ‘Cartwrightisme,’ he seems to have reserved his severest language for the ‘poets and writers’ who had taken part in the dispute. He is accused by Nashe of ‘misterming’ the poets ‘piperly makeplaies and make-bates.’ Richard continued with his attack on ‘Marprelate’ with the anonymous tract ‘Plaine Percevall, the Peacemaker of England’ (1590), which made scornful mention of the tract entitled ‘Pap with a Hatchet,’ (1589) ascribed to John Lyly. Richard’s abuse of the men of letters caused Robert Greene (see no. 364 below) to pen a libellous attack on him and his brothers Gabriel and John, which appeared in the original edition (now lost) of ‘A Quippe for an Upstart Courtier’ (1592). In the literary quarrel which followed between Gabriel Harvey and Nashe, Greene’s champion, Nashe satirised Richard Harvey as unsparingly as Gabriel. He parodied Richard’s ‘Astrological Discourse’ of 1583 in ‘A Wonderfull, strange, and miraculous Astrologicall Prognostication,’ (1592). In his ‘Strange Newes of the Intercepting of certain Letters,’ (1593), Nashe spoke of Richard as ‘a notable ruffian with his pen, having first took upon him in the blundering Persivall to play the Iacke of both sides ‘twixt Martin and us’, and he savagely ridiculed Richard’s ‘Theologicall Discourse of the Lamb of God.’ In his ‘Haue with you to Saffron Walden’ (1596), Nashe charged Richard with all manner of offences, and reported Kit Marlowe’s opinion of him that he was ‘an asse good for nothing but to preach of the Iron age’. According to Nashe, Richard was at one time rector of Chislehurst, but lost his benefice through incompetency. Nashe also states that he eloped with and married a daughter of Thomas Mead the judge, and pacified Mead by dedicating to him an almanack. Richard’s ‘Leap Yeare. A compendious Prognostication for 1584,’ (London, 1583) is dedicated to his ‘good and curtuous frende’ Mr. Thomas Meade. Richard also published: 1. ‘Mercurius sive lachrymæ in obitum D. Thomæ Smith’ (which is printed at the end of Gabriel Harvey’s ‘Smithus,’ 1578). 2. ‘Ephemeron sive Pæana: in gratiam propurgatæ reformatæque dialecticæ,’ (London, 1583), dedicated to Robert, earl of Essex. 3. ‘Philadelphus, or a Defence of Brutes and the Brutans History,’ (London, by Iohn Wolfe, 1593), dedicated to the Earl of Essex, in which George Buchanan is addressed as ‘the trumpet of Scotland’ and ‘the noble scholler.’ See, Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Vol. 25, Harvey, Richard pp. 91-2; The Encyclopedia of English Renaissance Literature, General Editors: Garrett A. Sullivan, Jr and Alan Stewart, Vol. II, pp. 455-56.
355. 1590 The first known appearance of the proverb of George a Greene in relation to the Pinder of Wakefield (see no. 230 above) found in Tarltons Newes out of Purgatorie. At London: printed [by R. Robinson] for T. G[ubbin and T. N[ewman]. It was entered in the Stationers Register on 26 June 1590 as ‘Tarltons newes out of Purgatorye, or a caskett full of pleasant conceiptes stuffed with delightfull devises and quaint myrthe as his humour maye afoorde to feede gentlemens fancies . . . .’ to Thomas Gubbins and Thomas Newman. It was published with the title page ‘Tarltons Newes out of Purgatorie. Onelye such a jest as his Jigge, fit for Gentlemen to laugh at an houre, &c. Published by and old Companion of his, Robin Goodfellow’. The work contains a description of purgatory purporting to come from Tarlton, with which several tales were interwoven. One of them, the story of the ‘Two Lovers of Pisa,’ is a version of the tale employed by Shakespeare in the ‘Merry Wives of Windsor’. There is a copy in the British Library. A second edition appeared in c. 1600 (At London, printed for Edward White). There are copies in the Huntington and Bodleian libraries. A third edition appeared in 1630 (Printed by George Purslowe, and are to be sold by Francis Groue, on Snow-hill, at the Signe of the Wind-mill, neere vnto St. Sepulchres Church). There are copies in the British and Bodleian libraries, Trinity College at Cambridge, Folger Shakespeare Library (imperfect), and Harvard University Library (imperfect); there were apparently sixteen editions published between 1590 and 1676. Apart from Halliwell’s edition, there was another by John Feather, ‘The Collected Works of Robert Armin’, 2 vols (New York, 1972). The first edition of Tarltons Newes Out of Purgatorie is reproduced in facsimile in volume 1 . There was another by D.N. Ranson, ‘Tarltons Newes Out of Purgatorie: A Critical Edition with Introduction and Commentary’ (unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, Case Western Reserve University, 1974).
Although the name Tarlton (obviously a reference to Richard Tarlton) appears in the title, there is no indication that he was the author of the work, but it has been attributed, not certainly, to Thomas Nashe (see no. 346 above). ‘Tarltons Newes out of Purgatorie’ evoked a reply in the year of its original publication, entitled ‘The Cobler of Canterburie: or an Invective against Tarltons Newes out of Purgatorie.’ Another edition appeared in 1608, and this was reprinted in 1862. It was republished, with alterations, in 1630 under the title ‘The Tincker of Turvey.’ Tarlton’s fame also led to the collection and publication of a popular volume of more or less fictitious anecdotes in which he figured as hero. Many of the stories are far older than Tarlton. Some of them, however, contain biographical details concerning him which in several instances are confirmed by independent testimony, and serve to show that the compiler of the work was familiar with Tarlton’s history.
Most of the information about Richard Tarlton appears after his death, and there are two conflicting accounts of his early life. Thomas Fuller was the author of ‘The history of the worthies of England who for parts and learning have been eminent in the several counties : together with an historical narrative of the native commodities and rarities in each county’ (London: Printed by J.G.W.L. and W.G. for Thomas Williams …, 1662). This first edition was published posthumously under the revision and superintendence of his son John. Fuller claims that Tarlton (printed incorrectly as Thomas Tarlton) was born in Condover in Shropshire, and was found keeping swine by a servant of the Earl of Leicester, who was amused by him, and took him to Court where he became Queen Elizabeth’s jester (see Worthies). On the other hand Robert Wilson (see no. 332 above) was the author of the play ‘The pleasant and stately morall, of the three lordes and three ladies of London With the great ioy and pompe, solempnized at their mariages: commically interlaced with much honest mirth, for pleasure and recreation, among many morall obseruations and other important matters of due regard. by R.W’ (LONDON. Printed by R. Ihones, at the Rose and Crowne neere Holburne Bridge. 1590). Wilson claims that Tarlton ‘ . . . when he was yoong he was leaning to the trade that my wife useth nowe, and I have used, vide lice shirt, water-bearing’ (see The three lordes and three ladies of London). One or both of the stories about Tarlton could be true, however, the likelihood of the second being correct must be strengthened by the fact that it was told very shortly after Tarlton’s death, while there were still acquaintances who could contradict false tales, and also by the fact that Robert Wilson knew Tarlton well, both of them being with the Queen’s Men, and the two frequently being associated as clowns.
Richard Tarlton (d. September 1588), actor, writer, and a favourite of queen Elizabeth, was the most popular comedian of his age. His father, whose name is unknown, later resided at Ilford in Essex; his mother’s name was Katharine. The earliest known mention of Tarlton’s name is in 1570, when the words ‘Qd. Richard Tarlton’ appear at the end of a ballad entitled ‘A very lamentable and wofull discours of the fierce fluds whiche lately flowed in Bedfordshire, in Lincolnshire, and in many other places, with the great losses of sheep and other cattel, the 5 of October, 1570’ (Imprinted at London by John Allde). It is unlikely that Tarlton was the author, his name may have been used to promote the ballad. The next mention of Tarlton is by Gabriel Harvey in a letter to Edmund Spenser written in the summer of 1579, the first that indicates his reputation as a player: ‘And canst thou tell me nowe, or doist thou at the last begin to imagin with thy selfe what a wonderfull and exceeding displeasure thou and thy prynter have wroughte me, and howe peremptorily ye have preiudished my good name for ever in thrustinge me thus on the stage to make tryall of my extemporall faculty, and to play Wylsons or Tarletons parte’. Tarlton’s name does not figure in the first known patent granted to players, which was bestowed on the Earl of Leicester’s servants in 1574, but he was soon afterwards recognized as an experienced player. He played the part of Derrick the clown in the old pre-Shakespearean play of ‘Henry V.’ Early in 1583, on the institution of the queen’s players, he was one of the twelve who were chosen to form that company. ‘They were sworn the queenes servants, and were allowed wages and liveries as groomes of the chamber’ (Stow, Annals, 1615, p. 697). He remained one of the queen’s actor-servants until his death (Bohun, Character of Queen Elizabeth, 1693, pp. 352–3).
During the last five years of his life Tarlton’s popularity on the stage as a clownish comedian was enormous. ‘Richard Tarleton,’ says Stow, ‘for a wondrous plentifull pleasant extemporall wit, hee was the wonder of his time,’ and Nash declares that ‘the people began exceedingly to laugh when Tarlton first peept out his head’ (Pierce Penniles his Supplication to the Devil, 1592). As Thomas Fuller tells us, he was credited with the power of diverting Elizabeth when her mood was least amiable, and it was believed that her ‘highest favorites’ frequently sought his countenance for their suits. The faculty which excited the highest enthusiasm among his hearers was his power of improvising doggerel verse on themes suggested by the audience. So famous was he in exhibitions of this nature that he gave his name to them; and Gabriel Harvey, speaking of Robert Greene in 1592, mentions ‘his piperly and Tarletonizing.’
Tarlton was also noted for his jigs, metrical compositions sung by the clown to the accompaniment of tabor and pipe. The music of several is preserved among Dowland’s collections in the university library at Cambridge (Halliwell, Cambridge Manuscript Rarities, p. 8). The words of one, ‘The jigge of the horse loade of Fools,’ was supposedly preserved. They were published by Halliwell in the preface to his edition of Tarlton’s ‘Jests,’ ‘from a manuscript in the possession of John Payne Collier,’ however this was proved to have been a forgery by Collier, and references from him by Halliwell are dubious. The only documented contemporary tale of Tarlton which includes any detail of interest concerning the man, is that told by witnesses of a fight in Norwich in 1583, in which some of the Queen’s Men were involved in, when acting at the Red Lion Inn. Tarlton was also a skilled fencer, and on 23 Oct. 1587 was admitted to the highest degree, that of master of fence at the school of the science of defence in London.
During the latter part of his life Tarlton dwelt in ‘Haliwel Stret,’ now known as High Street, Shoreditch. He died there at the house of Emma Ball, a woman of bad reputation, on 5 Sept. 1588, and was buried in St. Leonard’s Churchyard on the same day. Tarlton’s wife Kate died before him, but by her he left an only child, Philip Tarlton, about six years of age, to whom, by a will dated 3 Sept., he bequeathed all his belongings. His mother, Katharine Tarlton, and two friends, Robert Adams and William Johnson, were appointed his son’s guardians. Immediately after his death a dispute as to the disposition of the property arose between the boy’s grandmother, Katharine Tarlton, and Adams. Katharine, who suspected Adams of fraudulent behaviour, appealed to Sir Christopher Hatton, and her memorial, with Adams’s rejoinder, was privately printed by Halliwell in 1866.
Tarlton was the alleged author of several songs and ballads. But it is probable that they were written by others, and that his name was attached to them with a view to attracting public attention. Several productions with which his name was associated are noticed in the registers of the Stationers’ Company. These include three lost works, entitled respectively ‘Tarltons Toyes,’ 1576, which is alluded to by Nash in his ‘Terrors of the Night,’ 1594; ‘Tarltons Tragicall Treatises,’ 1578; ‘Tarlton’s Devise upon the unlooked for great Snowe,’ 1579 (Arber, Transcript, ii. 306, 328, 346). According to both Gabriel Harvey and Nash, Tarlton was the contriver and arranger of the extempore play the ‘Seven Deadly Sins’ (Nash, Strange Newes; Harvey, Foure Letters). The original ‘platt’ or programme of the second part is preserved in the library at Dulwich College. On the authority of an annotated copy of the 1611 edition of ‘Teares of the Muses,’ Tarlton has been identified with the ‘Pleasant Willy’ whose recent death and the gloom it spread among the lovers of the theatre Edmund Spenser commemorates in that poem. ‘Willy’ was used at the time as implying affectionate familiarity, and often bore no direct relation to the real christian name of the person addressed. The music of a song, ‘Tarltons Willy,’ is preserved in manuscript at Cambridge ({{sc|Halliwell-Phillipps, Outlines of the Life of Shakespeare, 1887, i. 93). It has also been conjectured with great likelihood that in Hamlet’s elegy on Yorick, Shakespeare embodied a regretful remembrance of the great jester (Cornhill Mag. 1879, ii. 731). After Tarlton’s death there appeared the ballad ‘Tarltons Farewell,’ and in 1589–90 three other ballads were licensed, ‘Tarltons Recantacion,’ ‘Tarlton’s Repentance,’ and ‘Tarlton’s Ghost and Robyn Goodfellowe’ (Arber, Transcript of Stationers’ Reg. iii. 500, 526, 531, 559). None of these ditties are extant. A Latin elegy was published by Charles Fitzgeffrey in his ‘Affaniæ,’ 1601; another, by Sir John Stradling, in his ‘Epigrammatum libri quatuor,’ 1607; while a third, in English, is in ‘Wits Bedlam,’ 1617. According to William Gifford (in his preface to the works of Ben Jonson), ‘Tarlton’s memory was cherished with fond delight by the vulgar to the period of the revolution,’ and as late as 1798 ‘his portrait with tabor and pipe still served as a sign to an alehouse in the Borough’ (Ellis, Hist. of Shoreditch, p. 209).
Tarlton (according to the unknown author of ‘Tarltons Jests,’) was at one time an innkeeper, and he made Robert Armin (who became a comedy actor with the troupe associated with William Shakespeare) his adopted son to succeed him (see Tarlton’s Jests). William Kemp (fl. 1600) succeeded Tarlton in the field of comic improvisation, and he in turn was succeeded by Robert Armin. In person Tarlton was ugly. He had a flat nose with a tendency to squint. An early drawing of him is preserved in the Harleian manuscripts with some verses by John How of Norwich (No. 3885, f. 19). There is another likeness in the Pepysian Library, and a ballad in the Ashmolean collection has Tarlton’s portrait as a drummer. See, Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Vol. 55, Tarlton, Richard by Edward Irving Carlyle, pp. 369-71; Encyclopedia Britannica, 1911, Vol. 26, Tarlton, Richard, p. 428; ‘Tarlton’s News out of Purgatory (1590): A Modern-spelling Edition, with Introduction and Commentary,’ Jane Belfield, Shakespeare Institute, 1978 (Thesis, online).
356. 1590? ‘tales of Robin hood’ mentioned in A Treatise tending vnto a declaration whether a man be in the estate of damnation, by William Perkins. The ‘Epistle Dedicatorie’ is signed William Perkins, dated 24 November, 1589. Later editions appeared in 1592, 1595, 1608, and 1619. There are several copies in the British Library and another in the Huntington Library.
Theological writer and Church of England clergyman, William Perkins (1558-1602) was born at Marston Jabbett in the parish of Bulkington in Warwickshire. His parents, Thomas and Hannah, both survived him. In June 1577 he matriculated as a pensioner of Christ’s College, Cambridge. During his early life there he was apparently noted for his recklessness and profanity, and his addiction to drunkenness. One story relates that he reformed his life after hearing a Cambridge woman say to her child, ‘Hold your tongue, or I will give you to drunken Perkins yonder’ (Haller, 64). There is some speculation that Perkins may have fathered a daughter out of wedlock, and he possibly flirted with astrology, which may explain his opposition to astrology in his later years. Perkins graduated BA at Cambridge in 1581 and proceeded MA in 1584, and he began to be widely known as an earnest and effective preacher. He was recognized as an able and popular advocate of the Calvinist doctrine common among ‘the group of moderate Puritans’ in Cambridge, ‘a spiritual brotherhood’ which included his tutor and lifelong friend, Laurence Chaderton, and Richard Greenham. He preached to the prisoners in Cambridge goal, and was appointed lecturer at St. Andrews Church, where both the members of the university and the townsmen flocked in great numbers to listen to him. According to Fuller (Holy State, ed. 1648, p. 81), ‘his sermons were not so plain but that the piously learned did admire them, nor so learned but that the plain did understand them;’ and he seems to have possessed the art of conducting his argument after the strictly logical method then in vogue, while preserving a simplicity of language which made him intelligible to all.
His reputation as a theologian progressed rapidly, and at a time when controversy between the anglican and puritan parties in the university was at its height, he became noted for his outspoken resistance to the Roman use of ritual. In a ‘commonplace’ delivered in the chapel of his college (13 Jan. 1586–7), he objected to the practice of kneeling at the taking of the sacrament, and also to that of turning to the east. He was subsequently ordered to read a paper in which he partly qualified and partly recalled what he was reported to have said. From this time he appears to have used more guarded language in public, but his sympathy with the puritan party continued undiminished. According to Bancroft (Daungerous Positions, ed. 1593, p. 92), he was one of the members of a ‘synod’ which in 1589 assembled at St. John’s College to revise the treatise ‘Of Discipline’ (afterwards ‘The Directory’), an embodiment of puritan doctrine which those present pledged themselves to support. In the same year he was one of the petitioners to the authorities of the university on behalf of Francis Johnson, a fellow of Christ’s, who had been committed to prison on account of his advocacy of a presbyterian form of church government (Strype, Annals, iv. 134; Lansdowne MSS. lxi. 19–57). His sense of the severity with which his party was treated by Bishop Whitgift, both in the university and elsewhere, is probably indicated in the preface to his ‘Armilla Aurea’ (editions of 1590 and 1592), it being dated ‘in the year of the last sufferings of the Saints.’ In the same preface he refers to the attacks to which he was himself at that time exposed, but says that he holds it better to encounter calumny, however unscrupulous, than be silent when duty towards ‘Mater Academia’ calls for his testimony to the truth. In some quarters the ‘Armilla’ was vehemently opposed owing to its unflinching Calvinism, and, according to Heylin (Aerius Redivivus, p. 341), was the occasion of William Barret’s violent attack on the calvinistic tenets from the pulpit of St. Mary’s.
The publication of Perkins’s ‘Reformed Catholike’ in 1597 was an important event in relation to the controversy of the principals of the Roman church. He here sought to draw the boundary-line indicating the essential points of difference between the protestant and the Roman belief, beyond which it appeared to him impossible for concession and conciliation on the part of the reformed churches to go. The ability and candid spirit of this treatise were recognised by the most competent judges of both parties, and William Bishop, the catholic writer, assailed the book in his ‘Catholic Deformed,’ although he did admit that he had ‘not seene any book of like quantity, published by a Protestant, to contain either more matter, or delivered in better method;’ while Robert Abbot, afterwards bishop of Salisbury, in his reply to Bishop, praises Perkins’s ‘great trauell and paines for the furtherance of true religion and edifying of the Church.’ Perkins’s ‘De praedestinationis modo et ordine’ (1598) was well received by most Calvinists, but drew fire from Jacob Arminius, the controversial Dutch Reformed theologian. Nor was Arminius satisfied with Perkins’s treatise ‘God’s Free Grace and Man’s Freewill’ (1602).
Perkins’s tenure of his fellowship at Christ’s College, where he taught from his election in 1584, until he resignation at Michaelmas 1594, was probably vacated by his marriage. He died in Cambridge in October 1602, aged forty-four, and was interred in St. Andrew’s church at the expense of his college, which honoured his memory with a stately funeral. Perkins is frequently described a ‘puritan’ or a ‘moderate puritan’, and his reputation as a teacher during the closing years of his life was unrivalled in the university. As a writer his practical and theological works (many were first published after his death) continued to be studied throughout the seventeenth century, and as an authority, he was little inferior to Hooker or Calvin. William Ames was perhaps his most important pupil; but John Robinson the founder of congregationalism at Leiden, who republished Perkins’s catechism in that city, diffused his influence probably over a wider area. Other heirs of Perkins’s thought included the elder Thomas Goodwin, Paul Baynes, Samuel Ward, later master of Sidney Sussex Colege, Cambridge, and the poet Phineas Fletcher. The remarkable popularity of Perkins’s writings is attested by the number of languages into which many of them were translated. Those that appeared in English were almost immediately rendered into Latin, while several were reproduced in Dutch, Spanish, Welsh, and Irish, ‘a thing,’ observes John Legate, the printer, in his preface to the edition of the ‘Collected Works’ of 1616–18, ‘not ordinarily observed in other writings of these our times.’ Of his ‘Armilla Aurea’ fifteen editions appeared in twenty years (Hickman, Hist. Quinq. p. 500).
His portrait hangs in the combination-room of Christ’s College, and his right hand is visibly maimed. The portrait was engraved for the ‘Herωologia’ of Henry Holland in 1620, and there is another engraved portrait in Lupton, p. 347. It is known that he married Timothye Cradocke of Grantchester in July 1595, and together they had seven children. Of his collected works very incomplete editions appeared at Cambridge in 1597, 1600, 1603, 1605; a more complete edition, 3 vols. folio, 1608, 1609, 1612; at London in 1606, 1612, 1616; at Geneva, in Latin, fol. 1611, 2 vols. 1611–18 and 1624; a Dutch translation at Amsterdam, 3 vols. fol. 1659. See, Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Vol. 45, Perkins, William by James Bass Mullinger, pp. 6-9; Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, in Association with The British Academy, From the earliest times to the year 2000, H. C. G. Matthew and Brian Harrison, Oxford University Press, 2004, Perkins, William (1558-1602).
357. c. 1590 ‘A merry Iest of Robin Hood, and of his life, With a newe play for to be plaied in May-games. Very pleasant and full of pastime.’ A reprinting of William Copland’s earlier edition of the Gest (see no. 237 above) by Edward White (Bodleian Library, Oxford, Z. 3. Art. Seld.), to which is appended The Play of Robin Hood and the Friar and The Play of Robin Hood and the Potter (see also, Printed Sources for the Tales of Robin Hood).
Edward White (born 1548/1549?) was the son of John White, a mercer of Bury St Edmond’s, Suffolk. Although his career as a stationer lasted for about forty years, Edward remains relatively unknown. During this time he licensed and sold numerous texts, including all three quartos of William Shakespeare’s play Titus Andronicus, the first Shakespearean play to be printed and sold. Edward married Sara Lodge, a daughter of the second marriage of Sir Thomas Lodge, merchant and mayor of London, which made Edward brother-in-law to his son, the well-known writer, Thomas Lodge, Sara’s half-brother. The Whites had at least one child, Edward junior. Edward senior began his career in 1565 as apprentice to William Lobley, who is recorded as a London stationer (A Transcript of the Registers of the Company of Stationers of London, 1554-1640 A.D., Vol II, Edward Arber, London 1875, p. 30). By 1576 Edward had established himself sufficiently to take on his first apprentice, his brother Andreas (or Andrew); in the following years he is known to have employed eleven others. In 1577 Edward made his first entry in the registers of the Stationers Company, and just over eleven years later in 1588, he was admitted to the membership of that company. From the Sign of the Gun in the district of St Paul’s Churchyard, he made a steady living printing and selling a variety of books, including the works of Robert Greene, several books of secrets, and a variety of ballads and other forms of popular print. He joined with John Charlewood the printer in 1578, to produce a book containing Calvin’s sermons, and also issued one book each with Robert Bourne and John Wolfe in 1591 and 1592, in addition to The Good Huswifes Jewell, which he printed with John Wolfe in 1587 and The Widowes treasure with Edward Allde in 1595 and 1599. Edward began his partnership with Adam Islip in 1596, when the two men produced A booke of secrets, a small book translated from the Dutch that contains the secrets of ink making and engraving. Edward made a new partnership with James Roberts in 1600 with whom he printed The Treasurie of hidden secrets, and there was collaboration among Edward Allde, William Jaggard, and Edward to produce the 1607 edition of Gervase Markham’s second book of equestrian secrets. Edward’s most prolific partnership was with Edward Allde, the trade printer with whom he printed and sold at least ten titles between 1588 and 1607. Two or more of their titles were aimed at female audiences, and a third was intended for gardeners. Roughly a quarter of Edward’s entire catalogue contains the literature of crime, and here we see popular literature–pamphlets, ballads and plays–dealing with serious offences, serious offenders and their (usually fatal) judicial punishments. There are prose accounts of the traitorous, rebellious and seditious actions of the Babington Plotters as well as the trials and executions of heretics like Edmund Campion along with exposés of their heretical views. Similarly, we find accounts of homicide in pamphlets like that on VVilliam Sherwood and plays like Thomas Kyd’s The Spanish tragedie and Titus; petty treason, or the murder of a husband by his wife, in the fact-based drama Arden of Feuersham; and infanticide in Titus and Christopher Marlowe’s Tamburlaine, part 2.
Edward also stocked accounts of witchcraft, including the popular prose pamphlet about Doctor Iohn Faustus, and robbery as well as reports of criminals executions and ‘last dying speeches’. Between 1577 and 1612 there was regular availability of crime-related works, for out of these thirty-five years, twenty-seven of them show Edward licensing literature of crime and selling it at the Sign of the Gun. Edward also sold plays, like Marlowe’s Massacre at Paris, and prose fictions, like Robert Greene’s Philomela, and his catalogue has works of religious instruction, like Leonard Wright’s Summons for Sleepers.
After his death in late 1612 or early 1613, his son Edward White junior took over the Sign of the Gun with his mother, Widow White, until her death c. 1615. The son, however, appears to have been less successful than the father, because in 1619 the Gun seems to have been taken over, at least partially, by John Grismand. See, Rymes of Robyn Hood: An Introduction to the English Outlaw, R. B. Dobson and J. Taylor, London, 1976, pp. 72, 208, 215, 312; Books of Secrets: Natural Philosophy in England, 1550-1600, Allison Kavey, 2007, Chapter One, Printing Secrets, pp. 19-28; Titus out of Joint: Reading the Fragmented Titus Andronicus, Liberty Stanavage and Paxton Hehmeyer, Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2012: Chapter One ‘At the Signe of the Gunne’: Titus Andronicus, the London Book Trade and the Literature of Crime, 1590-1615, Nadia Bishai, King’s College London, pp. 7-48.
358. 1590 Cranston, Lothian: Thirteen men are summoned before the Presbytery ‘for prophaning the sabboth with pasch playis as robene hudis abbottis vnresson etc.’ [Mill, Medieval Plays, 170].
359. 1590-91 St. Breock, Cornwall: Parish makes payment to Robin Hood of St. Columb Minor [Reference courtesy of Evelyn Newlyn and Sally L. Joyce].
360. 1591 Two mentions of Robin Hood, including the well known proverb, in John Harington’s translation of Orlando Furioso, first published in folio in 1591, and reissued in 1607 and 1634. Sir John Harington (1561–1612) was a translator, Elizabethan courtier, author, and wit. His father, also named John, had enriched the family by marrying an illegitimate daughter of Henry VIII. The second wife of John senior was an attendant to the Princess Elizabeth, who became godmother to the young Harington. He was educated first at Eton, then in 1578 he went to Cambridge. Harington ran into debt, and after leaving Cambridge studied law at Lincoln’s Inn. His reputation as a wit and a man of the world was soon established, and he looked for success at court rather than for a legal profession. About 1584 he married Mary, daughter of Sir George Rogers of Cannington in Somerset, and became a writer of epigrams, which enlivened the court. According to tradition he translated for the amusement of the ladies of the court the story of Giocondo, from the twenty-eighth book of Ludovico Ariosto’s ‘Orlando Furioso.’ His translation was handed about in manuscript till it fell into the hands of Queen Elizabeth, who reprimanded Harington for corrupting the morals of her ladies by translating the least seemly part of Ariosto’s work. She ordered him as a punishment to leave the court for his seat at Kelston till he had made a translation of the whole work. In 1592 Elizabeth, on her visit to Bath, was the guest of Harington at Kelston, which he spent a good deal of money in restoring and decorating in honour of the queen (Nichols, Progresses of Queen Elizabeth, ed. 1823, iii. 250). In the same year he was high sheriff of Somerset, and in 1596 was again at court, where he published (under the pseudonym of Misacmos) a bawdy satire entitled ‘A New Discourse of a Stale subject, called the Metamorphosis of Ajax,’ which was rapidly succeeded by three similar tracts, ‘Ulysses upon Ajax’ (under the pseudonym of Misodiaboles); ‘An Anatomie of the Metamorphosed Ajax’ (under the pseudonym of ‘T. C. Traveller ‘), and ‘An Apologie : 1. Or rather a Retractation; 2. Or rather a Recantation; 3. Or rather a Recapitulation …; 12. Or rather none of them ‘ (anon.) It is enough to say that ‘Ajax’ is a euphemism for ‘a jakes,’ the English term for a toilet. A design for what is supposedly the first water closet, appears in ‘the Metamorphosis of Ajax.’ It was not the indecency of the books but a suspected innuendo about the Earl of Leicester which drew on Harington the queen’s anger (Nugae Antiquae, i. 240). He was ordered to leave the court ’till he had grown sober,’ and there was even a talk of summoning him before the Star-chamber. Ultimately a license was refused for printing the books, but not till the earliest volume had run through three editions in the year (Steevens, Shakespeare, ed. 1793, v. 354). In 1598 Harington was forgiven by Elizabeth, and was one of those who were chosen to accompany Robert Devereux, earl of Essex (1567-1601), on his ill-fated expedition to Ireland, where he served as commander of horse under the Earl of Southampton. In Ireland Harington was knighted by Essex, which greatly angered the queen. He took part in the expedition to Connaught, where he accompanied his cousin, Sir Griffin Markham. He afterwards, went with Essex on his expedition against Tyrone, and was chosen by Essex to go with him to London on his rapid journey, whereby he hoped to appease the queen’s anger. When Harington entered the queen’s chamber she was not amused and she sent him home. Harington wrote a journal of Essex’s proceedings in Ireland, perhaps a precautionary measure recommended by his friends. At all events he seems to have made his peace with the queen by putting it into her hands, with the result of inflaming her rage against Essex, who was arrested. ‘She swore we were all idle knaves, and the Lord Deputy worse for wasting our time and her commands in such wise as my journal doth write of.’ This Irish journal is printed in ‘Nugae Antiquae,’ i. 247-301. After thus saving himself he thought it wise to avoid any risk of ‘shipwreck on the Essex coast.’ ‘Thank heaven,’ he says, ‘I am safe at home, and if I go into such troubles again I deserve the gallows for a meddling fool.’ With the Queen’s death and James’s accession, Harington continued to seek the Court’s favor, but he was never to achieve the position he desired. His financial situation had deteriorated, and he landed in jail for debt. Despite his situation, he continued to write, translate, and court the favor of the king and Prince Henry. Harington suggested that he be appointed archbishop and lord chancellor of Ireland, but nothing became of his attempts at self-promotion, and he returned to writing. He died at Kelston on 20 Nov. 1612, aged 51. He had nine children, and his wife survived him till 1634.
Harington published in 1609 ‘The Englishman’s Doctor, or the Schoole of Salerne,’ a treatise upon health, chiefly founded upon the precepts of Cardan. After his death a few of his ‘Epigrams ‘ were appended to ‘Alcilia,’ a poem by J. C. issued in 1613. A volume containing 116 of them appeared in 1615. This collection formed the fourth book of the complete edition of Harington’s ‘Epigrams’ issued in 1618 and reprinted in 1625, 1633, and again with his ‘Orlando Furioso,’ 1634. But the writings which Harington himself committed to the press and the epigrams on which his reputation as a wit was founded were soon forgotten, and copies of them are now very rare. It is by his letters and his miscellaneous writings that Harington is remembered. These were first published in 1769 by a descendant, the Rev. Henry Harington, D.D., under the title of ‘Nugae Antiquae, being a Miscellaneous Collection of Original Papers in Prose and Verse, by Sir John Harington, Knight, and others who lived in those times.’ This passed through three editions, 1779, 1792, and was re-edited by Thomas Park with additions and notes in 1804. Harington’s letters owe their value to the character of their author, which strongly resembles that of an Italian humorist attached to a court. Harington considered himself a privileged person who might jest at will. He had a quick power of observation, and did not show restraint. Elizabeth spoke of him as ‘that saucy poet, my godson,’ and he was generally regarded as an amusing gossip. Harington provided a picture of life and society in his times, which throws a light on many prominent persons, but his works did not gain him any lasting fame. See Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Vol. 24, Harington, John (1561-1612) by Mandell Creighton, pp. 385-88; Encyclopedia of World Biography, John Harington Facts, The Gale Group, Inc, 2010 (online); NNDB, Sir John Harington, Soylent Communications, 2019 (online).
361. 1591-92 St. Breock, Cornwall: Parish makes payment to Robin Hood of Mawgan [Reference courtesy of Evelyn Newlyn and Sally L. Joyce].
362. 1592 Scotland: General Assembly resolves ‘It is craveit . . . The acts of Parliament made for the suppressing of the enormities following may be put to executioun: . . . profaners of the Sabboth day be Robein Hoodes playis’ [Acts and Proceedings of the General Assemblies, 2. 784].
363. 1592 The third mention of Robin Hood and Little John as outlaws in the time of Richard I (by John Stow), in The Annales of England, where he repeats the material of 1565 (see no. 262 above). There is a copy in the Huntington Library, San Marino, California. Further editions by Stow appeared in 1600?, 1601, and 1605, with a further edition by Edmund Howes in 1615, which had the title ‘The annales, or a generall chronicle of England, begun first by maister Iohn Stow, and after him continued and augmented with matters forreyne, and domestique, auncient and modern . . . . by Edmond Howes, gentleman’. Another edition by Howes, with a similar title, appeared in 1631. Stow’s ‘Annales’ also has a mention of Friar Tuck (which is a reference to Robert Stafford) as well as a repeat of the story of King John and Mawd (or Matilda), which first appears in Stow’s ‘Chronicles of England’ in 1580 (see no. 321 above).
364. 1592 Maid Marion mentioned by Robert Greene in A Quip for an Upstart Courtier. At least six editions were printed in 1592, and there are copies in the Westminster Abbey Library, the Harvard University Library, the Huntington Library, the Folger Shakespeare Library, and the collection of Dr. A. S. Rosenbach. The ‘Quip’ was reprinted in 1606, 1615, 1620, 1625, and 1635. A Dutch translation was published at the Hague in 1601, and later editions appeared; the pamphlet was also translated into French. This was the latest work issued in Greene’s lifetime.
Robert Greene (1558?-1592) was one of the most popular and notorious writers and dramatists of the sixteenth century. Born at Norwich, he obtained degrees at both Cambridge and Oxford, and according to his own account, between the years 1578 and 1583 he had travelled abroad. Moving to London, he became notorious for his lifestyle of debauchery, however towards the end of 1585, or early in 1586, Greene married ‘a gentleman’s daughter of good account’ (in his Repentance), and seems to have settled for a while at Norwich. When she had borne him a child he deserted her, after spending her marriage-money. She returned to Lincolnshire, and he settled in London. Greene began his literary career writing prose pastorals, and his early specialty was the ‘love pamphlet,’ or the sixteenth-century equivalent of the romance magazine. Greene also composed various plays, establishing himself as Shakespeare’s most successful predecessor in blank-verse romantic comedy. During his final years he published ‘repentance pamphlets’ in which he described various aspects of his youthful lifestyle as thinly veiled fictional accounts. He also produced a series of ‘coney-catching’ pamphlets which intended to reveal the nature of criminals and rogues inhabiting London’s underworld. Greene became one of the first English authors to support himself through his writing. Despite his controversial youth, he confessed the wickedness of his earlier ways, and his works often communicate themes of morality and repentance. Greene was well-known for his feuds with various other writers, and in his Groats-worth of Wit he calls Shakespeare an ‘upstart crow.’ It is clear that Shakespeare borrowed quite frequently from Green: 1. The Scottish Historie of James the fourth, slaine at Flodden (written c. 1590, published 1598), was a forerunner of As You Like It and A Midsummer Night’s Dream 2. It is known that on Greene’s Pandosto, the Triumph of Time (1588) Shakespeare founded his Winter’s Tale; it contains the entire plot of Greene’s prose romance, though some of the characters in the latter (including the immortal Autolycus) were added by Shakespeare 3. Greene’s Orlando has been described as ‘a stepping stone to Lear and Hamlet.’ The account of his last illness and death was given by his Puritan adversary, Gabriel Harvey (see no. 367 below). Early in August 1592 Greene fell ill (after a dinner at which his associate, the dramatist Thomas Nashe (see no. 346 above) was present) ‘of a surfeit of pickle herringe and Rennish wine.’ If Harvey’s account is true, Greene was deserted by all his friends, including Nashe, and he died in poverty. He lodged with a poor shoemaker and his wife, and his only visitors were two women, one of them a former mistress (sister to the rogue known as ‘Cutting Ball,’ who had been hanged at Tyburn), the mother of his son, Fortunatus Greene, who died in 1593. On the day before his death Greene wrote to the wife he had not seen for six years. He died 3 Sept. 1592, and on the following day was buried in the New Churchyard, near Bethlehem Hospital. Shortly after Greene’s death, there appeared Harvey’s attack on his dead antagonist ‘Fovre Letters and Certaine Sonnets: especially touching Robert Greene and other parties by him abused.’ Nashe, who had been attacked in ‘Fovre Letters,’ produced his ‘Strange Newes,’ one of a series of pamphlets which were directed against Harvey. Greene wrote more than 35 works between 1580 and 1592, and no less than twenty-eight separate publications (chiefly romances and prose tracts) appeared in his lifetime. Ten other books issued after his death have been assigned to him. Greene’s writings for the theatre present numerous problems; the dating of his plays is conjectural, and his role as collaborator has produced much inconclusive discussion. The following list represents a probable record of most of his works:
Plays
- Friar Bacon and Friar Bungay
- The History of Orlando Furioso
- A Looking-Glass for London and England
- A Pleasant Conceited Comedy of George a Green
- The Scottish History of James the Fourth
- The Comical History of Alphonsus, King of Aragon
.. Poetry
- Cupid Abroad was Late
- Farewell to Folly
- Fawnia
- Maesia’s Song
- Menaphon: Sephesta’s Song to her Child
- Samela
- Sephestia’s Lullaby
- Sweet are the Thoughts of that Savour of Content
- The Description of Sir Geoffrey Chaucer
- The Shepherd’s Wife’s Song
- Weep Not, My Wanton
. Prose
- Mamillia: A Mirror or Looking-glass for the Ladies of England (1583)
- Mamillia: The Second Part of the Triumph of Pallas (1593)
- The Anatomy of Lovers’ Flatteries (1584)
- The Myrrour of Modestie (1584)
- Arbasto; The Anatomy of Fortune (1584) Gwydonius; The Card of Fancy (1584)
- The Debate Between Folly and Love (1584)
- The Second Part of the Tritameron of Love (1587)
- Planetomachia (1585)
- An Oration or Funeral Sermon (1585)
- Morando; The Tritameron of Love (1587)
- Morando; The Second Part of the Tritameron of Love (1587)
- Euphues: His Censure to Philautus (1587)
- Greene’s Farewell to Folly (1591)
- Penelope’s Web (1587?)
- Pandosto (1588)
- Perimedes (1588)
- Ciceronis Amor (1589)
- Menaphon (1589)
- The Spanish Masquerado (1589)
- Greene’s Mourning Garment (1590)
- Greene’s Never Too Late (1590)
- Francesco’s Fortunes, or The Second Part of Greene’s Never Too Late (1590)
- Greene’s Vision, Written at the Instant of his Death (1590?)
- The Royal Exchange (1590)
- A Notable Discovery of Coosnage (1591)
- The Second Part of Conycatching (1591)
- The Black Books Messenger (1592)
- A Disputation Between a Hee Conny-Catcher and a Shee Conny-Catcher (1592)
- A Groatsworth of Wit Bought with a Million of Repentance (1592)
- Philomela (1592)
- A Quip for an Upstart Courtier (1592)
- The Third and Last Part of Conycatching (1592)
See, Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, Vol. XI (1875–1889), Robert Greene, pp. 163-65; Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900 Volume 23, Greene, Robert (1560?-1592), by Arthur Henry Bullen; The Editions of Robert Greene’s A Quip for an Upstart Courtier (1592), Edwin Haviland Miller, Studies in Bibliography, Vol. 6 (1954), University of Virginia, pp. 107-116; 16th–Century British Literature, Robert Greene, by Kristin Weisse (online); Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc., Robert Greene, written by the editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica, 2020 (online); World Heritage Encyclopedia, Robert Greene (16th century), Article Id: WHEBNOO19718265, Project Gutenberg Self-Publishing Press, 2020 (online) .
365. 1592-95 A mention of ‘the bare scalpe of Robin Hoods fat Fryer,’ by the ‘Outlaw’ in The Two Gentlemen of Verona (First Folio), the work of the poet, player and playwright, William Shakespeare.
366. 1593 George Peele’s popular play Edward the first (printed in 1593) may have been acted two or three years earlier. It incorporates a Robin Hood game and borrows heavily from the ballad of the outlaw’s contest with the potter. Its full title is: The Famous Chronicle of King Edward the first, sirnamed Edward Longshankes, with his returne from the holy land. Also the life of Lleuellen, rebell in Wales. Lastly, the sinking of Queen Elinor, who suncke at Charingcrosse, and rose again at Pottershith, now named Queenehith.
George Peele (c.1556 – c.1596), born in London, was an Elizabethan dramatist who experimented in many forms of theatrical art: pastoral, history, melodrama, tragedy, folk play, and pageant. His father, James Peele, citizen and salter of London, had for many years held the office of clerk of Christ’s Hospital (cf. State Papers, Dom. Eliz. Addenda, xxiii. 28). At the same time he taught and wrote on book-keeping. George Peele was a ‘free scholar’ at Christ’s Hospital from 1565 to 1570 (Bullen, pp. xiii–xiv). In March 1571 he entered Broadgates Hall, now Pembroke College, Oxford; but from 1574 to 1579 he was a member of Christ Church, where he graduated B.A. 1577, and M.A. 1579. Peele is thought to have written a poem, The Tale of Troy, while at university, and also translated one of Euripides’ ancient Greek plays, either Iphigenia at Aulis or Iphigenia in Taurus. He went to London about 1580, but in 1583 he returned to Oxford to supervise the performance at Christ Church of two Latin plays by the noted academic dramatist William Gager (1555–1622). Peele was one of the so-called University Wits active on the London literary and theatrical scene in the 1580s and early 1590s, which also included John Lyly, Christopher Marlowe, Thomas Lodge, Robert Greene, and Thomas Nashe. Peele is believed to have acted as well, as a member of the Lord Admiral’s Company and the Queen’s Men. Peele’s reckless life was emphasized by the use of his name in connection with the ‘Merry conceited Jests of George Peele, sometime a Student in Oxford,’ which was entered in the ‘Stationers Registers’ in 1605; the earliest known edition appeared in 1607, nine or more years after his death. The booklet contained tales of ‘discreditable escapades’, stories that show Peele as a man of no scruples, earning money through fraudulent, if not entertaining, schemes. Thought to be largely a fictitious work of dubious authorship, it may contain some elements of truth: the work describes Peele as having a wife who brought him some property, which he speedily dissipated, and a ten-year-old daughter; that he lived at Bankside; and that he possessed a voice ‘more woman than man.’
Peele’s earliest known play, the pastoral comedy of The Araygnement of Paris, was presented by the Children of the Chapel Royal before Queen Elizabeth, perhaps as early as 1581, and printed anonymously in 1584. His other surviving plays are: ‘The Battle of Alcazar,’ printed in 1594, probably acted before the spring of 1589; his most famous achievement ‘The Old Wives Tale,’ printed in 1595, possibly acted five years earlier; and ‘The Love of King David and Fair Bethsabe, with the Tragedy of Absalon,’ not printed till 1599, the date of its composition is uncertain. Besides the above, Peele wrote ‘The Hunting of Cupid,’ a lost pastoral drama licensed 26 July 1591 (see Arber, Stationers’ Registers, ii. 278). He was possibly the author of the plays ‘Sir Clyomon and Sir Clamydes,’ 1599; ‘The Life and Death of Jack Strawe,’ 1593; portions of the ‘First and Second Parts of Henry VI,’; ‘The Troublesome Reign of King John’ (printed in 1591); ‘The Wisdom of Doctor Doddipoll’ (printed in 1600); and ‘Alphonsus, Emperor of Germany’ (published in 1654). He may possibly have had a hand in ‘Wily Beguiled,’ first known to have been printed in 1606. Peele is said by some scholars to have written or contributed to the tragedy Titus Andronicus, which is normally attributed to Shakespeare. Peele also provided London with pageants, such as: ‘The Device of the Pageant borne before Woolston Dixie, Mayor [of London], 29 October 1585’, printed in 1585; ‘Descensus Astrææ,’ written for the mayoral ceremony of Sir William Webbe, 29 Oct. 1591; and ‘Speeches to Queen Elizabeth at Theobalds,’ composed for an entertainment devised for the queen’s visit in 1591 to Lord Burghley’s country seat. Among his poems are The Honour of the Garter, and Polyhymnia (1590), and to the Phoenix Nest in 1593 he contributed The Praise of Chastity, and he has been ‘credited’ with A Merry Ballet of the Hawthorn-tree, first printed in Ritson’s Ancient Songs, 1790.
The exact date of his death is uncertain, but it was before 1598, as Francis Meres, in his ‘Palladis Tamia, Wit’s Treasury,’ mentions him as having died of a terrible disease. The credit given to Greene and Marlowe must be shared by Peele, who was one of the most prominent figures among those of Shakespeare’s ‘predecessors’ and earlier contemporaries. In his manipulation of his own language for metrical purposes he was skilful, and now and then very successful. Dyce’s Account of George Peele and his Writings, can be found in the Dramatic and Poetical Works of Robert Greene and George Peele, 1861 (Dyce’s first edition of Peele’s Works, with Life, was published in 3 vols. in 1829–39). There is also Ward’s History of English Dramatic Literature (1875), i. 203–13; Collier’s History of English Dramatic Poetry, 3 vols. (new edit. 1879); F.A.R. Læmmerhirt’s George Peele, Untersuchungen über sein Leben und seine Werke (Rostock, 1882); Symonds’s Shakspere’s Predecessors in the English Drama, 1884, pp. 537 seqq.; Mr. A. H. Bullen’s Works of George Peele, 2 vols. 1888, introduction; and Fleay’s Biographical Chronicle of the English Drama, 1891, ii. 150–162. Also, Professor F.B. Gummere, in Representative English Comedies (1903); and an edition of The Battell of Alcazar, printed for the Malone Society in 1907. See, Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, vol. 44 Peele, George by Adolphus William Ward, pp. 225-229; Encyclopedia Britannica: A Dictionary of Arts, Sciences, Literature and General Information, 11th Ed., vol. XXI, Cambridge University Press, 1911, pp. 44- 45; Elizabethandrama.org, ‘Introduction to George Peele,’ Peter Lukacs, 2016-2020; Poetry Foundation, ‘George Peele, 1556-1596,’ 2020 (online).
367. 1593 Friar Tuck and Maid Marian referred to in Pierce’s Supererogation by Gabriel Harvey (c.1552/3–1631), scholar and writer born at Saffron Walden, Essex (see no. 341 above). The eldest son of six children, his father John Harvey was a prosperous yeoman farmer and master rope maker, and prominent member of the town’s corporation. He was able to send Gabriel and his younger brothers, Richard and John, to Cambridge. Gabriel matriculated at Christ College, Cambridge, in 1566, received his bachelor’s degree in 1570, and became a fellow at Pembroke Hall (later Pembroke College) that same year. His arrogant, unsociable demeanour, caused conflict with many of his fellows, and he would appear to have been continually at war. The ill-feeling ran so high that when the time came for him to proceed M.A. they agreed to refuse him the necessary ‘grace’ from the college. It was not until after a delay of three months that he eventually in 1573 obtained his degree, and although he was shortly after appointed college lecturer, his relations with the society seem to have become permanently embittered. Gabriel however, did become an intimate friend of Edmund Spenser, and he is the ‘Hobbinol’ of Spencer’s Shepheardes Calender. In 1578 Gabriel became a fellow of Trinity Hall, Cambridge, and began to study civil law. For five months, from May 1583, he was appointed by the college as deputy proctor of the university. In 1585 he failed to be elected master of Trinity Hall and was not admitted to a doctor’s degree there. He completed his doctorate in civil law at Oxford University. Gabriel moved to London at some point between about 1586 and 1588 to take up legal practice in the court of arches. Shortly after, both he and his brother Richard became involved in a long war of words with some of the most significant pamphlet writers of the day, which included Thomas Nashe and Robert Greene (see no. 346 above).
Gabriel largely disappeared from view in the last three decades of his life. He left London and appears to have lived in Cambridge for a time, then seems to have retired to Saffron Walden, the town of his birth. He was buried there on the 11th February, 1631. His unfulfilled achievement was the introduction of the classical hexameter into English poetry. Gabriel’s principal Latin writings are: 1. ‘Rhetor, sive 2. Dierum Oratio de Natura, Arte et Exercitatione Rhetorica,’ 1577. 2. ‘Ciceronianus, sive Oratio post reditum habita Cantabrigiæ ad suos auditores,’ 1577. 3. ‘Smithus, vel Musarum Lachrymæ pro Obitu honoratiss. Viri … Thomæ Smith, Esq. aur., Majestatisque Regiæ Secretarii,’ 1578. 4. ‘Χαῖρη vel Gratulationum Valdensium Libri quatuour [sic],’ 1578. His English works, were edited by Alexander B. Grosart in three volumes (The Huth Library, 1884-85) and include the following: 1. ‘The Story of Mercy Harvey,’ 1574–5. 2. ‘Letters to and from Edmund Spenser,’ 1579–80. 3. ‘Foure Letters and certaine Sonnets,’ 1592. 4. ‘A Letter of Notable Contents,’ &c., 1593. 5. ‘Precursor of Pierce’s Supererogation [1593], and Pierce’s Supererogation, or a new Prayse of the Olde Asse,’ 1593. 6. ‘The Trimming of Thomas Nashe,’ 1597. His ‘Letter Book’ a manuscript in the possession of Pembroke College comprising letters between the dates 1573–80, was edited by Mr. E. J. L. Scott for the Camden Society. An edition of Gabriel Harvey’s anti-Nashe tracts, appeared in the doctoral thesis of Peter Brynmor Roberts (Cardiff University). See, Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Volume 25 Harvey, Gabriel by James Bass Mullinger, pp. 83-85; Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Harvey, Gabriel by Jason Scott-Warren, 2016 (online); Britannica: The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica, Gabriel Harvey, 2020 (online); The Literary Encyclopedia, Peter Brynmor Roberts, 2020 (online).
368. 1593 Two mentions of Robin Hood and Little John in A treatise conteyning the true catholike and apostolike faith, by William Rainolds (1544?-1594), a Roman Catholic priest and author. There is a copy in the Folger Shakespeare Library. It was digitized by Google Books in 2009 from a copy at the Complutense University of Madrid.
William was born in Pinhoe, Devon, the second son of Richard Rainolds, farmer, and elder brother of John Rainolds, the puritan theologian. His name is variously spelt Rainolds, Raynolds, Reynolds, and Reginaldus. Educated at Winchester School and New College, Oxford, he was elected probationer fellow in 1560, and perpetual fellow in 1562. During Elizabeth I’s visit to Oxford in 1566 Rainolds was one of the members of the university to mark the occasion with poems. He graduated B.A. on 17 June 1563, and proceeded M.A. on 4 April 1567. Having taken holy orders in the Church of England, he held for a time the rectory of Lavenham, Suffolk. In 1572 he resigned his fellowship, and went into residence as a commoner at Hart Hall. In 1575 he made a public recantation at Rome and was received into the Catholic church. On 16th August 1577 he arrived at the English College, Douai. In 1578 and 1579 there were journeys to Rheims (the new location of the English College) Louvain, and Paris. On 31 March 1580 he was ordained priest at Chalons. His change of faith is attributed partly to a study of the controversy between John Jewel and Thomas Harding (1516–1572), and partly to the influence of William, afterwards Cardinal Allen, the president of the English College at Rheims. Allen appointed Rainolds professor of scriptures and Hebrew and on 11 April 1581 he started to lecture on the epistles of St. Paul. However his bad health prevented him from carrying out his teaching duties very regularly. Together with Gregory Martin, William Allen, and Richard Bristow, Rainolds was involved in the translation of the Rheims Bible (New Testament, 1582). Rainolds contribution mainly consisted of answering controversial works by opponents in England . Ironically, one of those opponents was William’s brother John. He spent the last few years of his life as priest of the Beguines church at Antwerp, where he died on 24 Aug. 1594. His remains were interred in the Beguines church, on the south side of the chancel.
His works are as follows: 1. ‘A Refutation of sundry Reprehensions, Cavils, and false Sleightes, by which M. Whitaker laboureth to deface the late English translation, and Catholic Annotations of the New Testament, and the Book of Discovery of heretical corruptions,’ Paris, 1583, 8vo. 2. ‘De Justa Reipublicæ Christianæ in reges impios et hæreticos Authoritate’ (published as by G. Gulielmus Rossæus, but ascribed by John Pits to Rainolds), Antwerp, 1592, 8vo. 3. ‘Treatise conteyning the true Catholike and Apostolike Faith of the Holy Sacrifice and Sacrament ordeyned by Christ as His Last Supper, with a Declaration of the Berengarian Heresie renewed in our Age,’ &c., Antwerp, 1593, 8vo. 4. ‘Calvino-Turcismus, i.e. Calvinisticæ Perfidiæ cum Mahumetana Collatio, et utriusque sectæ Confutatio,’ Antwerp, 1597, and Cologne, 1603, 8vo [see Gifford, William, D.D., (1554–1629)]. Some unpublished works are also ascribed to Rainolds by Pits. See, Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Vol. 47, Rainolds, William, by James McMullen Rigg, pp. 182-3; Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, in Association with The British Academy, From the earliest times to the year 2000, H. C. G. Matthew and Brian Harrison, Oxford University Press, 2004, Rainolds [Reynolds], William (1544?-1594).
369. 1593 Robin Hood mentioned in Ortho-epia Gallica. Eliots fruits for the French, a French teaching manual by John Eliot, in which he attempted to ‘teacheth to speake truely, speedily and volubly the French-tongue. Pend for the practise, pleasure, and profit of all English Gentlemen.’ There are two copies in the British Library, and another in the Huntington Library. An edition from Scolar Press appeared in 1968, and another by EEBO Editions, ProQuest (2010).
This work was almost entirely forgotten until 1920, when Miss Kathleen Lambley devoted several pages to the work and its author in The Teaching and Cultivation of the French Language in England during Tudor and Stuart Times (Manchester, 1920). In 1928 Mr. Jack Lindsay ‘extracted’ a large part of the work, and reprinted the English portions of the second and third parts, at the Fanfrolico Press, under the title The Parlement of Pratlers, this being a sub-title which Eliot gave to his ‘fantasticall Rapsody of dialogisme.’ In an article in the Review of English Studies (VIII, 1931, 419-30), Miss Frances Yates demonstrated the satirical purpose of the Ortho-epia Gallica as it applied to several Elizabethan conversation manuals written by foreign refugees, with special emphasis on the works of John Florio, an English writer of Italian Origin, born in London about 1553. She developed this theme further in her biographical study (John Florio: The Life of an Italian in Shakespeare’s England (Cambridge, 1934), and also showed the part that Eliot played in the background of Shakespeare’s Love’s Labour’s Lost (Idem, A Study of Love’s Labour’s Lost (Cambridge, 1936).
When Eliot’s book came from the press in 1593 the contents were as follows: The First Book, The Second Book, and The Second Method. The First Book contains three dialogues, the third of which is titled ‘The Traveller’ (pp 41-60). This dialogue, in parallel columns of English and French, gives an account of travels in France and Italy. Eliot’s work can be described as a witty satire of contemporary conversation manuals such as Florio’s First Fruits, which yield Familiar Speech, Merry Proverbs, Witty Sentences, and Golden Sayings (1578). Florio, one of the most famous of the language teachers, was attacked by Eliot, the main victim of his satire. Eliot was probably the author of a poem in French, printed in 1588, in the second edition of Maurice Kyffin’s The Blessedness of Britayne, which is signed ‘I. Eliote’. Kyffin, a Welshman, and Robert Greene (see no. 364 above) were Eliot’s friends; prefixed to Greene’s Perimedes the Blacke-Smith is I. Eliote’s sonnet ‘Au R. Greene Gentilhomme.’ Kyffin was also a friend of Gabriel Harvey (see no. 367 above) who formerly owned a copy of Eliot’s Ortho-epia which is now in the Huntington Library. Harvey’s signature appears on the title-page, and his markings, underscorings, or marginal notes are found in part of this work as well. Little else is known of Eliot, however he was in England by October 17th 1588, and appears to have returned there from the continent after the murder of Henry III in 1589. See, Encyclopædia Britannica, 1911, Vol. 10, Florio, Giovanni, pp. 546-47; Huntington Library Quarterly Vol. 1, No. 2 (Jan., 1938), pp. 169-187; Art of Travel, 1500-1850, NUI Galway, 2016-2021 (online); Resolute John Florio, 2019 (online).
370. 1593 ‘Gawen,’ ‘Sir Guy,’ ‘Robin Hood,’ and ‘Clem a Clough,’ in Idea the shepheards garland Fashioned in nine Eglogs by Michael Drayton, probably a reference to Sir Gawain, a legendary character in the King Arthur stories, Guy of Gisborne, in one of the early Robin Hood ballads, and Clim of the Clough in the tale of Adam Bell. A copy was discovered in 1867 at Lamport Hall, Northamptonshire; it was added to the Britwell Library in 1893, and is now in the Huntington Library. There are also two copies in the British Library. These eclogues, which were written on the model of Spencer’s ‘Shepheardes Calender,’ afterwards underwent considerable revision. In the fourth eclogue there is introduced an elegy, which was afterwards completely rewritten, on Sir Philip Sidney; and it is probably to this that Nathaniel Baxter, in speaking of Sidney’s death, makes reference in his ‘Sir Philip Sydneys Ourania,’ 1606:
O noble Drayton! well didst thou rehearse
Our damages in dryrie sable verse.
The first English poet to write odes in imitation of Horace, Michael Drayton (1563-1631) was born at Hartshill, near Atherstone, Warwickshire. He states in his epistle to Henry Reynolds that he had been a page, and it is not improbable that he was attached to the household of Sir Henry Goodere of Powlesworth; in a dedicatory address prefixed to one of his ‘Heroical Epistles’ (Mary, the French queen, to Charles Brandon) he acknowledges that he was indebted to Sir Henry Goodere for the ‘most part’ of his education. In 1598, Drayton was involved in a lawsuit over property filed by Margaret, the widow of Thomas Goodere, Henry’s younger brother. There is some belief that he was the son of a butcher; but we have in Drayton’s own words (‘The Owle,’ 1604) that he was ‘nobly bred’ and ‘well ally’d.’ There is no evidence to show that he attended university. His earliest work, ‘The Harmonie of the Church,’ a metrical rendering of portions of the scriptures, was published in 1591 with a preface-dated London, 10 Feb. 1591, ‘To the godly and vertuous Lady, the Lady Jane Deuoreux of Merivale,’ in which he speaks of the ‘bountiful hospitality’ that he had received from his patroness. This book seems to have been confused with ‘The Triumphes of the Churche,’ which was ordered to be destroyed by church authorities.
In 1593 Drayton published the first of his historical poems, ‘The Legend of Piers Gaveston,’ which was followed in 1594 by ‘Matilda, the faire and chaste Daughter of the Lord Robert Fitzwater’ which almost certainly influenced Anthony Munday (see no. 378 below). Both poems, after revision, were reprinted in 1596, with the addition of ‘The Tragicall Legend of Robert, Duke of Normandie,’ the volume being dedicated to Lucy, countess of Bedford. Before leaving Warwickshire, according to tradition, Drayton courted a lady from Coventry who lived near the River Anker, long identified as Sir Henry Goodere’s daughter. In her honour he supposedly published, in 1594, a series of fifty-one sonnets under the title of ‘Ideas Mirrour: Amours in Quatorzains.’ The lady (celebrated under the name ‘Idea’) to whom the sonnets were addressed did not become the poet’s wife, but he continued for many years to sing her praises. In the 1605 collection of his poems he has a ‘Hymn to his Lady’s Birth-place,’ which is written in a strain of effusive gallantry. The magnificent sonnet, ‘Since there’s no help, come let us kiss and part,’ first appeared in the 1619 folio. An epistle, ‘Of his Lady’s not coming to town,’ first published in the 1627 collection, shows that his devotion, after thirty years’ service, was unchanged. Biographers agree that he lived and died a bachelor; but Edmond Gayton in ‘Festivous Notes on Don Quixote,’ 1654, p. 150, states that he was married.
In 1595 Drayton published ‘Endymion and Phoebe, dedicated to the fourteen-year-old Lucy Harington, now countess of Bedford. The first poem planned on a large scale is ‘Mortimeriados,’ published in 1596, and republished with many alterations in 1603, under the title of ‘The Barrons Wars.’ An address to the reader in 1603 explains that ‘the cause of this my second greater labour was the insufficient and carelesse handling of the first’; the 1619 edition makes it clear that the carelessness was the printer’s. Drayton was constantly engaged in revising his works, and ‘The Barons’ Wars’ saw many changes before it reached its final shape. ‘Mortimeriados’ was dedicated, in nine seven-line stanzas, to the Countess of Bedford; but when, in 1603, Drayton reissued the poem, he withdrew the dedication and cancelled various references to his patroness. ‘England’s Heroicall Epistles,’ 1597, his next work of importance, is the most readable of Drayton’s longer works. The book was modelled on Ovid’s ‘Heroides.’ A second edition appeared in 1598; a third, with the addition of the sonnets, in 1599; a fourth in 1602, again with the sonnets; and a fifth, with ‘The Barons’ Wars,’ in 1603. Historical notes are appended to each epistle; and to each pair of epistles (with a few exceptions) Drayton prefixed a dedication to some distinguished patron.
From Henslowe’s ‘Diary’ (see no. 393 below) it appears that Drayton was writing for the stage between 1597 and 1602. From late 1597 to 1604 he wrote more that twenty plays for the Lord Admiral’s Men. He wrote few single-handed, but worked with Henry Chettle, Thomas Dekker, and others. In December 1597 he was engaged with Munday on a lost play called ‘Mother Redcap.’ On 20 Jan. 1598–9 he received three pounds ‘in earneste of his playe called Wm. Longberd’ (Diary, ed. Collier, p. 142), and on the following day he acknowledged the receipt of ‘forty shillinges of Mr. Phillip Hinslowe, in part of vili, for the playe of Willm. Longsword.’ Both entries probably refer to the same lost play. In 1599 Drayton wrote the ‘First Part of Sir John Oldcastle,’ with Wilson, Hathway, and Munday (see no. 394 below); and in January 1599–1600 he was engaged with the same authors on ‘Owen Tudor.’ There was a ‘Second Part of Sir John Oldcastle;’ but it is not clear whether it was written by the four playwrights or whether Drayton was solely responsible. ‘The First Part of the true and honorable History of the Life of Sir John Oldcastle’ was published in 1600 in a corrupt form. Some copies fraudulently bear Shakespeare’s name on the title-page (see no. 394 below). In May 1602 Drayton wrote, with Dekker, Webster, Middleton, and Munday, a play which Henslowe calls ‘too harpes’ (‘Two Harpies’). The anonymous ‘Merry Divel of Edmonton,’ 1608, has been attributed to Drayton.
There is a tradition that Drayton was employed by Queen Elizabeth on a diplomatic mission in Scotland. In an obscure passage of the satirical poem ‘The Owle,’ 1604, he states that he went in search of preferment ‘unto the happie North,’ and ‘there arryv’d, disgrace was all my gayne.’ On the accession of James he published ‘To the majestie of King James. A gratulatorie Poem,’ 1603, and in the following year gave a further proof of his loyalty in ‘A Pæan Triumphall: composed for the societie of the Goldsmiths of London congratulating his Highnes Magnificent Entring the Citie,’ 1604. But his hopes of gaining advancement from James were rudely disappointed; his compliments met with indifference and contempt. Many years afterwards (1627) in an epistle to his friend George Sandys he refers to the ill-treatment that he had experienced. Chettle, in ‘England’s Mourning Garment,’ n.d. (1603), hints that he had been too hasty in paying his addresses to the new sovereign:
Think ’twas a fault to have thy Verses seene
Praising the King ere they had mournd the Queen.
‘The Owle,’ of 1604 is an allegorical poem, in imitation of Spenser’s ‘Mother Hubbard’s Tale,’ on the neglect shown to learning. It was written Drayton tells us, before his congratulatory poem on James. ‘The Owle’ was dedicated to the young Sir Walter Aston, to whom he also dedicated the 1603 edition of ‘The Barrons Wars’ and ‘Moyses in a Map of his Miracles,’ 1604. From a passage in the last-named poem it has been hastily inferred that Drayton had witnessed at Dover the destruction of the Spanish armada. At his investiture as knight of the Bath in 1603 Sir Walter Aston made Drayton one of his esquires (Douglas, Peerage, ed. Wood, i. 127), a title which Drayton afterwards used somewhat ostentatiously. In ‘Poems: by Michaell Draiton Esquire,’ 1605, the word ‘Esquire’ is made to occupy a line by itself. About 1605 appeared the undated ‘Poemes Lyrick and Pastorall: Odes, Eglogs, the Man in the Moone,’ 8vo, with a dedication to Sir Walter Aston. The volume contains some of Drayton’s choicest work. Here first appeared the famous ‘Ballad of Agincourt,’ which is unquestionably the most spirited of English martial lyrics; the fine ode ‘To the Virginian Voyage,’ the charming canzonet ‘To his coy Love,’ the address ‘To Cupid,’ and other delightful poems. Two of the odes (‘Sing we the Rose’ and the address to John Savage) were apparently never reprinted; the rest of the volume, after revision, was included in the 1619 folio. The collection of ‘Poems,’ 1605, 8vo, with commendatory verses by Thomas Greene, Sir John Beaumont, Sir William Alexander, &c., embraces ‘The Barons’ Wars,’ ‘England’s Heroical Epistles,’ ‘Idea,’ and the ‘Legends.’ Other editions appeared in 1608, n. d., 1610, and 1613. The edition of 1610 has at the end an additional leaf containing a commendatory sonnet by Selden. In 1607 Drayton published another of his legends, ‘The Legend of Great Cromwell,’ which was republished with alterations in 1609, and was included in the 1610 ‘Mirour for Magistrates.’
The first eighteen songs of Drayton’s longest and most famous poem, ‘Poly-olbion, or a Chorographicall Description of all the Tracts, Rivers, Mountaines, Forests, and other Parts … of Great Britaine,’ fol., appeared in 1612-13. A second part, containing songs xix–xxx, was written later, and published in 1622 – here Drayton celebrates Robin and his men in the 26th song. There is a copy in the Bodleian Library. The complete poem (with commendatory verses before the second part by William Browne, George Wither, and John Reynolds) was published in 1622. In 1619 Drayton collected into a small folio all the poems (with the exception of the ‘Poly-Olbion’) that he wished to preserve, and added some new lyrics. The collection consists of seven parts, each with a distinct title-page dated 1619, but the pagination is continuous. In some copies the general title-page is undated; in others it bears the date 1620. At the back of the general title-page is a portrait of Drayton, engraved by Hole, and round the portrait is inscribed ‘Effigies Michaelis Drayton, Armigeri, Poetæ Clariss. Ætat. suæ L. A Chr. ciɔ. dc. xiii.’ A fresh volume of miscellaneous poems, ‘The Battaile of Agincourt,’ &c., appeared in 1627, sm. fol. Here was published for the first time the dainty and inimitable fairy poem, ‘Nimphidia.’ ‘The Shepheards Sirena’ and ‘The Quest of Cynthia’ are agreeably written, though the latter poem is far too long. ‘The Battaile of Agincourt’ (not to be confused with ‘The Ballad of Agincourt’) and ‘The Miseries of Queen Margarite’ contain some spirited passages, but tax the reader’s patience severely. Among the ‘elegies’ is the interesting ‘Epistle to Henry Reynolds,’ in which Drayton delivers his views on the merits of various contemporary English poets. It may be doubted whether Drayton had any great liking for the drama; his praise of Shakespeare is tame in comparison with his enthusiasm for Spenser. One epistle is addressed to William Browne of Tavistock, and another to George Sandys, the translator of Ovid’s ‘Metamorphoses;’ both are written in a tone of sadness. ‘An Elegie vpon the death of the Lady Penelope Clifton’ and ‘Vpon the three Sonnes of the Lord Sheffield, drowned in Humber’ had previously appeared in Henry Fitzgeoffrey’s ‘Certayn Elegies,’ 1617. At the beginning of the volume are commendatory verses by I. Vaughan, John Reynolds, and the fine ‘Vision of Ben Jonson on the Muses of his friend, M. Drayton,’ which opens with the question whether he was a friend to Drayton. When he visited William Drummond of Hawthornden in 1619, Jonson stated that ‘Drayton feared him; and he [Jonson] esteemed not of him [Drayton],’ spoke disparagingly of the ‘Poly-Olbion,’ and had not a word to say in Drayton’s praise.
Drayton’s last work was ‘The Muses Elizium lately discovered by a new way over Parnassus … Noahs floud, Moses his birth and miracles. David and Golia,’ (1630). The pastorals were dedicated to the Earl of Dorset, and at p. 87 there is a fresh dedication to the Countess of Dorset, preceding the poems. In the main body of the volume, ten exquisite ‘nimphalls’ describe a green world, a ‘Poets Paradise’, in which the muses, fairies, and poets can wander far from the corruptions of power and the greed of printers. In 1627 Drayton was involved in another lawsuit and he appeared before the London consistory court in St. Paul’s accused of ‘suspicion of incontinency with Mary Peters, wife of John Peters.’ Drayton died in London in 1631 and was buried in Westminster Abbey, where a monument was erected to him by the Countess of Dorset. There is a portrait of Drayton at Dulwich College, presented by Cartwright the actor. In person he was small, and his complexion was swarthy. He speaks of his ‘swart and melancholy face’ in his ‘Legend of Robert, Duke of Normandy.’ His moral character was unassailable, and he was regarded by his contemporaries as a model of virtue. His poetry won him applause from many quarters. He is mentioned under the name of ‘Good Rowland’ in Barnfield’s ‘Affectionate Shepheard,’ 1594, and he is praised in company with Spenser, Daniel, and Shakespeare in Barnfield’s ‘A Remembrance of some English Poets,’ 1598. A very clear proof of his popularity is shown by the fact that he is quoted no less than a hundred and fifty times in ‘England’s Parnassus,’ 1600. There is no direct evidence to show that Shakespeare and Drayton were personal friends, but there is strong traditional evidence. The Rev. John Ward, sometime vicar of Stratford-on-Avon, states in his manuscript note-book that ‘Shakespear, Drayton, and Ben Jhonson had a merry meeting, and, itt seems, drank too hard, for Shakespear died of a feavour there contracted.’ The entry was written in 1662 or 1663. It is not uninteresting to notice that Drayton was once cured of a ‘tertian’ by Shakespeare’s son-in-law, Dr. John Hall (Select Observations on English Bodies, 1657, p. 26). Drayton drew praise from fellow poets such as Richard Barnfield, Thomas Lodge and William Browne. He in turn wrote commendatory poems for books ranging from Thomas Morley’s ‘First Book of Ballets,’ 1595, to George Chapman’s ‘Hesiod,’ 1618.
Drayton was much read and published in his own day, but less so in the eighteenth century. His fame was revived in the nineteenth century but no complete edition of his works appears to have been issued. Poems of Drayton are included in ‘England’s Helicon,’ 1600; some had been printed before, but others were published for the first time. There are verses of Drayton, posthumously published, in ‘Annalia Dubrensia,’ 1636. An imperfect collection of Drayton’s poems by William Oldys, appeared in 1748, fol., and again in 1753, 4 vols. 8vo; but his poetry was little to the taste of eighteenth-century critics. In 1856 John Payne Collier edited for the Roxburghe Club a valuable collection of the rarer works: ‘The Harmonie of the Church,’ ‘Idea. The Shepheards Garland,’ ‘Ideas Mirrour,’ ‘Endimion and Phœbe,’ ‘Mortimeriados,’ and ‘Poemes Lyrick and Pastorall.’ The Rev. Richard Hooper in 1876 issued an edition of the ‘Poly-Olbion’ in three volumes; and the same editor was preparing a complete critical edition of Drayton’s entire works, however it was never completed. Facsimile reprints of the early editions were issued by the Spenser Society. A volume of selections from Drayton’s poems was edited by Arthur Henry Bullen in 1883. ‘Michael Drayton: a critical study with a bibliography’, by Oliver Elton appeared in 1905. The Works of Michael Drayton (Oxford, five volumes, 1931-41) was edited by J. William Hebel. The fifth volume contains introductions, notes, and various readings edited by Kathleen Tillotson and Bernard H. Newdigate, with a revised edition in 1961. A two volume edition of Drayton’s poems published at Harvard in 1953, edited by John Buxton, are the only twentieth century editions of his poems recorded by the Library of Congress. See, Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Vol. 16, Drayton, Michael by Arthur Henry Bullen, pp. 8-13; Encyclopædia Britannica, 1911, Vol. 8, Drayton, Michael by Edmund William Gosse, pp. 557-58; Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, in Association with The British Academy, From the earliest times to the year 2000, H. C. G. Matthew and Brian Harrison, Oxford University Press, 2004, Drayton, Michael (1563-1631); New World Encyclopedia, Michael Drayton (online).
371. 1594 ‘A booke entituled a pastorall plesant Commedie of Robin Hood and Little John &c.’ was entered to Edward White (see no. 357 above) in the Stationers Register on May 14. This play has not survived and there is no record of it being printed. There is some suggestion that it is one of the several lost works of Anthony Munday (see no. 373 below), and even that it was the work of Shakespeare. The play can presumably be identified with ‘Robin Hood and Little John’ entered in the Stationers Registers on 29 June 1624, and another ‘Robin Hood and Little John’ entered to Master Oulton on 22 April 1640. These two ‘ballads’ may possibly be identified with other editions of ‘Robin Hood and Little John’ by Thomas Evans, 1777, Vol. I, 204-10 (and later editions); Joseph Ritson, 1795, Vol. II, 138-45 (and later editions); John Mathew Gutch, 1847, Vol. II, 295-301; Francis James Child, 1888, Vol. III, 134-6, and 1965, Vol. III, 133-6; MacEdward Leach, 1955, 367-70; and R. B. Dobson and J. Taylor, 1976, 165-71. See, Pastoral Poetry & Pastoral Drama: A literary inquiry, with special reference to the pre-Restoration stage in England, Walter W. Greg, London, 1906, 405-6; A Literary Pirate’s Attempt to Publish The Winter’s Tale in 1594: Significant Facts Testifying to the Early Composition of Shakespeare’s Comedy of Jealousy, Charles Wisner Barrell, The Shakespeare Fellowship Quarterly, Vol VII, April, 1946, 29; The English and Scottish Popular Ballads, Francis James Child, Dover Publications, Inc., 1965, Vol. III, 40, 134; Rymes of Robyn Hood: An Introduction to the English Outlaw, R. B. Dobson and J. Taylor, London, 1976, 43, 165, 220; Robin Hood: A Complete Study of the English Outlaw, Stephen Knight, Oxford, 1994, 116, 285.
372. 1595 St. Columb Major, Cornwall: Churchwardens accounts record debts ‘of Robin hoodes monyes’ [Bakere, The Cornish Ordinalia, 18].
373. c. 1595-96 John a Kent and John a Cumber by Anthony Munday, refers to ‘that monstrous murrian’ and ‘mayde Marian.’ The manuscript of the play was in the possession of E. M. L. Mostyn, Esq., M.P., and it came to the notice of Sir Frederick Madden (Keeper of the manuscripts in the British Museum). It was printed by the Shakespeare Society in 1851. John S. Farmer published a facsimile of the manuscript in 1912, and he wrote that the present Lord Mostyn ‘believes the MS. to have come into the possession of his family in 1690, and that it belonged to the Hobart Collection’. A reprint for the Malone Society (by Frederick Hall M.A.) appeared in 1923, taken from the manuscript which was now in the possession of Messrs. Quaritch. The play in humorous fashion, concerns the grotesque and supernatural adventures of two west-country wizards. It is written throughout in the hand of Anthony Munday, however at the end it is signed ‘Anthony Mundy, Decembris, 1595’ (in the Shakespeare Society print) and ‘Anthony Mundy, Decembris, 1596’ (in the Malone Society reprint); it is thought that the signature is not Munday’s, but is in the handwriting of the time. There is the suggestion that ‘John a Kent’ is identical with the lost play The Wise Man of West Chester produced by the Admiral’s men at the Rose Theatre on 2 Dec. 1594 (see Notes and Queries, 1st ser. iv. 55, 83; art. Kent, John). There may be some connection with another lost play, Randal Earl of Chester, which Thomas Middleton was working on in collaboration with Munday, Dekker, Drayton and Webster in 1602. More recent research has led to the belief that ‘John a Kent’ was alluded to in the last of the Marprelate tracts, The Protestation (c. September 1589), and that Munday was the ‘Mar-Martin’ referred to in the tract, and that he was an anti-Martinist playwright and pamphleteer (see no. 344 above). It has further been suggested that the manuscript of ‘John a Kent’ was completed in 1590. It does not contain a list of the players, however they are placed in order of appearance in the Malone Society reprint. See, John a Kent and John a Cumber; A Comedy, by Anthony Munday. Printed from the Original Manuscript, J. Payne Collier, London (Printed for the Shakespeare Society), 1851; John a Kent & John a Cumber (The Malone Society Reprints), 1923: The Witch: Thomas Middleton, Elizabeth Schafer, London, 1994, (Introduction, x); John a Kent and Marprelate, E. A. J. Honigmann, The Yearbook of English Studies, Vol. 13, Colonial and Imperial Themes Special Number (1983), pp. 288-293.
Anthony Munday (1560?-1633) playwright, poet, and miscellaneous writer, was born in the parish of St Gregory London, where the parish register records his baptism on 13 October 1560 (he was once thought to have been born in 1553). City records indicate that Munday was an orphan, his father Christopher, a stationer and draper, was apparently dead by 1571, although his mother Jane appears to have died in 1599. Munday had probably been an actor before he was apprenticed to the stationer and printer John Allde in 1576. This was short lived as in 1578 or 1579 he undertook a journey to Rome, to see foreign countries and to learn their languages, according to his own account; but, also, with the less creditable object of spying upon English Catholics abroad, and getting together materials for popular pamphlets against them on his return to England. Along the way, Munday had some interesting adventures. He says that he and his companion, Thomas Nowell, were robbed of their possessions on the road from Boulogne to Amiens, where they were kindly received by an English priest, who entrusted them with letters to be delivered in Reims. These they handed over to the English ambassador in Paris, where under a false name, as the son of a well-known English Catholic, Munday gained recommendations which secured his reception at the English College in Rome. He was treated with special kindness by the rector, Dr Morris, for the sake of his supposed father. He gives a detailed account of the routine of the place, of the dispute between the English and Welsh students, of the carnival at Rome, and finally of the martyrdom of Richard Atkins. He returned to England in 1579, and became an actor again, being a member of the Earl of Oxford’s company between 1579 and 1584. Also in this period, Munday studied with Claudius Hollyband ‘a London Huguenot who offered Latin, French, Italian, penmanship, and arithmetic’. In a Catholic tract entitled A True Reporte of the death of—M. Campion (1581), Munday is accused of having deceived his master Allde, a charge which he refuted by publishing Allde’s signed declaration to the contrary, and he is also said to have been hissed off the stage. He was one of the chief witnesses against Edmund Campion (see no. 286 above) and his associates, and wrote about this time five anti-popish pamphlets, among them the savage and bigoted tract entitled A Discoverie of Edmund Campion and his Confederates—whereto is added the execution of Edmund Campion, Raphe Sherwin, and Alexander Brian, the first part of which was read aloud from the scaffold at Campion’s death in December 1581. During the 1580s Munday worked in various capacities for government officials, and in 1588 in Palladine and Palmerin D’Oiva he signed his name as ‘Messenger of Her Majesty’s Chamber’. Munday’s work for government officials also included serving as a pursuivant ‘a messenger or agent employed by such authorities as the Privy Council, the courts of High Commission and the ecclesiastical courts, and was usually armed with a warrant to arrest’. Richard Topcliffe, Elizabeth’s chief torturer seems to have employed Munday in 1582, and he apprehended dissidents and provided information on priests and other Catholics. In 1588 Munday ‘appeared before the Council . . . to answer unspecified charges. In 1598-1599, he travelled with the earl of Pembroke’s men in the Low Countries, it was in the capacity of playwright to furbish up old plays. Before the end of 1599 Munday was back in England, and he devoted himself to writing for the booksellers and the theatres, compiling religious works, translating Amadis de Gaule and other French romances, and putting words to popular airs.
Munday was the chief pageant-writer for the City from 1605 to 1616, and it is likely that he supplied most of the pageants between 1592 and 1605, of which no authentic record has been kept. It is by these entertainments of his, which rivalled in success those of Ben Jonson (his bitter rival) and Middleton, that he won his greatest fame. In some of his pageants he signs himself ‘citizen and draper of London.’ Of all the achievements of his versatile talent the only one that was noted in his epitaph in St Stephens, Coleman Street, London, where he was buried on the 9th or 10th of August 1633, was his enlarged edition (1618) of Stow’s Survay of London (see no. 381 below). His monument, with a long inscription, was destroyed in 1666, but the inscription was printed in full in the 1633 edition of Stow’s ‘Survay’ (p. 869). The names of Munday’s children, together with the dates of their christenings, are given in the register of St. Giles, Cripplegate: Elizabeth, 28 June 1584; Roase, 17 Oct. 1585 (buried 19 Jan. 1586); Priscilla, 9 Jan. 1587; Richard, 27 Jan. 1588; Anne, 5 Sept. 1589. The records show that ‘Elizabeth wife of Anthony Mondaye gentleman’ was buried there on 7 October 1621. Munday’s second wife Gillian, is mentioned in his will.
Of the eighteen plays between the dates of 1584 and 1602 which are assigned to Munday in collaboration with Henry Chettle, Michael Drayton, Thomas Dekker and other dramatists, only four are extant. As well as John a Kent and John a Cumber, a ballad of British Sidanen, was entered at Stationers’ Hall in 1579. This was followed by The Downfall of Robert Earl of Huntington, and The Death of Robert Earl of Huntington (see no. 378 below). Munday also had a share with Michael Drayton, Robert Wilson and Richard Hathway in the First Part of the history of the life of Sir John Oldcastle (acted 1599), which was printed in 1600, with the name of William Shakespeare, which was quickly withdrawn, on the title page (see no. 394 below). Munday is thought to have originally been the sole author of the autograph manuscript version of Sir Thomas More (c. 1593) a play in whose revision other dramatists, and possibly Shakespeare, took a hand.
A contemporary of many of the great English writers (including Shakespeare), there can be no doubt that Munday had the longest writing career of any author of his generation. He left one of the largest and most varied bodies of work for that time. His writings include translations of Romances, City Pageants, and many miscellaneous works. John Charlewood printed Munday’s first book in 1577, and he would continue as Munday’s chief printer for a number of years. ‘Mundaie’s Dreame,’ a ballad, was licensed to John Allde 2 Aug. 1578 (see Collier, Broadside Ballads, 1868, p. viii). A ballad (assigned to Munday) of the ‘Encouragement of an English Soldier to his Mates’ was licensed to J. Charlwood 8 March 1580, and another, ‘Against Plays,’ 10 Nov. 1580; but neither of these is now known. In his ‘Banquet of Dainty Conceits’ Munday similarly tried his hand at song-writing, fitting words to well-known music by various composers (including the Mundys, his connections); but what was probably his best essay as a lyrist, the ‘Sweete Sobbes and Amorous Complaintes of Sheppardes and Nymphs in a Fancye,’ is not extant. Munday attached his name in full to most of his works, though in some cases he uses the pseudonym Lazarus Piot, or L. P. A great number bear his motto, ‘Honos alit artes’. See, Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Volume 39, Munday, Anthony by Thomas Seccombe, pp. 290-97; Encyclopædia Britannica, 1911, Vol. 19, Hugh Chisholm, pp. 3-4; The Cambridge History of English and American Literature in 18 Volumes (1907–21). Volume V. The Drama to 1642, Part One. XIII. Lesser Elizabethan Dramatists. § 3. Antony Munday’s career (1553–1633) and industry as a writer; Anthony Munday and the Catholics, 1560–1633, Donna B. Hamilton (Introduction), Ashgate Publishing, 2005; Rymes of Robyn Hood, R. B. Dobson and J. Taylor, London, 1976, p. 221.
374. 1597 The tune ‘Bonny Sweet Robin’ in The Cittharn Schoole by Anthony Holborne (Cambridge University Library, pages unnumbered). There are several tunes and songs that refer to either Robin Hood, Bonny Robin, Jolly Robin, Gentle Robin, or just plain Robin, and others that contain the line ‘Robin Hood (or Robin) is to the greenwood gone.’ The clown sings ‘Hey Robin, jolly Robin’ in Twelfth Night, and Ophelia sings ‘For bonny sweet Robin is all my joy’ in Hamlet (see Robin in Music and Literature and also, Old English Popular Music).
Little is know of the life of Anthony Holborne (1545?-1602), a musical composer who was possibly a member of Queen Elizabeth’s Chapel Royal. In 1562 he entered Cambridge University, and in 1565 he was apparently admitted to Inner Temple Court (London). On June 14, 1584, he married Elisabeth Marten in St Margaret’s Church Westminster (today the parish church of the House of Commons). From some time in the 1590s through 1602 he was in service to Sir Robert Cecil ‘Baron Cecil.’ In January of 1599 he travelled as a letter courier ‘for her Maiesties service.’ According to a letter written by his wife, he suffered from a bad cold in November, 1602, which was the cause of his death at the end of that month. His ‘Cittharn Schoole,’ has a dedication to Thomas, lord Burgh, baron Gainsburgh, and an address to the ‘proficient scholler or lover of the cittharn.’ It contains (Grove, Dict. i. 743) thirty-two preludes, pavans, galliards, popular song tunes, &c., for the cithern alone, in tablature; twenty-three others for the cithern with an accompaniment, in ordinary notation, for the bass viol; and another two for the cithern with accompaniments for treble, tenor, and bass viols. These pieces are followed by ‘Sixe short Aers Neapolitan like to three voyces, without the instrument: done by his brother William Holborne.’
His other publication was: ‘Pavans, Galliards, Almains, and other short Æirs both grave and light, in five parts, for Viols, Violins, or other Musicall Winde Instruments, made by Anthony Holborne, gentleman and servant to her Most Excellent Maiestie. Imprinted at London … by William Barley … ,’ 1599. The books contain sixty-five pieces. ‘As they are in number many, so they are of a nature variable to please variable natures,’ wrote Holborne in a graceful dedication to Sir Richard Champernown. A copy of this work, possibly unique, was in the British Museum Library, where there were also some unpublished single pieces (Lute music, Addit. MS. 31392, and Egerton MS. 2046). A duet, ‘My heavy Sprite,’ with lute accompaniment, by Holborne, is in Robert Dowland’s ‘Musicall Banquet,’ 1610. Holborne wrote commendatory lines in Latin for Farnaby’s ‘Canzonets,’ 1598, and in English for Morley’s ‘Plain Introduction,’ 1608; while John Dowland dedicated the first song, ‘I saw my Ladye weepe,’ of his ‘Second Book,’ 1600, to the ‘most famous Anthony Holborne.’ Dowland, who published some of Holborne’s music after his death, twice calls him a ‘Gentleman Usher’ to Queen Elizabeth I. Both composers enjoyed close contacts with literary circles at court – Dowland via Lucie Russell, Countess of Bedford, and Holborne via Mary Sidney, a leading intellectual, poetess, and patroness of Edmund Spenser. Despite the obvious importance of Holborne’s publications, in the New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, it is noted: ‘Although he [Holborne] cannot count among the major English composers of his time, he was a good artisan with a facility for producing well-written, attractive music of a sort that made him widely popular in his lifetime, but which was not of sufficient musical substance to maintain his reputation for long after his death.’ Lute arrangements of three of Holborne’s dances were published in Germany in 1600, and The Complete Works of Anthony Holborne by Kanazawa, Masakata (Cambridge, Mass : Cambridge University Press) appeared in c. 1967-73. See, Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Vol. 27, Holborne, Anthony by Louisa M. Middleton; ‘Antony Holborne’ Brian Jeffery, Musica Disciplina, Vol. 22, 1968, pp. 129-205; HOASM: Anthony Holborne (online); MusicTales ‘Anthony Holborne: the master of Elizabethan consort music’, 2018 (online); ALLMUSIC: Anthony Holborne, James Reel, 2020 (online).
375. 1597 A mention of Maid Marian (actually referring to the wife of an Inn-keeper) in Wits Trenchmour, by Nicholas Breton (see no. 311 above). There is a copy in the Huntington Library.
376. 1597-98 Maid Marian is referred to, and ‘Robin Hood, Scarlet, and John’ (a line from the ballad The Jolly Pinder of Wakefield) is sung by Master Silence in Henry IV (First Folio) by William Shakespeare (see no. 365 above). See also, Robin Hood and the Pindar of Wakefield.
377. 1597-1600 Two mentions of Robin Hood in the Carew Manuscripts, some of which are kept in the Lambeth Palace Library (MS 596-638). They were collected by Sir George Carew during his period in Ireland. He had a vivid interest in Irish history, and his papers inspired the detailed account of the Irish revolt (1599–1602), which was published after his death, in 1633, under the title of ‘Pacata Hibernia, or the History of the late Wars in Ireland.’ This was reprinted in 1810 and re-edited in 1896. The actual author of this book, which has often been ascribed to Carew himself, is undoubtedly Sir Thomas Stafford, reputed to be Carew’s illegitimate son, who had served under Carew in Munster.. Carew carefully preserved and annotated all letters and papers relating to the Ireland of his own day, and purchased many ancient documents. He spent much of his leisure time in constructing pedigrees of Irish families, many of which in his own hand still exist. He bequeathed his manuscripts and books to Stafford, from whom they passed to Archbishop Laud. More than thirty volumes of Carew’s manuscripts relating to Irish affairs were placed by Laud in the Lambeth Library, and four are in the Laudian collection at the Bodleian; several of the volumes are now lost. Others of Carew’s papers were among the Harleian MSS. at the British Museum, at the State Paper Office, and at Hatfield. Calendars of the Lambeth documents, dating from 1515, have been issued in the official series of State Paper Calendars, under the editorship of J. S. Brewer and William Bullen. A number of Sir Robert Cecil’s letters to Carew, during the time that Carew was president of Munster, have been printed from the originals at Lambeth by the Camden Society (1864, edited by John Maclean). The same society has also printed Carew’s letters to Sir Thomas Roe 1615-17. A portrait of Carew is prefixed to ‘Pacata Hibernia.’ A Fragment of the History of Ireland, a translation from a French version of an Irish original, and King Richard II …. in Ireland from the French, both by Carew, are printed in Walter Harris’s Hibernica (1747). Carew may have contributed to the history of the reign of Henry V. in Speed’s Chronicle.
George Carew, Baron of Clopton and Earl of Totnes (1555?–1629), was a statesman and writer, the son of George Carew, dean of Windsor, by his wife Anne, daughter of Sir Nicholas Harvey. The young George was educated at Broadgates Hall, Oxford, where he took the degree of M.A. In 1574 he entered the service of his first cousin, Sir Peter Carew in Ireland, where he distinguished himself in the field on several occasions. In 1576 he was appointed lieutenant-governor of the county of Carlow and vice-constable of Leighlin Castle. In 1578 he was a captain in the royal navy, and in 1579 and 1580 he was at the head of a regiment of Irish infantry and afterwards of a regiment of cavalry in Ireland. Carew was made constable of Leighlin~bridge Castle in 1580, on the death (in a skirmish, 25 Aug., with the Irish) of his brother Peter (State Papers, Ireland lxxv. 88). Shortly afterwards Carew killed with his own hand, Irishman suspected of slaying his brother, and was severely reprimanded by the home government. However in 1582-4 he was appointed gentleman pensioner to Queen Elizabeth, whose favour he gained. In 1586 he was knighted in Ireland. Refusing the embassy to France, Carew was made master of the ordnance in Ireland in 1588, in 1590 Irish privy councillor; and in 1592 lieutenant general of the ordnance in England, in which capacity he accompanied Essex in the expedition to Cadiz in 1596 and to the Azores in 1597. In 1598 he attended Sir Robert Cecil, the ambassador, to France. He was appointed treasurer at war to Essex in Ireland in March 1599, and on the latter’s sudden departure in September of the same year, leaving the island in disorder, Carew was appointed a lord justice, and in 1600 president of Munster. His vigorous measures enabled the new lord deputy, Lord Mountjoy, to suppress the great rebellion of O’Neil, earl of Tyrone. In 1601 a large Spanish force under Don Juan d’Aguila in several vessels, appeared off the south coast of Ireland. The aim of this expedition was to affect a landing, join up with the northern rebels, and together smash the English power in Ireland. The south again rose in arms, and O’Neill and O’Donnell hastened to join with Don Juan, but Carew marched south and blockaded Kinsale. Troops were sent to him from England, and in conjunction with Lord Mountjoy, he routed the allies. Don Juan shortly capitulated and returned to Spain. Carew returned to England in 1603 and was well received by James I., who appointed him vice-chamberlain to Queen Anne the same year, master of the ordnance in 1608, and privy councillor in 1616; and on the accession of Charles I. he became treasurer to Queen Henrietta Maria in 1626. He sat for Hastings in the parliament of 1604, and on the 4th of June 1605 was created Baron Carew of Clopton; he had married the daughter of William Clopton, of Clopton in Warwickshire. Carew was advanced to the earldom of Totnes on the 5th of February 1626. In 1610 he revisited Ireland to report on the state of the country; and in 1618 pleaded in vain for his friend Sir Walter Raleigh. He died on the 27th of March 1629, leaving no issue. See, Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Vol. 9, Carew, George by Sidney Lee, pp. 51-53; Encyclopædia Britannica, Vol. 27, 1911, Totnes, George Carew, by Hugh Chisholm, p. 91; A Compendium of Irish biography: comprising sketches of distinguished Irishmen, and of eminent persons connected with Ireland by office or by their writings, Alfred Webb, Dublin, 1878, pp. 71-73; Lambeth Palace Library (online).
378. c. 1598 The two plays The Downfall of Robert Earl of Huntington and The Death of Robert Earl of Huntington (facsimiles from the British Museum; The Tudor Facsimile Texts, John S. Farmer, 1913) written by Anthony Munday (see no. 373 above). An original edition of The Downfall was at the British Museum (161 k. 70.) and also the The Death (C 34 d. 18.) Produced by the theatrical company the Admiral’s Men in 1599, and part of their repertoire, both plays were entered in the Register of the Stationers Company on 1 December 1600 and each was first ‘Imprinted at London, for William Leake’ in the following year. Evidence for the authorship and date of composition of the two plays is provided by the famous ‘Diary’ of the London theatre manager and proprietor, Philip Henslowe (see no. 393 below). On 15 February 1598, Henslowe ‘layd owt unto antony monday’ the sum of five pound for ‘a playe boocke called the firste parte of Robyne Hoode’; and in the following month (on 28 March) he licensed ‘the ij partes of Robart Hoode’ with the Master of the Revels. Henslowe paid ten shillings later in the same year to another Elizabethan playwright, Henry Chettle (see no. 373 above) ‘for mendinge of Roben hood for the corte’. It is quite possible that the 1601 editions of both The Downfall and The Death were printed directly from rough manuscript copies dating from early March 1598. The surviving texts of the two plays are probably solely the work of Anthony Munday, although Henry Chettle may have contributed to one or both. There can be little doubt that Munday was influenced by his literary friend Michael Drayton (see no. 370 above and The Downfall and Death of Robert, Earl of Huntington and The Many Robin Hoods 5). See also, Rymes of Robyn Hood, R. B. Dobson and J. Taylor, London, 1976, pp. 220-21; Robin Hood: A Complete Study of the English Outlaw, Stephen Knight, 1994, pp. 119, 122, 131.
379. 1598 Another reference to the well-known Robin Hood proverb, by the Rev. David Fergusson or Ferguson (1525?-1598), in the earliest known collection of Scottish proverbs, put in alphabetical order, first printed in 1641 (National Library of Scotland). There was a copy of this edition in the Advocates Library, Edinburgh, and an imperfect copy in the library of the British Museum. Other editions appeared in 1649, 1659, 1667, 1675, 1692, 1699, and 1706, the latter bearing the title, ‘Nine Hundred and Forty Scottish Proverbs, the greater part of which were first gathered together by David Ferguson, the rest since added.’
Fergusson was possibly born about 1533, although it could have been ten or twenty years earlier. David Laing thinks it could not have been later than 1525. Fergusson appears to have been a native of Dundee, but the only evidence for this is an entry in the treasurer’s accounts of Scotland 7 July 1558, of a summons to him and others within the borough of Dundee, to appear before the justices at the Tolbooth on 28 July, for disputing upon erroneous opinions and eating flesh during Lent. He appears to have been a glover by trade; the controversial Roman Catholic, James Laing, sneered at him as being an ignorant cobbler (sutor) and glover (De Vitâ Hæreticorum, p. 36). Fergusson gave up business and ‘went to school,’ in order to become a preacher or reformer. He was among the earliest of the Scottish Reformers – one of six, according to his own statement. It is doubtful if he ever attended a university, but he was well acquainted with Latin and Greek. In July 1560 he was appointed minister at Dunfermline by the Committee of Parliament, and in 1567 Rosyth was placed under his care, but in 1574 it was excluded, while Cumnock and Beith were added. In 1563 Fergusson published ‘An Answer to ane Epistle written by Renat Benedict, the French doctor, professor of God’s word (as the translator of this epistle calleth him) to John Knox and the rest of his brethren, ministers of that word of God made by David Feargusone, minister of this same word at this present Dunfermline.’ The only copy of this known to exist was presented to the University Library, Edinburgh, in 1701 by John Row, but it has been printed in the volume entitled ‘Tracts by David Ferguson,’ edited by David Laing for the Bannatyne Club in 1860. On 13 Jan. 1571–2 Fergusson preached a sermon before the regent at the meeting of the assembly in Leith, when a modified episcopacy was established. It was chiefly devoted to a protest against the alienation of the spoils of the church to the private uses of the nobility or to purposes of government, instead of their being applied to the establishment of churches and schools, and to meet the necessities of the poor. At the assembly held at Perth in August 1572 it was submitted to the revision of five of the most eminent ministers, all of whom gave it their strong approval, after which it was printed at St. Andrews by Robert Lekprevick, the dedication to the regent Mar bearing the date of 20 Aug. John Knox gave it his recommendation in the following striking terms: ‘John Knox with my dead hand but glad heart, praising God that of his mercy he leaves such light to his kirk in this desolation.’ The only copy known to exist is that in the Advocates’ Library, Edinburgh, but it also has been printed in the volume edited by Laing. Fergusson was chosen moderator of the general assembly which met at Edinburgh on 6 March 1573, and also of that which met on 24 Oct. 1578. He usually had a place on all important commissions, and for many years was chosen one of the assessors to the moderator to prepare matters for the assembly. In 1582 he was appointed by the assembly a commissioner for the ‘west end of Fife to superintend the establishment of kirks and planting of ministers.’ When the assembly wished to bring any matter of importance before the notice of the king, Fergusson was usually one of the deputies chosen to wait on him, and by his tact and ready wit he frequently succeeded in obtaining his end. In August of the same year Fergusson and six other ministers were cited by the king to attend a convention at St. Andrews to answer for certain proceedings of the assembly. On 12 May 1596, on the renewal of the covenant by the synod of Fife at Dunfermline, Fergusson gave an interesting address. At a meeting of the synod of Fife, held at Cupar in February 1597–8, in regard to a proposal to give ministers a vote in parliament, Fergusson, the eldest minister at that time in Scotland, after relating the difficulties of the church in the past in contending against the efforts to introduce episcopacy, strongly opposed the proposal, which he compared to the ‘busking up of the brave horse’ for the overthrow of Troy.
Fergusson was known for his humour and for his skill in the vernacular language. John Spotiswood calls him ‘a good preacher, wise, and of jocund and pleasant disposition’ (History, i. 129), and Robert Wodrow says that by ‘his pleasant and facetious conversation he often pleased and pacified the king when he was in a fury’ (Analecta, p. 120). Fergusson was also the author of ‘Epithalamium Mysticum Solomonis Regis, sive analysis critico-poetica Cantici Canticorum,’ Edinburgh, 1677. He left a diary containing a record of the principal ecclesiastical events of his time, which has been lost, but which probably his son-in-law, John Row (1568–1646), incorporated in his ‘History.’ By his wife, Isabel Durham, he had five sons and four daughters, one of whom, Grizzel, married Row. Fergusson died on 13 Aug. 1598, and a portrait done on timber, of a small oval form, was presented by Row to the university library of Edinburgh, but is now lost. See, Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Vol. 18, Ferguson, David by Thomas Finlayson Henderson, pp. 341-42; The Scottish Text Society, Fergusson’s Scottish Proverbs, Erskine Beveridge, Edinburgh and London, 1924.
380. 1598 Robin Hood Buttes near Eskdale Wood, Farlam, Cumberland (see Robin Hood Place Names).
381. 1598 Another reference to Robin Hood by John Stow (see no. 363 above) in A Survay of London which contains the account by Edward Hall (see no. 107 above) of Henry VIII and the Queen’s meeting with two hundred yeomen on Shooter’s Hill. Stow’s ‘Survay,’ his final work, from its first publication in 1598, when he was past seventy years of age, was dedicated to Robert Lee, lord mayor, and to the citizens of London. An exhaustive and invaluable record of Elizabethan London, it has taken rank as the first authority on the history of that city. However, this very fame has been the cause of some injury to the unity of the work, owing to the additions of successive editors, whose words have often been quoted as if they were written by the original author, although often referring to occurrences long after Stow’s death. The Survay is a masterpiece of topographical literature written by a Londoner of ripe experience, who was interested in everything that occurred around him. Stow founded his work upon documents of great value collected by himself, and also upon the splendid series of manuscripts belonging to the city of London, to which he had access as ‘fee’d chronicler’ of the corporation. He himself acknowledged that the model for his Survay was his friend William Lambarde’s excellent Perambulation of Kent, 1576.
‘Increased with divers notes of antiquity,’ Stow’s book was republished in 1603, two years before his death, but he omitted some passages in the first edition. An enlarged edition of the Survay was prepared by Anthony Munday after Stow’s death, and published in 1618 (see no. 373 above). In 1633, four months after Munday’s death, another edition, in folio, appeared ‘completely finished by the study of A. M., H. D., (Munday, Henry or Humphry Dyson) and others’. John Strype took the matter in hand in the next century and made a new book of the Survay in two volumes, folio, 1720. John Mottley published an edition in 1734, under the pseudonym of Robert Seymour. Another edition, enlarged by John Strype, ‘brought down to the present time by careful hands,’ was published in the same form in 1754-5. Strype died in 1737. This edition of Stow is an excellent history of London, but most persons will agree with Thomas Hearne in his criticism, ‘Stow should have been simply reprinted as a venerable original, and the additions given in a different character.’ A reprint of the 1603 edition, edited by William J. Thoms, founder and first editor of Notes and Queries, appeared in 1842, in 1846, and with illustrations in 1876, and edited by Henry Morley in the Carisbrooke Library in 1890. Stow’s authorised text is to be found alone in the edition of 1603. Mr. C. L. Kingsford produced a critical edition of Stow’s second edition (1603) which is of great value. It was published by the Clarendon Press, Oxford, in 1908. See, The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Survey of London, by John Stow, Henry B. Wheatley, [EBook #42959].
382. 1599 Another reference to the well-known Robin Hood proverb, in the Paradoxes of Defence (Folger Shakespeare Library), published by George Silver, who describes himself on the title-page as a ‘gentleman.’ The work was dedicated to Robert Devereux, second earl of Essex. At the end there is added ‘A Briefe Note of Three Italian Teachers of Offence’: ‘Here were three Italian Teachers of Offense in my time. The first was Signior Rocko: the second was Jeronimo, that was Signior Rocko his boy, that taught Gentlemen in the Blacke-Fryers, as Usher for his maister in steed of a man. The third was Vincentio . . . .’ The manuscript of the ‘Paradoxes’ was owned by Sir Samuel Rush Meyrick in 1841, and sold at his sale in 1870, then purchased in 1892 at the sale of the manuscripts of Edwin H. Laurence, lot 603, at a cost of £11. From here the manuscript went to the British Museum, but is now in the British Library (Add MS 34192).
Silver’s date of birth and death is uncertain, but he is remembered for his writings on the use of swords and other weapons. He states that he was skilled at fencing with the short sword, which he claimed to be the Englishman’s national weapon. Silver was angered by the Italian fencing-masters who taught the use of the long rapier in England, and was especially contemptuous of the popularity achieved by the book ‘Vincentio Saviolo his Practise. In two Bookes. The first intreating of the use of the Rapier and Dagger. The second, of Honor and honorable Quarrels’ (London, Printed by John Wolfe, 1595). Saviolo and Jeronimo were Italian fencing teachers in London, and they implied that ‘Englishmen were strong men, but had no cunning, and they would go backe too much in their fight, which was great disgrace unto them.’ As Silver tells us, he and his brother Toby tried in vain to arrange a challenge with Saviolo and Jeronimo ‘to be played at the Bell Saua ge vpon the Scaffold.’ They placarded London, Southwark, and Westminster with their challenges, and then waited for the Italians at the appointed time and place, which was ‘within a bow shot of their Fence schoole.’ Bills of challenge were delivered to them ‘telling them that now the Silvers were at the place appointed,’ however the Italians failed to show up. Two or three days after, ‘the maisters of Defence of London,’ had a chance scrimmage with the two Italians in a hall of entertainment, but there was no formal fight.
To prove his contention, Silver ultimately published his ‘Paradoxes.’ George Silver, ‘gent.,’ married Mary Heydon at St. Clement Danes on 24 March 1579–80 (Chester, Marriage Licenses, col. 1226). Silver also wrote ‘Bref Instructions Vpo my Pradoxes of Defence for the true handling of all Mann of weapons . . . .’ It appears to have been written shortly after the ‘Paradoxes,’ although the early seventeenth century has been suggested. The manuscript remained largely unknown, until it was discovered at the British Museum by Mr. W. London in about 1890. London made a complete transcript of it, which he gave in 1894, to Captain Hutton, a recognized authority on the sword and its employment. In 1895 the ‘Bref Instructions’ first came to the notice of Cyril G. R. Matthey, Captain, London Rifle Brigade, and member of the London Fencing Club. After London’s death, Hutton used his transcript for his own article in ‘The Indian Fencing Review’ of 1897. This article, and Hutton’s exhibition of swordsmanship at the Whitton Park Club, inspired Matthey to consult Silver’s original manuscript at the British Museum. With the encouragement of Captain Hutton and Captain Thimm, Matthey published the manuscript in 1898 – he determined to make the work really complete, as Silver had apparently intended, by reprinting the ‘Paradoxes’ with the ‘Bref Instructions.’ Matthey saw the latter as the more important work, and he suggested that the infantry officer would benefit from reading it, as it ‘can be put into practice in sword encounters with highly successful results, especially when they take place against men of savage or barbarian races that Her Majesty’s troops are now so frequently sent to face in various quarters of the globe.’ The manuscript is now in the British Library (Sloane MS 376). See, ‘The Works of George Silver: Comprising “Paradoxes of Defence” [Printed in 1599 and now reprinted] and “Bref Instructions Vpo my Pradoxes of Defence” [Printed for the first time from the MS. in the British Museum]’, Cyril G. R. Matthey, London, 1898; Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Vol. 52, Silver, George by Sidney Lee, pp. 250-51.
383. 1599 The play attributed to Robert Greene (see no. 364 above) has the characters Robin Hood, Much, the Miller’s son, Scarlet, and Maid Marian, and focuses on a figure taken from the ballad The Jolly Pinder of Wakefield (see no. 230 above). The play opens with a rebellion in the north led by the Earl of Kendall, and George confronts the three rebel leaders as he did the three outlaws in the ballad. George, Edward IV, and even King James of Scotland are involved in romantic activities, and with the guild of shoemakers, the two kings fight against George and Robin Hood. Like the ballad, it includes Robin’s invitation to George to join his band – George invites Robin to a banquet at his home; then they appear disguised in Bradford, where they fight the two kings and the shoemakers.
A Pleasant Conceyted Comedie of George a Greene, the Pinner of Wakefield was first published in 1599, but the name of the author is not given. It was entered on the Stationers Registers, Arpil I, 1595; the following is the entry (Arber, ii. 295):- ‘primo die Aprilis [1595] Entered for Cuthbert-Burby his copie under the wardens handes an Enterlude called the Pynder of Wakefeilde . . . vj₫.’ The date of its composition and of its first appearance is conjectural. The earliest notice of it is in Henslowe’s Diary, ed. Collier, p. 31:- ‘Rd at gorge a gren, The 29 of December 1593 . . . iijli xs.’ but he does not mark it as a new play, which leads to the assumption that it had been acted before. Henslowe notices it five times. On the 8th of January, 1593-4, it is entered under the title of ‘the piner of wiackefelld,’ which led Steevens, who gave the first transcripts from the Diary, to assume that this was another play.
It was ascribed, by Phillips in his Theatrum Poetarum (1675), by Winstanley in his Lives of the Poets (1687), and by Theophilus Cibber, or whoever was responsible for the Lives of the Poets which goes under his name, to John Heywood, presumably because they saw it described on the title-page as an interlude.
Langbaine and Ritson saw that it could not belong to Heywood, but gave no opinion about its authorship. Since then a copy of the Quarto of 1599, in the possession of the Duke of Devonshire, was brought to light by Mr. Payne Collier with the following notes on the title-page:- ‘ Written by . . . a minister who act[ed] th[e] piners pt in it himselfe. Teste W. Shakespea[re] Ed. Juby saith that ye play was made by Ro. Gree[ne].’ These notes appear to be by different persons, and to have been written at a different time, but the handwriting is that of the Elizabethan age. Juby, it may be added, was an actor in Prince Henry’s Company in 1604, and had joined Rowley in writing a play called Sampson in 1602.
Alexander Dyce expresses no opinion about the authenticity of the play, but merely says: ‘it has been thought right to include in the present collection George-a- Greene, the Pinner of Wakefield, 1599, in consequence of the following M. S. notes having been found’ (see The Dramatic and Poetical Works of Robert Greene & George Peele: with Memoirs of the Authors and Notes, Rev. Alexander Dyce, London, 1861, p. 33).
Tieck in his Vorrede zu Shakespeare, 1823, says that he is convinced the play is by Greene:- ‘Ich bin jetzt, nachdem ich noch mehr als damals in den Schriftstellern dieser alten Zeit gelesen habe, iiberzeugt, dass jenes vortreffliche kleine Lustspiel ebenfalls von R. Greene ist.’
Stephen Knight also thought that the play was Greene’s work, and suggests that it must be dated to 1592, the year of his death. Knight also adds ‘Conceivably Edward I (see no. 366 above) could have stimulated the play, as in George a Greene the king is Edward and both share a strong King and Subject sequence, but both of these could have come separately from the Gest’. See, Robin Hood: A Complete Study of the English Outlaw, Stephen Knight, Blackwell Publishers, Oxford, 1994, pp. 119-21. See also, The Plays & Poems of Robert Greene, J. Churton Collins, Vol II, ‘Introduction to George a Greene’, Oxford, 1905, pp. 159-67. The play is reprinted in Dodsley’s Old Plays (the third volume of the edition of 1825); The Dramatic and Poetical Works of Robert Greene & George Peele: with Memoirs of the Authors and Notes, Rev. Alexander Dyce, London and New York, 1861; The Life and Compete Works in Prose and Verse of Robert Greene, M. A., Cambridge and Oxford, Alexander B. Grosart, Vol XIV, For private circulation, London and Aylesbury, 1881-6; Robert Greene (The Mermaid Series), Thomas H. Dickinson, London and New York, 1909; ‘The Comedy of George a Green 1599’, The Malone Society Reprints, 1911; ‘A Pleasant Conceited Comedy of George A. Greene : The Pinner of Wakefield (1599)’ (facsimile reprint), Kessinger Publishing, 2010.
384. 1599 Two references to the legend by Thomas Nashe (see no. 346 above) – ‘Maid-marrian’ in the amusing dedication, and ‘Robin hoode and little Iohn’ in ‘Praise of the Red Herring,’ in Nashe’s final work, Lenten Stuffe – the red herring was the food that sustained Nashe through the hard days of Lent 1598. Copies are in the British Library, and another in the Huntington Library. There is an edition by Charles Hindley (London, 1871), and a facsimile reprint (Menston: Scolar Press, 1971). Nashe had co-written the satirical play The Isle of Dogs with Ben Jonson, which was performed in 1597. It was never published and no copy is known to exist. The ‘lewd plaie’ full of seditious and ‘slanderous matter’, caused an uproar. The issue was raised to the Privy Council who ordered the play to be suppressed. Three of the players (Gabriel Spenser, Robert Shaw, and Ben Jonson) were arrested and sent to prison. Nashe managed to flee London, but his home was raided and his papers seized. While in exile in 1598, he visited the town of Yarmouth as he tells us, for five or six weeks. Lenten Stuffe contains a charming description of the town, a herring fishery. The work grew out of a desire to thank the town for the ‘kind entertainment and benigne hospitality’ it had shown him. Having obtained a loan of money there, and taken a part in the festivities then going on, he formed an acquaintance with one Humphrey King, ‘King of the Tobacconists,’ the author of a poem entitled ‘An Halfe-penny-worth of Wit in a Penny-worth of Paper, or The Hermit’s Tale,’ to whom Nashe dedicated his work, and as a return for all favours granted, writes, ‘Because I had money lent me at Yarmouth, I pay them again in praise of their own town and the Red-Herring.’ Having escaped imprisonment, Nashe was back in London in 1599, the year his work was published. See, ‘Nash’s Lenten Stuff: containing the description and first procreation and increase of the town of Great Yarmouth, in Norfolk: with a new play, never played before, of The Praise of the Red Herring’, Charles Hindley, London, 1871, i-ii; A Cup of News: The Life of Thomas Nashe, Charles Nicholl, Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1984, pp. 258-65; ‘The Isle of Dogs (Play)’, World Heritage Encyclopedia, 2021 (online) .
385. c. 1600 Another reference to the legend by William Shakespeare (see no. 376 above) in As You Like It. His play is based on Rosalynde: Euphues Golden Legacie a prose romance by Thomas Lodge, who based his work on The Tale of Gamelyn. Shakespeare’s play has two main settings: the Duke’s court and the Forest of Arden, which is near his birthplace. His mother’s maiden name was Arden, an ancient Warwickshire surname which is presumed to be derived from the forest itself. See, ‘Rosalynde or, Euphues’ Golden Legacy by Thomas Lodge’, Edward Chauncey Baldwin, Ginn and Company, 1910, ix; Robin Hood: A Complete Study of the English Outlaw, Stephen Knight, Blackwell Publishers, Oxford, 1994, p. 133; ‘Where was Shakespeare’s Forest of Arden?’ National Trust: A Trusted Source article created in partnership with the University of Oxford, Sian Mitchell (online); Encyclopedia Britannica, Inc., ‘As You Like It: work by Shakespeare,’ David Bevington, 2021 (online).
386. 1600 A play presenting Robin Hood as the Earl of Huntington. Looke About You was performed by the theatrical company the Admiral’s Men. Its authorship remains uncertain, but a possible candidate has been identified as Anthony Wadeson, a playwright, who borrowed, on 13 June 1601, twenty shillings of Philip Henslowe, the theatrical manager, on account of a play on which he was engaged, bearing the title ‘The honourable life of the humorous Earle of Gloster, with his conquest of Portugall’ (Henslowe, Diary, p. 183). The play was to be acted by the Lord Admiral’s company, but it is not known to have survived. It could have been Wadeson’s sequel to ‘Looke About You,’ which has the ‘fantastical Robert [Earl] of Gloster’ (probably the hero of Wadeson’s play of 1601) as a leading character – towards the end Gloster announces that he is about to proceed to Portugal on a crusade against ‘the unchristned Sarisons.’ Other candidates for authorship include Henry Chettle, Anthony Munday and Thomas Dekker. ‘Looke About You’ was possibly written for Henslowe between 17 April and 26 May 1599 – a period for which his diary is lost. There was a copy in the British Museum, another example being at Bridgewater House, and yet another in the Dyce collection at South Kensington. There are copies in the British Library, and it was reprinted in ‘A Select Collection of Old English Plays: originally published by Robert Dodsley in the year 1744’, W. Carew Hazlitt, fourth edition, Vol. 7, London, 1874, pp. 385-506, and a facsimile (Tudor Facsimile Texts, John S. Farmer, 1912).
The play opens with ‘Robert Hood a young Noble-man’ and his servant – Robert is visiting Skinke (who pretends to be a hermit) on important business for his master, Richard I, who is seeking the affections of Lady Marian Faukenbridge, the sister of Robert of Gloster, Richard’s enemy. In the play ‘Troublesome Raigne of John, King of England,’ Philip Falconbridge is the bastard son of Richard I, by Lady Falconbridge. In ‘Looke About You’ Robert Hood does not become an outlaw, he is portrayed as a energetic young aristocrat, and plays the role of a glorified messenger boy – in one scene he is persuaded by Lady Marian to dress as herself. There is an obvious influence from the plays of Anthony Munday (see no. 378 above), who borrowed from several sources, including ‘Troublesome Raigne of John.’ (see, The Downfall and Death of Robert, Earl of Huntington). Other sources for ‘Looke About You’ probably include Holinshed’s Chronicles and the legend of Rosamund. See also, Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Vol. 58 Wadeson, Anthony by Sidney Lee, p. 422; ‘The Troublesome reign of King John’: being the original of Shakespeare’s ‘Life and death of King John’, F. J. Furnivall and John Munro, London, 1913, xlvii; A Pleasant Commodie Called Looke About You: A Critical Edition, Richard S.M. Hirsch, New York: Garland Publishing, 1980, xiii-xix; Robin Hood: A Complete Study of the English Outlaw, Stephen Knight, Blackwell Publishers, Oxford, 1994, pp. 131-3.
387. 1600 More references to the legend (including the well-known proverb) by Nicholas Breton (see no. 310 above) in Pasquils Fooles-Cap, one of Breton’s series of verse satires written under the name of ‘Pasquil.’ It was entered on the Stationers Register 10 May 1600: ‘Entred for his copie vnder the handes of master Sonnybank and ye wardens. The second part of PASQUILLes madcap, Intituled, the fooles Cappe, begunne by him and finished by Maphorius vjd.’ The dedication, addressed ‘to my very good friende, Master Edward Conquest,’ is signed ‘N. B.’ The only know copy is in the Bodleian Library. It was reprinted in The Works in Verse and Prose of Nicholas Breton, Alexander B. Grosart, Edinburgh University Press, 1879, Vol. I, pp. 15-25; and there is a facsimile publication ‘Pasquils mad-cap, and Pasquils fooles-cap’, Amsterdam, Theatrum Orbis Terrarum; New York, Da Capo Press, 1969. See, The Works in Verse and Prose of Nicholas Breton, Alexander B. Grosart, Edinburgh University Press, 1879, Vol. I, xxii; Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Vol. 06, Breton, Nicholas by Sidney Lee, p. 278.
388. 1600 More references to the legend in Nicholas Breton’s verse satire Pasquils Passe, and passeth not. It was entered on the Stationers Register 29 May 1600: ‘Entred for his copie vnder the handes of the wardens, a booke called PASQUILLes passe and passe not, sett downe in Threed P P P., . . . vjd.’ The dedication, signed ‘N. B.,’ is addressed ‘to my … good friend M. Griffith Pen.’ There are copies in the British Library and another in the Huntington Library. It was reprinted in The Works in Verse and Prose of Nicholas Breton, Alexander B. Grosart, Edinburgh University Press, 1879, Vol. I, pp. 1-12; and an edition published by EEBO Editions, ProQuest (July 13, 2010). See, The Works in Verse and Prose of Nicholas Breton, Alexander B. Grosart, Edinburgh University Press, 1879, Vol. I, xxii; Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Vol. 06, Breton, Nicholas by Sidney Lee, p. 278.
389. 1600 Another reference to the legend in Nicholas Breton’s verse satire Pasquils Mistresse. One of the few books published by Thomas Fisher, it bears his device of a kingfisher on the title-page. There is a copy in the British Library, the Huntington Library, and the Harvard College Library. It was first reprinted in Nicholas Breton: Poems not hitherto reprinted, Jean Robertson, Liverpool University Press, 1967, pp. 79-108, and another reprint by Forgotten Books (October 22, 2017). It would appear that Pasquils Mistresse came in late in the ‘Pasquil’ series, in any case, it cannot have been printed before June 3, 1600 ( i.e. after Pasquils Mad-Cap, Pasquils Fooles-Cap, and Pasquils Passe, and passeth not), when Fisher became a freeman of the Stationers Company: the first book to be entered to him in the Stationers Register was ‘A Mydsommers nightes dreame’ on October 8, 1600. The ‘Epistle Dedicatory’ of Pasquils Mistresse is signed ‘Salohcin Treboun’, apparently an imperfect anagram of Nicholas Breton, similar to the signature ‘Bonerto’ at the end of the preface to The Passionate Shepheard (1604). See, Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Vol. 06, Breton, Nicholas by Sidney Lee, p. 278; Nicholas Breton’s Pasquil Books, Jean Robertson, The Review of English Studies Vol. 17, No. 65 (Jan., 1941), Oxford University Press, p. 80.
390. 1600 Maid Marian mentioned in The Hospitall of Incurable Fooles (a translation of Tomaso Garzoni’s Hospidale de’ pazzi incurabili), probably by the stationer, translator, and printer Edward Blount or Blunt – Marian is in reference to a ‘decrepit woman’ called Acco who goes mad after looking at her face (which is deformed through old age) in a mirror. The translation is sometimes attributed to Thomas Nash (see no. 346 above). There are copies in the British Library and another in the Huntington Library. It was reprinted in 2010 by EEBO Editions, ProQuest.
The Stationers Register states that Edward Blount (1562?-1632?) was the son of Ralph Blount or Blunt, merchant tailor of London and apprenticed himself in 1578 for ten years to William Ponsonby, a stationer. In 1588 he was admitted a freeman of the Stationers Company. The first work published by Blount and registered in the extant Stationers Books is Joshua Sylvester’s ‘The Profitt of Imprisonment’ (1594), and the next is John Florio’s ‘Dictionarye in Italian and Englishe’ (1595–6). In 1598 Blount, out of respect (as he tells us) for the memory of Christopher Marlowe, who had died five years before, brought out the poet’s ‘Hero and Leander’ (printed by Adam Islip for Edward Blunt); and in a well-written dedication to Sir Thomas Walsingham, Blount speaks of himself as one of Marlowe’s intimate friends. In 1600 Blount published and dedicated to the Earl of Southampton a translation by ‘a respected friend,’ entitled ‘The Uniting of the Kingdom of Portugall to the Crowne of Castill.’ In 1603 Blount issued Florio’s translation of ‘Montaigne’s Essays,’ and in 1607 ‘Ars Aulica, or, The Courtier’s Arte,’ translated by himself from the Italian of Lorenzo Ducci, and dedicated to the brothers William, earl of Pembroke, and Philip, earl of Montgomery, the patrons of the first folio of Shakespeare. In 1620 he issued, with an introduction signed by himself, a series of essays entitled ‘Horæ Subsecivæ: Obseruations and Discovrses;’ he states in the preface that he did not know who the author was. In the same year he also published Shelton’s first English translation of ‘Don Quixote.’ The book is in two parts, and Blount prefaces the second with a dedication by himself to George Villiers, marquis of Buckingham. In 1623 Blount joined with another stationer, Isaac Jaggard, in producing, under Heming and Condell’s direction, the great first folio of Shakespeare (see no. 365 above). His name (‘Ed. Blount’) appears as one of the printers on the title-page and in the colophon. As he combined the functions of printer and editor on other occasions, it is fair to conjecture that he to some extent edited the first folio. Another translation in 1623 (by James Mabbe) edited by Blount is ‘The Rogue: or the Life of Guzman de Alfarache, written in Spanish by Matheo Aleman, printed for Edward Blount, 1623.’ It includes commendatory verses by Ben Jonson and Leonard Digges, and characteristic addresses by Blount himself. Blount played ‘the mid-wife’s part’ (as he terms it) in the production of Bishop Earle’s ‘Microcosmographie’ in 1628. The original edition bears no author’s name, but contains an amusing address to the reader signed ‘Ed. Blovnt.’ The book was printed ‘by William Stansby for Robert Allot.’ But although he did not publish this work, Blount had not yet retired from business. In 1632 he collected for the first time John Lyly’s ‘Sixe Court Comedies,’ 12mo (see no. 320 above), and had them printed by William Stansby for publication by himself. Blount signs both ‘the Epistle Dedicatorie’ addressed to Lord Lumley, and the notice ‘to the reader,’ in which he speaks in high praise of Lyly not only as a dramatist but as the originator of ‘Euphueisme.’ Blount appears to have had access to Lyly’s manuscripts; in no earlier editions of the separate plays were any of Lyly’s lyrics inserted. It was also in 1632 that R. Collins published Blount’s ‘Christian Policie,’ a translation from the Spanish of Juan de Santa Maria, dedicated by the translator to James Hay, earl of Carlisle. Nothing is known of Blount in later years. His shop in earlier days had been ‘in Paul’s Churchyard at the signe of the Black Beare.’ According to a document in the archives of the city of London, Blount married, before 2 Dec. 1623, Elizabeth, widow of a London stationer named Richard Bankworth (Overall’s Remembrancia, p. 318). See, Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Vol. 05, Blount, Edward by Sidney Lee, pp. 246-47; Encyclopædia Britannica, 1911, Vol. 4, Blount, Edward by Hugh Chisholm, p. 87.
391. 1600 William Kemp danced, as he tells us, with ‘a lusty Country lasse / my merry Maydemarian,’ at Sudbury (Suffolk). In February and March 1600, he had morris danced from London to Norwich (a distance of over a hundred miles) in a journey that took him nine days spread over several weeks, often amid cheering crowds. According to a common custom, he ‘put out’ a sum of money before his departure, on condition of receiving thrice the amount on his safe return. He left the lord mayor’s dwelling in London on the first Monday in Lent, accompanied by Thomas Slye, ‘taberer,’ William Bee, his servant, and George Sprat, his ‘overseer.’ His route lay through Romford, Chelmsford, Sudbury, Bury, Rockland, and Burford Bridge. Bad weather and his own fatigues caused many delays, and he did not arrive in Norwich till twenty-three days after his departure. He spent only nine days in actual dancing on the road. The mayor of Norwich arranged a triumphal entry for him, and gave him not only five pounds in Elizabethan angels, but a pension for life of 40s. The freedom of the Merchant Adventurers’ Company was also conferred on him. The exploit was long remembered in popular literature (ie. Ben Jonson’s mention of ‘the famous morrisse unto Norwich’ in his Works, 1616, p. 814). Later that year, Kemp had published his ‘first pamphlet to the presse,’ entitled Kemps nine daies wonder, a description of the event to correct inaccurate reports of his journey which had been published, such as ‘Kemp’s farewell to the tune of Kery, mery Buffe,’ or ‘his desperate dangers in his late trauaile,’ or ‘his entertainement to New-Market,’ a town which he never visited. A woodcut on the title-page shows Kemp in an elaborate costume, with bells about his knees, dancing to the accompaniment of a drum and tabor, which a man is playing at his side. The only known copy is in the Bodleian Library. It has been reprinted by the Camden Society (Kemps Nine Daies Wonder: Performed in a Daunce from London to Norwich, Alexander Dyce, London, 1840), by Professor Arber (An English Garner; ingatherings from our history and literature, Vol. 6, London, 1909, and G. B. Harrison (Henrie Chettle: Kind-hartes dreame, 1592; William Kemp: Nine daies wonder, 1600, London, 1923).
William Kemp or Kempe, commonly referred to as Will Kemp (d. 1603?) a comic actor and dancer, has uncertain parentage and date of birth. He was possibly linked to the Kempes of Ollantighe, near Ashford in Kent, or he could have been the son of ‘William Kempe, servant with William Holliday,’ who was buried at St. Giles’s, Cripplegate, 15 April 1589. Other candidates include William, son of Stephen Kempe of Broxbourne, who was apprenticed to William Cooke, printer, in November 1566 (Arber, Stationers’ Reg. i. 146). It has also been suggested that he is the William Kemp who married Cole Holwyn at St. Botolph’s, Bishopsgate, 13 June 1568, and the ‘Wm. Kempte’—no uncommon variant of the name—who owed money to one Phillipson in August 1559 (Warner, Cat. Dulwich MSS. pp. 1–2). Kemp probably began his theatrical career as a member of the company of actors in the service of Robert Dudley, earl of Leicester, Queen Elizabeth’s favourite. He was possibly in Utrecht in 1586 and may have taken part in the ‘dancing, vaulting, tumbling,’ and pantomime with which Leicester celebrated there the ensuing St. George’s day (Stow, Chron. p. 717; Shakespeare Society’s Papers, i. 88–95). Some of Leicester’s actor-servants seem to have proceeded a month or two later to the court of Denmark, where Frederick II gave them a warm welcome. In October 1586, at the invitation of Christian I, the elector of Saxony, they passed on to his court. Kemp has been described as a member of this travelling troupe, although his name does not appear on a list of its members names supplied in an official German document, dated October 1586 (Cohn, Shakespeare in Germany, p. xxv; Fleay, Hist. of the Stage, p. 82; Simpson, School of Shakspere, ii. 373). Leicester’s company of players paid a visit to Stratford-on-Avon in 1587, when it is more probable that Kemp was with them. On Leicester’s death, 4 Sept. 1588, his place as patron of the company was taken by Ferdinand Stanley, lord Strange (afterwards earl of Derby). Kemp doubtless remained with his fellow-actors. The famous comic actor, Richard Tarleton (see no. 355 above) died on 3 Sept. 1588, and Kemp succeeded him. Heywood, writing of this period in his ‘Apology for Actors,’ 1612, mentions ‘Will Kemp’ as succeeding Tarleton, ‘as wel in the favour of her majesty as in the opinions and good thoughts of the generall audience.’ The author of ‘An Almond for a Parrat’ (1589)—an attack on the Martin Mar-Prelate pamphleteers—similarly testified to Kemp’s fitness to fill Tarleton’s place by dedicating his tract ‘To that most Comicall and Conceited Cavaliero, Monsieur du Kempe, Jestmonger and Viceregent-generall to the Ghost of Dicke Tarlton.’ The writer, who claims long intimacy with the actor, and pretends that reports of the ‘pleasaunce’ of ‘Signor Chiarlatano Kempe’ had reached him while at Bergamo, has been doubtfully identified with the satirist Thomas Nashe (see no. 346 above). Kemp’s name first appears after the death of Leicester in a list of players authorized by an order of the privy council in 1593 to play seven miles out of London (Halliwell, Illustrations, p. 33). The company was transferred to the patronage of Lord Hunsdon, lord chamberlain in 1594, and Kemp was a leading member of it, at least till 1598. At Christmas 1594 he was summoned, with two other leading members of the company, Richard Burbage and William Shakespeare, to act before the queen at Greenwich. It was probably Shakespeare’s first appearance at court.
Kemp writing in 1600, asserts that he spent his life ‘in mad Iigges and merry iestes.’ Although he was entrusted with many leading parts in farce or broad comedy, his dancing of jigs at the close of plays gave him his chief popularity. These jigs were performed to musical accompaniments, and included the singing of comic words. One or even two actors at times supported Kemp in his entertainment, and danced and sang with him. Some examples of the music to which Kemp danced are preserved in a manuscript collection of John Dowland, now in the Cambridge University Library (Dd ii. 11; cf. Halliwell, MS. Rarities, p. 8). The words were doubtless often improvised at the moment, but on occasion they were written out and published. The ‘Stationers Registers’ contain licenses for the publication of at least four sets of words for the jigs in which Kemp was the chief performer. On 28 Dec. 1591 ‘the thirde and last parte of Kempe’s Jigge’ was licensed for publication to Thomas Gosson; on 16 Jan. 1594–5 Kemp’s name is appended in the margin to an entry licensing ‘A pleasant newe Jigge of the broome man’ for publication to Thomas Creede; on 2 May 1595 ‘A Ballad of Mr. Kempe’s New Jigge of the Kitchen Stuffe Woman’ was licensed to William Blackwall; and on 21 Oct. 1595 ‘A Ballad called Kempe’s new Jygge betwixt a Souldiour and a Miser and Sym the Clown’ was again licensed to Gosson. It is probable that his ‘jigs’ were not written by himself, but by the authors employed by the company to which he was attached. Very frequent reference is made to his jigs in plays and poems of the period (ie. Guilpin, Skialetheia, 1598; Marston, Scourge of Villanie, 1599, in Works, ed. Bullen, iii. 372); but none of those recorded in the ‘Stationers Registers’ are extant. In the Elizabethan play, ‘Jack Drum’s Entertainment,’ 1616, however, there is introduced a song to which ‘Kempe’s morris’ is danced. Kemp as a more dramatic character is extant in the printed comedy, ‘A Knacke to knowe a knave’ (1594, 4to). One scene there is entitled ‘Kemps applauded Merriments of the men of Goteham in receiuing the King into Goteham.’ The play was acted by Alleyn and his company at the Rose Theatre in 1592. The scene assigned to Kemp consists of senseless buffoonery. He has been identified with the ‘William’ who is noted as filling the part of Itys in the extant ‘plat’ or cast of the second part of the ‘Seven Deadly Sins,’ a morality play, now lost. It was acted by Alleyn and his company about 1592. Peter in Shakespeare’s ‘Romeo and Juliet’ and Dogberry in ‘Much Ado about Nothing’ undoubtedly belonged to Kemp’s repertory. In the second and third quartos of Shakespeare’s ‘Romeo and Juliet’ (1599 and 1609 respectively) ‘Enter Peter’ is misprinted as ‘Enter Will. Kemp’ (act iv. sc. 5), and in ‘Much Ado about Nothing,’ in both the quarto of 1600 and the folio of 1623, the names of Kemp and Cowley are prefixed, by a copyist’s error, to some speeches respectively of Dogberry and Verges (act iv. sc. 2). In the ‘Return from Parnassus,’ probably written about 1601, Kemp comes on the stage under his own name in the company of Burbage, and the two performers instruct Cambridge students in acting. Each actor is said to be a general favourite throughout the country, and since Kemp offers to teach his pupil how to portray ‘a foolish mayor or a foolish justice of the peace,’ it has been suggested that he created the part of Justice Shallow.
His name figures in the lists of actors appended to the First Folio of Shakespeare’s plays (1623) as ‘Kempt,’ to the quarto edition of Ben Jonson’s ‘Every Man in his Humour’ (1599), and to the folio of Jonson’s ‘Plays’ (1616). But, except in the cases of Peter and Dogberry, there is no means of positively identifying his parts in the dramas either of Shakespeare or Ben Jonson. It is possible that Shakespeare had at times cause to complain of Kemp’s interpolated buffoonery, and that Hamlet’s advice to the players, ‘Let those that play your clowns speak no more than is set down for them,’ was intended as a reflection on him. For unknown reasons, Kemp appears to have left the Chamberlain’s Men in 1599, possibly because his jigs may not have appealed to the more refined audience the company was trying to cultivate. Richard Brome, in his ‘Antipodes’ (1640), refers to the ‘fools and jesters’ practice in ‘the days of Tarlton and Kempe’ of introducing their own wit into poets plays. His dancing exploits were soon emulated by John Taylor the Water-poet and by Tom Coryate. The latter includes in the eccentric preface to his ‘Crudities’ some verses by Strangwaies in which Kemp’s dance is mentioned. Kemp remained in the public eye, and some time after his morris dance from London to Norwich he appears to have made another European tour. In Weelkes’s ‘Ayres’ (1608) mention is made of Kemp’s skipping into France. A ballad entitled ‘An excellent new Medley,’ dated about 1600, refers to his returning from Rome. William Rowley, in his ‘Search for Money’ (1609), mentions consecutively among recent ‘mad voyages,’ ‘the travel to Rome with the return in certain daies’ and ‘the wild morrise to Norrige,’ According to ‘The Travels of the three English Brothers,’ 1607, 4to, a play by John Day and others, dealing with the foreign adventures of the brothers Shirley, Anthony Shirley is represented as meeting Kemp with his boy at Venice. In any case, Kemp had left the lord chamberlain’s company; he had joined by 1602, the Earl of Worcester’s players, who were performing in that year at the Rose Theatre managed by Philip Henslowe (see no. 393 below). Henslowe’s account-books show a loan of 20s. to Kemp (10 March 1602), ‘for his necessary uses,’ and three payments in the following autumn for his clothes. Like other actors of the time, Kemp doubtless lived in Southwark, and he may possibly be the William Kemp residing in Samson’s Rents between 1595 and 1599, and in Langley’s New Rents in 1602. ‘William Kempe, a man,’ was buried in the church of St. Saviour, Southwark, on 2 Nov. 1603, but there is nothing to show his identity with the actor. The name is a common one in parish registers of the day. Dekker, in his ‘Guls Hornebook,’ speaks of the actor as dead in 1609, and Heywood, in his ‘Apology for Actors’ (1612), says of Kemp and other recent comic players that, ‘though they be dead, their deserts yet live in the remembrance of many.’ Richard Braithwaite includes in his ‘Remains after Death,’ 1618, an epitaph on Kemp.
In Norwich, on the wall of the Maddermarket Theatre in St. John’s Alley there is a plaque marking the spot where Kemp supposedly ended his morris dance and where, to celebrate, he jumped over the wall of the St. John Maddermarket Church. Kemp is also commemorated in a new walkway connecting Bethel Street to Theatre Street. The walkway lies at the back of the Forum and is called the ‘Will Kemp Way’. In Chapelfield Gardens there is a wooden carving of Kemp by Mark Goldsworthy which commemorates his journey. Kemp has appeared as a character in Film, TV, and in novels and plays. Tim FitzHigham, a modern-day comedian, has recreated some of Kemp’s feats including rowing the length of the River Thames in a paper boat. See Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Vol. 30, Kemp, William (fl.1600) by Sidney Lee, pp. 390-94; Encyclopedia Britannica, 1911, Vol. 15, Kemp, William by Hugh Chisholm; World Heritage Encyclopedia, William Kempe, 2021 (online); Literary Norfolk, Will Kemp (Flourished 1600), Cameron Self, 2007-2014 (online).
392. c. 1600 The tunes ‘Bonny Sweet Robin’ and ‘Robin hood is to the greenwood gone’ in the so-called Ballet lute book, kept in the Library of Trinity College Dublin (TCD MS 408). Various composers, including Anthony Holborne, produced songs and tunes relating to Robin or Robin Hood (see no. 374 above). Statistics from the Library’s Digital Repository revealed that after the Book of Kells, the Ballet lute book has been the second most-viewed item in the collection. It is actually a composite volume comprising two unrelated manuscripts dating from the late 16th or early 17th centuries, which were not bound together before the eighteenth century. The first book contains dance pieces, some for lute and others for viol, by prominent composers of the time; a mainstream selection of popular lute pieces entered c. 1590, together with sixty-four lyra viol pieces probably entered after 1610. This book is titled ‘William ballet his booke wittns william vines’. It has been assumed that the main hand was that of William Ballet. This hand was responsible for adding the sixteen solo lute pieces and two duets, plus part of a third duet. An unidentified adult hand added two short pieces, ‘Pegaramsey’ and ‘Robin Reddock’, on p. 26, and yet another hand a version of ‘Bonny Sweet Robin’ on p. 27. A child, or adult who could only write with difficulty, has tried to copy pieces and added flourishes at the bottom of several pages. It is possible that the book was originally a selection of sixteen lute pieces plus some duets, written by a professional scribe to be sold – later the book was passed to a child, William Ballet, whose teacher or guardian, William Vines, wrote the title of the book – Vines then added the extra pieces to the manuscript, which the child attempted to copy. Of the solo pieces in the main scribe’s hand, several were already current by 1580 and maintained their popularity well into the next century. There are also pieces by John Dowland, Daniel Bacheler, and probably Anthony Holborne that date from the late 1580s and 1590s, as well as a number of other tuneful pieces.
The Ballet companion manuscript (c.1593-1603) is slightly later in date than the Ballet manuscript itself, and contains approximately thirty simple ballad-tune arrangements. It preserves popular dance and broadside ballad tunes of the late Elizabethan period, some of which are named in plays by Shakespeare and others. Amongst these the best-known is Greensleeves, but in an Irish context the most significant is Callino casturame (or Cailín ó chois tSiúire mé – I am a girl from beside the Suir), the earliest known notation of an Irish song. Also included is the so-called Lute book lullaby: ‘Sweet was the sounge the vergin sange’. The manuscript was used by researchers into ballad and folk tunes from William Chappell to Claude Simpson, as a primary source for popular Elizabethan ballad tunes, and it has proved to be a valuable resource. See, The Lute in Britain: A History of the Instrument and its Music, Matthew Spring, Oxford, 2001, pp. 125-26; Manuscripts at Trinity: News and events from Manuscripts & Archives at Trinity College Dublin, October 31, 2014 (Lute-Books Online).
393. 1600 A lost play called ‘Robin Hood’s Pennyworth’s’ (also recorded as Pen’orths, Penerthes, Penerth, or Penerthe) in Philip Henslowe’s Diary. The play was written by William Haughton, and it could possibly be the same play as The English Fugitives, also by Haughton. See, Walter Greg, E. K. Chambers, and Foakes and Rickert. The play was acted by the theatrical company the Admiral’s Men, at the Fortune Theatre, an Elizabethan public playhouse on the northern edge of London. Built in 1600 by Henslowe to compete with the newly constructed Globe Theatre, it was destroyed by fire in 1621. The Fortune was rebuilt with brick, the first theatre to be so constructed, and re-opened in 1623. The closing of the theatres in 1642 by the Puritans affected the Fortune as well, but it was occasionally used for illegal, secret performances. It was partially torn down in 1649, and eventually demolished in 1661 to make way for housing.
Philip Henslow (c. 1550 – 1616) theatrical manager and entrepreneur, was born in Lindfield, Sussex. He appears to have settled in Southwark, London, before 1577, and on the death of his employer, Henslowe married his wealthy widow. With her money he became an owner of several Southwark properties, including inns and lodging houses. He was variously interested in dyeing, starch making, and wood selling, as well as pawnbroking, money-lending, and theatrical enterprises. He was a churchwarden and held some minor court offices, becoming a groom of the chamber. In 1586-7 Henslowe and a partner arranged for the rebuilding of the Rose Theatre on the Bankside near Southwark Bridge, and, under Henslowe’s financial management, various companies acted there from 1592 to 1603. Henslowe had an interest in the suburban Newington Butts Theatre in 1594 and, later, in the Swan Theatre in the Paris Garden at the western end of the Bankside. The actor Edward Alleyn had married Henslowe’s stepdaughter, and Henslowe and he presented bearbaiting and bullbaiting in an old arena near the Swan. In 1613 Henslowe built a new theatre, the Hope, designed for plays as well as bearbaiting, on this site. The most sumptuous of Henslowe’s theatres was the Fortune, built for the Admirals Men in 1600.
Henslowe’s theatres gave the first productions of many important Elizabethan dramas; he was associated in one way or another with most of the famous playwrights for a quarter of a century, and his Admiral’s Men were the chief rivals of the Chamberlain’s Men, Shakespeare’s company. Henslowe was a shrewd, crotchety man of business who kept a tight hand on his theatrical companies, his players, and his playwrights.
Henslowe’s famous Diary is one of the most important sources for the English theatrical history of the time. His extant account-book proves that he bought plays direct from the authors, and hired them out at a profit, together with the necessary properties, to various acting companies. Among those who sold their works to him were Dekker, Drayton, Chapman, Chettle, Day, and Rowley. The highest price paid by him for a play before 1600 was 6l.; after that date the price sometimes rose to 10l., but in many cases four, five, or even six authors were concerned in the composition, and shared in the emolument. The receipts, inserted in the extant diary, of moneys paid to dramatists by Henslowe are signed, and in some instances fully written out, by the recipients themselves, and thus some unique autographs are preserved. Henslowe often lent the authors small sums of money on account of promised work, and invariably kept them in humiliating subjection to himself. He always looked carefully after his security. Frances, wife of Robert Daborne, one of his most needy clients, stated at the time of Henslowe’s death that he had in his possession all Daborne’s manuscripts, together with a bond for 20l. as security for some loan; these Henslowe restored a few hours before he died.
Many of the plays mentioned by Henslowe as being acted under his management are now lost. Although plays by Marlowe, Chapman, and Dekker were repeatedly performed at his theatres, no play mentioned by him can be identified with any by Shakespeare. Shakespeare belonged to and wrote almost solely for the lord chamberlain’s company of players, and that company only on one occasion came into contact with Henslowe or his theatres, namely, in 1594. The lord chamberlain’s men then combined with the lord admiral’s men, a company always more or less associated with Henslowe, to give some performances under Henslowe’s management at the theatre in Newington Butts.
Henslowe died on 6 Jan. 1616, and was buried in the chancel of St. Saviour’s Church, Southwark, on 10 Jan. 1616. By his will, dated 5 Jan. 1616, he left all his lands and tenements to Agnes, his wife, whom he admits not to have used very well, although he derived much of his fortune from her. The overseers of his will were Edward Alleyn, Robert Bromfield, William Austin (1587–1634), and Roger Cole.
The volume containing Henslowe’s diary and accounts, with many of his letters and other papers relating to him, is now preserved in Dulwich College library. The diary deals mainly with the expenses of his management of the Rose and Fortune theatres between 1592 and 1603, but interspersed are memoranda, dated both earlier and later, of other commercial transactions, especially of his loans as money-lender or pawnbroker to the general public as well as to dramatists. Almost the whole is in his own crabbed handwriting, and the spelling is singularly bad. The theatrical entries between 1592 and 1597 supply the names of the plays performed at his theatres, with the dates of performance and his share of the receipts. After 1597 he added to the names of the plays only the sums advanced by him to authors, actors, or property-makers. After Henslowe’s death in 1616, Edward Alleyn, Henslowe’s business partner and stepson-in-law, had inherited and deposited Henslowe’s papers into the library at Dulwich College. The diary and some of the letters and papers were borrowed from the college about 1790 by Edmund Malone, who printed valuable extracts in his ‘Historical Account’ prefixed to the ‘Variorum Shakespeare.’ James Boswell the younger, Malone’s literary executor, returned the volume to the college in 1812, but some of the inventories of Henslowe’s theatrical properties and the like which Malone printed are now missing from the college library. The diary was (probably after Boswell returned it to Dulwich) much mutilated, chiefly by the excision of narrow slips. One of these cuttings, containing genuine signatures of George Chapman and Thomas Dekker, was purchased at a sale, and was in Brit. Mus. Addit. MS. 30262. The diary was first printed at length by Mr. J. P. Collier for the Shakespeare Society in 1845, but while Collier had access to this and the other theatrical documents preserved at Dulwich, several forged entries were interpolated in the manuscript diary, and appear in the printed edition. Mr. G. F. Warner, in his ‘Catalogue of the Dulwich MSS.,’ pointed out forgeries which introduce the names of Nashe, Webster, and other dramatists. A letter at Dulwich purporting to be written by Marston to Henslowe is also a forgery.
Henslowe’s diary was edited (1904-08) by Walter Greg, and was supplemented by Henslowe Papers (1907), also edited by Greg. Another edition by R. A. Foakes and R. T. Rickert appeared in 1961, based heavily on Greg’s, but corrects Greg in several instances. See, Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Vol. 26, Henslowe, Philip by Sidney Lee, pp. 136-38; Luminarium Encyclopedia, ‘The Fortune Theatre’, Anniina Jokinen, 1996-2010 (online); Britannica Academic, ‘Philip Henslowe’, 2021 (online); MoEML project, ‘Henslowe’s Diary’, 2020? (online).
394. 1600 Robin Hood, Bevis of Hampton, Ellen Rumming and others, mentioned in the play The first part Of the true and honorable historie, of the life of Sir John Old-castle. It was acted by the theatre company that became know as the Admiral’s Men, the ‘servants’ of Charles Howard, 1st earl of Nottingham, 2nd Baron Howard of Effingham; in 1585 he became England’s lord high admiral. The play, first performed in 1599, has been attributed to Anthony Munday, Michael Drayton, Robert Wilson, and Richard Hathway in Henslowe’s Diary (see also no. 373 above). There is another edition of the play with the imprint date of 1600, which has Shakespeare’s name as author. Thomas Pavier published both editions; but the one that bears Shakespeare’s name was apparently published in 1619. There are copies of both editions in the Huntington Library. An edtion by EEBO Editions, ProQuest appeared in July, 2010.
The Protestant martyr Sir John Oldcastle is the historical original of Shakespeare’s Sir John Falstaff. The play’s Prologue suggests a relationship to the Henry IV plays in its claim that ‘It is no pamperd glutton we present, / Nor aged Councellor to youthfull sinne,’ providing one of the strongest pieces of corroborative evidence that Shakespeare’s Falstaff may have originally been called ‘Oldcastle,’ and that this play purported to tell the ‘true’ story of the maligned martyr. See, ‘The first part of the true and honorable historie, of the life of Sir Iohn Old-castle, the good Lord Cobham’, Folger Shakespeare Library, Peter Kirwan, 2020 (online).
395. 1600 Robin Hood mentioned by Samuel Nicholson (fl. 1597?-1602), in Acolastus his after-witte. The ‘Epistle Dedicatory’ is addressed to ‘his deare Achates Master Richard Warburton.’ Nicholson’s dedication to Warburton, describes the work as ‘the first borne of my barren invention . . . begotten in my anticke age’ [i.e. sportive years]. The poem consists of 446 stanzas, each containing six decasyllabic or hendecasyllabic lines. Copies of this work are exceedingly rare, and the primary source of fascination for nineteenth-century readers seems to have been the unmistakable plagiarisms from Shakespeare (‘Rape of Lucrece’ and ‘Venus and Adonis’), and in a smaller measure from Nash’s ‘Pierce Penniless’ and other works (J. P. Collier, A bibliographical and critical account of the rarest books in the English language, ii. 46, (1865), and A. B. Grosart, Acolastus his after-witte: a poem, Introd. (1876). Men of letters in the nineteenth century were divided over the importance of these plagiarisms. J. P. Collier accused Nicholson of ‘the most scandalous literary thefts and unacknowledged appropriations’ (A bibliographical and critical account of the rarest books in the English language, ii. 46, (1865). Facsimile editions were produced in 1866 and 1876 by J. O. Halliwell and A. B. Grosart respectively. Halliwell argued that Nicholson must have considered these appropriations ‘so well known that a special acknowledgment was unnecessary’ (Acolastus his after-witte, privately reprinted, Preface, vi, London, (1866). Grosart praised Nicholson’s ‘prescient discernment of the genius of Shakespeare’, and even went so far as to suggest that Acolastus occupied a pivotal place in English literary history for ‘the witness it bears to the popularity of Shakespeare thus (comparatively) early’ (Acolastus his after-witte: a poem, Preface, v, (1876). There is a copy in the Huntington Library.
Poet and divine, he was probably the Samuel Nicholson of Catharine Hall, Cambridge, who graduated B.A. 1597–8. He took orders, and also published a devotional treatise: ‘God’s New Yeeres Gift sent into England, or the Summe of the Gospell contaynd in these Wordes, ‘God so loved the world that he hath given his only begotten sonne that whosoever beleaveth in him should not perish, but should have life everlasting,’ John iii. 1; the First Part written by Samuel Nicholson, M. of Artes,’ London, 1602, small 8vo. It is a devotional treatise, puritan in tone, but not in sermon form. See, Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Vol. 41, Nicholson, Samuel by William Arthur Shaw, p. 26; Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, in Association with The British Academy, From the earliest times to the year 2000, H. C. G. Matthew and Brian Harrison, Oxford University Press, 2004, Nicholson, Samuel (fl. 1597?-1602).
396. 1600 Robin Hood and Little John mentioned in The Golden-groue moralized in three bookes by William Vaughan (c.1577-1641). A second enlarged edition appeared in 1608. There are copies in the British Library, and another in the Huntington Library.
Writer and colonial pioneer, William was the second son of Walter Vaughan of Golden Grove, Carmarthenshire. He matriculated, along with his brother John (who became earl of Carbery), from Jesus College, Oxford, on 4 Feb. 1591-2, and graduated B.A. on 1 March 1594-5, and M.A. on 16 Nov. 1597. He supplicated for B.C.L. on 3 Dec. 1600, but before taking the degree he went abroad, travelled in France and Italy, and visited Vienna, where he proceeded LL.D., being incorporated at Oxford on 23 June 1605. William had another brother, General Sir Henry or Harry Vaughan (1587–1659), who was a well-known royalist leader. Soon after his return, William married Elizabeth, daughter and heiress of David ap Robert of Llangyndeyrn, and her home became William’s main residence. In January 1608 the house was struck by lightning and his wife killed, though William himself ‘miraculously escaped.’ As a result, spiritual thoughts so absorbed his mind that apparently he suffered for a time from religious mania, while most of his subsequent work bears evidence of strong religious feeling. He was also the victim of insinuations about the circumstances of the wife’s death, and to refute these he wrote a strangely mystical work, which he entitled ‘The Spirit of Detraction coniured and contacted in Seven Circles: a Work both Divine and Morall, fit to be perused by the Libertines of this Age, who endeavour by their detracting and derogatory Speeches to embezell the Glory of God and the Credit of their Neighbours’ (London, 1611, 4to).
William’s attention was soon directed to other matters of great public interest. In 1610 James I had granted to ‘a company of adventurers,’ consisting of the Earl of Northampton, Sir Francis Bacon, and forty-six other associates, considerable territory in Newfoundland for purposes of colonisation. William was sheriff of Carmarthenshire for 1616, and in that same year he purchased from the grantees a part of their land, and in the following year ‘I transported thither,’ he says, ‘ certayne colonies of men and women at my owne charge; after which, finding the burthen too heavy for my weake shoulders, I assigned the Northerly proportion of my grant unto . . . Viscount Falkland,’ and a further portion somewhat later, probably in 1620, to Sir George Calvert (afterwards Lord Baltimore). In 1618 William sent out a second batch of settlers under the command of R. Whitbourne, whom he appointed governor for life of the undertaking (Whitbourne, A Discourse and Discovery of Newfoundland, 1620; Oldmixon, Brit. Empire in America, 1741, i. 8).
In compliment to Wales, William had given his settlement the name of Cambriol, while its place-names included Vaughan’s Cove, Golden Grove, and the names of all the counties of South Wales except Radnor, all of which have since disappeared. The settlement was situated on the south coast at the head of Trepassey Bay, and had been ‘expressly planned on such a scale as to make agricultural pursuits and the fishing mutually depend on each other’ (Bonnycastle). Ill-health had prevented William from accompanying the earliest settlers, but he appears to have gone out himself after the return of Whitbourne in 1622. He had, however, returned to England by 1625, bringing with him two works ready for publication. One was a Latin poem, written under the pseudonym of ‘Orpheus Junior,’ in celebration of the marriage of Charles I, under the title of ‘Cambrensium Caroleia ‘ (London, 1625, 8vo). This extremely rare book, which was at the British Museum also contains a map of Newfoundland by Captain John Mason (1586-1635). To another work published in 1626, William gave the title of ‘The Golden Fleece . . . transported from Cambrioll Colchios, By Orpheus Junior’ (London, 4to). This work ranks among the earliest contributions to English literature from America (see Encyclopedia Britannica 9th edit. i. 720, s.v. ‘American Literature’).
In 1628 William was knighted in Ireland, however he was again in England in 1630, settling his private affairs, which he would have ‘chiefly to rely upon untill the Plantation be better strengthened.’ His hopes for the future of the colony were doomed to disappointment, chiefly owing to its severe winters. He appears to have lived for the rest of his life in Carmarthenshire, and ‘consoled himself for the failure of his dreams with his meditations and writings upon religion’ (Cell, Newfoundland, 26). He died at Torcoed in August 1641, and was buried in Llangyndeyrn churchyard, ‘without vain pomp,’ as enjoined in his will (which was dated 14 Aug., and was proved on 29 Aug. 1641). William’s second wife, Anne, was the only child of John Christmas of Colchester. She died on 15 Aug. 1672, at the age of eighty-four, and was buried in St. Peter’s Church, Carmarthenshire.
‘Though indifferently learned’ in law, in which faculty he had taken his degree, William ‘went beyond most men of his time for Latin especially and English poetry’ (Wood). He was also greatly attracted ‘ever since his childhood’ to the study of medicine, and wrote on the subject, whence, coupled with his degree of ‘doctor,’ he has often been erroneously described as a physician (Appleton, Cyclop. of Amer. Biogr. vi. 268; Drake, Dict. of Amer. Biogr. p. 940).
Besides the works already mentioned, William was the author of the following: 1. ‘Eρωτοπαίγνιον pium: Continens Canticum Canticorum Salomonis, et Psalmos aliquot selectiores,’ part i., London, 1597, 16mo; part ii. 1598, 8vo. 2. ‘Poematum Libellus;’ containing (i) an ode to Robert, earl of Essex (to whom the book is also dedicated); (ii) ‘De Sphaerarum Ordine;’ and (iii) ‘Palaemonis Amoris Philosophici,’ London, 1598, 8vo. 3. ‘Speculum humanae condicionis, in Memoriam patris sui . . . Gualteri Vaughanni,’ London, 1598, 8vo. 4. ‘Naturall and Artificiall Directions for Health derived from the best Philosophers, as well Moderne as Ancient,’ London, 1600, 12mo; reprinted in black letter, 1602, 8vo; 3rd edit, (revised and enlarged), 1607, 16mo; 4th edit. 1613; 5th edit, (with dedication to Sir Francis Bacon), 1617; 6th edit, (dedicated to William, earl of Pembroke, and containing two other treatises by other writers on diseases of the eyes), 1626, 4to; 7th edit. 1633, 4to. 5. ‘The Newfound Politicke,’ &c., London, 1626, 4to. William’s anti-Catholic sentiment is expressed here (co-authored by John Florio and another unnamed person). This was a translation from the Italian of Trajano Boccalini’s ‘Ragguagli di Parnaso.’ The book is in three parts, William, who was responsible for its publication, having himself translated the third part only, to which he also appended a translation of ‘The Duke of Hernia, his Speech in the Councill of Spaine.’ The whole is intended as an earnest though indirect warning by a protestant against concluding any alliance with Spain, and is dedicated to the king, whom the author prophetically reminds of the verse, ‘Tunc tua res agitur paries cum proximus ardet.’ 6. ‘The Newlanders Cure,’ London, 1630, 8vo. This is a medical work, treating of the complaints most prevalent in Newfoundland, with an autobiographical dedication to the author’s brother, which was reprinted almost unabridged in the ‘North American Review’ for March 1817 (iv. 289-95). 7. ‘The Church Militant, historically continued from the Yeare of our Saviours Incarnation 33 untill this Present 1640,’ London, 1640, 8vo. 8. ‘The Soules Exercise in the Daily Contemplation of our Saviours Birth, Life, Passion, and Resurrection,’ London, 1641, 8vo. The two last mentioned are bulky books, written in verse, the latter being dedicated to both the king and queen. See, Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Vol. 58, Vaughan, William (1577-1641) by Daniel Lleufer Thomas, pp. 183-5; Encyclopædia Britannica, 1911, Vol. 27, Vaughan, William, p. 956; Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, in Association with The British Academy, From the earliest times to the year 2000, H. C. G. Matthew and Brian Harrison, Oxford University Press, 2004, Vaughan, Sir William [pseud. Orpheus junior] c.1575-1641).
397. c. 1600 The Sloane Manuscript ‘Life’ of Robin Hood.
Additions
398. 1531 Robert Barnes mocks the church for allowing its followers to read stories of Robin Hood in A supplicatyon made by Robert Barnes doctoure in diuinitie, vnto the most excellent and redoubted prince kinge henrye the eyght. The articles for which this forsayde doctoure Barnes was condemned of our spiritualtye, are confirmed by the Scripture, doctoures and their awne [sic] lawe. After that he disputeth certayne comon places which also he confermeth with the Scripture, holye doctoures and their awne [sic] lawe. There is a copy in the Cambridge University Library. This long, complex, and allusive work exists in four distinct editions, three of which are very different from each other. The first edition of 1531 was published in Antwerp by Simon Cock or Martinus de Keyser. A second edition was published by John Byddell in England in 1534, and a third by John Daye in 1573, which is very different than both the 1531 and 1534 editions. A 1548 edition, published in England during Edward VI’s reign, is essentially identical to that of 1534. Barnes’s English works, with those of Tyndall and Frith, were issued by John Daye, and edited by John Foxe, in 1573 (see no. below).
The protestant reformer and martyr Robert Barnes (c. 1495-1540), was born in King’s Lynn Norfolk. With the exception of William Tyndale, Barnes is probably the most important reformer of the 1520s and 1530s in England, not only because two versions of A Supplication had been published, but also because he was well known for his preaching. Barnes was educated at Cambridge, where he was a member, and afterwards prior of the convent of Austin Friars, and he graduated Doctor of Divinity in 1523. According to John Foxe, Barnes was one of the Cambridge men who gathered at the White Horse Tavern for Bible-reading and theological discussion early in the third decade of the 16th century. In 1526, he was brought before the vice-chancellor for preaching a heterodox sermon, and was subsequently examined by Wolsey and four other bishops. He was condemned to abjure or be burnt; and preferring the former alternative, was committed to the Fleet prison and afterwards to the Austin Friars in London ‘a free prisoner,’ as Foxe calls him. Barnes escaped to Antwerp in 1528, and also visited Wittenberg, where he made Martin Luther’s acquaintance. He also came across Stephen Vaughan, an agent of Thomas Cromwell and an advanced reformer, who recommended him to Cromwell. In his exile Barnes wrote a treatise in defence of some articles of the Lutheran faith, which was published in German, with a translation by Bugenhagen, in 1531. During the same year Barnes was invited to return to England by Henry VIII’s minister Cromwell, where he became one of the chief intermediaries between the English government and Lutheran Germany. In 1535 Barnes was sent to Germany, in the hope of inducing Lutheran divines to approve of Henry’s divorce from Catherine of Aragon, and four years later he was employed in negotiations connected with Anne of Cleves’s marriage. The policy was Cromwell’s, but Henry VIII. had already in 1538 refused to adopt Lutheran theology, and the statute of Six Articles (1539), followed by the king’s disgust with Anne of Cleves (1540), brought the agents of that policy to ruin. An attack upon Bishop Gardiner by Barnes in a sermon at St Paul’s Cross was the signal for a bitter struggle between the Protestant and reactionary parties in Henry’s council, which raged during the spring of 1540. Barnes was forced to apologize and recant; and Gardiner delivered a series of sermons at St Paul’s Cross to counteract Barnes’ invective. But a month or so later Cromwell was made earl of Essex, Gardiner’s friend, Bishop Sampson, was sent to the Tower, and Barnes reverted to Lutheranism. It was a delusive victory. In July, Cromwell was attainted, Anne of Cleves was divorced and Barnes was burnt (30th July 1540). He also had an act of attainder passed against him, a somewhat novel distinction for a heretic, which illustrates the way in which Henry VIII. employed secular machinery for ecclesiastical purposes, and regarded heresy as an offence against the state rather than against the church.
Barnes was one of six executed on the same day: two, William Jerome and Thomas Gerrard, were, like himself, burnt for heresy under the Six Articles; three, Thomas Abel, Richard Fetherstone and Edward Powell, were hanged for treason in denying the royal supremacy. Barnes had died a victim to that royal supremacy which he had done his best to promote. Both Lutherans and Catholics on the continent were shocked. Luther published Barnes’ confession with a preface of his own as Bekenntnis des Glaubens (1540), which is included in Walch’s edition of Luther’s Werke xxi. 186. See, Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900, Vol. 03, pp. 253-56, Barnes, Robert by James Gairdner; Encyclopædia Britannica, 1911, Vol. 3, p. 413, Barnes, Robert; A Critical Edition of Robert Barnes’s A Supplication Vnto the Most Gracyous Prince Kynge Henry The. VIIj. 1534, Douglas H. Parker, University of Toronto Press, 2008.
399. 1550 Ayr, Southern Lowlands, Scotland: John Adam is admitted to citizenship on the condition ‘Þat he be honestlie cled as ane honest man as efferis to ane burges man to be betueyn & sunday nixt tocum to serf robert hud’ [Mill, Medieval Plays, 167].
Robin Hood References After 1600
400. 1604 William Barlow (d. 1613), The svmme and svbstance of the conference which, it pleased his excellent Maiestie to haue with the lords, bishops, and other of his clergie, (at vvhich the most of the lordes of the councell were present) in his Maiesties priuy-chamber, at Hampton Court. Ianuary 14. 1603. London: imprinted by Iohn Windet [and T. Creede] for Mathew Law, and are to be sold at his shop in Paules Churchyeard, neare S. Austens Gate, 1604. THE SECOND DAYES Conference (Page 76) ‘But turning to Doctor Reyn. (with smiling, saith his Maiestie,) Many a man speakes of Robin Hood, who neuer shot in his bowe, if you had a good wife your selfe, you would thinke, all the honour and Worshippe you could doe her, were well bestowed’.
401. 1604 Barnabe Rich (1540?-1617), A souldiers vvishe to Britons welfare: or a discourse, fit to be read of all gentlemen and souldiers. Written by a Captaine of experience. Imprinted at London: [By T. Creed] for Ieffrey Chorlton, and are to be sold at the great North dore of Saint Paules, 1604. CAPTAINE PILL in his humorous fit. CAPTAINE SKIL in his temperate iudgement (page 1) Pill. ‘CAptaine Skill, and although in a late conference had betwéene vs, I vndertooke to speake of Robin Hood, when indeede I had neuer shot in his vowe, and presumed to dispute of martiall matters, before I had séene an enemies Tent’.
402. 1605 Thomas Bell (fl. 1593-1610), The Popes funerall Containing a plaine, succinct, and pithy reply, to a pretensed answere of a shamelesse and foolish libell, intituled, The forerunner of Bels downfall. VVhich is nothing else indeede, (as the indifferent reader shall preceiue by the due peruse thereof,) but an euident manifestation of his owne folly; with the vtter confusion of poperie, and all popish vassals throughout the Christian world. London: Printed by T[homas] C[reede] [, S. Stafford, and T. Purfoot] for William Welby, and are to be sold at his shop in Paules Church-yard, at the signe of the Grayhound, 1605. A Caueet, or Christian admonition to the Reader (page unnumbered) ‘Now sir, when these simple and sillie Papists, (alas, alas, for pitty, shall heare of my Reply, and shall tell the Iesuits and Iesuited Priests, what report flyeth abroad of the condemnation of their Fore-runner and Religion, they will tell them roundly a tale of Robin Hood, and little Iohn: viz’.
403. 1605 Peter Woodhouse, poet, The flea sic parua componere magnis. London: Printed [by Edward Allde] for Iohn Smethwick and are to be solde at his shop in Saint Dunstanes Churchyard in Fleet-street, vnder the Diall. 1605. Page Unnumbered ‘Many, many things haue written, When th’ad better still haue sitten. Peraduenture so had I: Yet I knowe no reason why. It’s a foolish toy I write• And in folly most delight: Then (I hope) it will please many, And not be dislikte of any, Euen from tales of Robin Hood’.
404. 1605 John Radford (1561-1630), A directorie teaching the way to the truth in a briefe and plaine discourse against the heresies of this time. Whereunto is added, a short treatise against adiaphorists, neuters, and such as say they may be saued in any sect or religion, and would make of many diuers sects one Church. Printed with licence [by the English secret press], 1605. Chap. LXVII. Of God that he is one in substance and three in persons: and of the horrible blasphemy of heretickes & Athistes against his diuine Maiestie. (page 459) ‘I say this to Christians, and yet there be that goe vnder that name, & in our country too that call these matters in question with no lesse vanity and leuity (would GOD with no more blasphemy) then to talke of Robin Hood, these be such whereof the Prophet speaketh: dixit insipiens in corde suo, &c. the foolish man said in his hart there is no God’.
405. 1607 Wells, Somerset: Church ale over a series of weeks includes a Robin Hood in the marketplace on May 31 (Trinity Sunday), in which Robert Prinne, a yeoman of Wells, was the Robin Hood, and Stephen Millard, a tailor of Wells, aged forty-three, was his man, carrying a bow and arrows; the displays featured drums, shot, pikes, bows and arrows, morris dances, ‘and other shows’ [REED: Somerset, 321, 944]. According to a poem describing the festivities: ‘And Robbyn Hoodd was likewise seene/with all his gallantes rayed in greene,/ theire arrowes were a longe Clothe yard’ [REED: Somerset, 267].
406. 1607 Westonzoyland, Somerset: Articles charged against Robert Wolfall, minister of Weston, by John Cornishe, carpenter describe a Robin Hood Ale held on the Sunday after Ascension Day [REED: Somerset, 388-89.
407. 1608 ‘Since Robin Hood’ by Thomas Weelkes (1576?-1623). See Robin in Music and Literature.
408. 1609 Robert Jones (fl. 1597-1615), A musicall dreame. Or The fourth booke of ayres the first part is for the lute, two voyces, and the viole de gambo; the second part is for the lute, the viole and foure voices to sing: the third part is for one voyce alone, or to the lute, the basse viole, or to both if you please, vvhereof, two are Italian ayres. Composed by Robert Iones. London: Imprinted by Iohn Windet, and are to be solde by Simon Waterson, in Powles Church-yeard, at the signe of :he [sic] Crowne, 1609. See, Robin in Music and Literature.
409. 1609 Thomas Ravenscroft (1592?-1635?), Deuteromelia: or the seconde part of Musicks melodie, or melodius musicke Of pleasant roundelaies; K.H. mirth, or freemens songs. And such delightful catches. London: Printed [by T. Snodham] for Thomas Adams, dwelling in Paules Church-yard at the signe of the white Lion, 1609. Freemens Songs of 3. Voices. BASSVS (page unnumbered) 10 ‘And there of him they made {repeat} good yeoman Robin hood, Scarlet, and little Iohn, and little Iohn, hey ho’. BASSVS (page unnumbered) 10 ‘And there of him they made {repeat} good yeoman Robin hood, Scarlet, and little Iohn, and little Iohn, hey ho’.
410. Early seventeenth century Hexton, Hertfordshire: Francis Taverner’s history of Hexton states that ‘Maying feasts, with their playes of Robynhood and little Iohn’ had been recently abandoned. [Peter Greenfield, ‘Parish Drama in Four Counties Bordering the Thames Watershed,’ in English Parish Drama, ed. Alexandra F. Johnston and Wim Husken (Amsterdam and Atlanta: Rodopi, 1996), 114].
411. 1610 Thomas Bell (fl. 1593-1610), The Catholique triumph conteyning, a reply to the pretensed answere of B.C. (a masked Iesuite,) lately published against the Tryall of the New Religion. Wherein is euidently prooued, that Poperie and the doctrine now professed in the Romish church, is the new religion: and that the fayth which the Church of England now mayntaineth, is the ancient Romane religion. At London: Printed for the companie of Stationers, 1610. The 14. Chapter: of Pope Martins Dispensation, for the Brother to marrie his naturall Sister (page 328) ‘Let him not be dismayed, for I can assure him of mine owne knowledge, that our consciences do not condemne vs; [This is a tale of Robin Hood & Litle Iohn.] neither do we know, that we are not able to performe as great a matter as that’.
412. 1610 Samuel Rid, Martin Mark-all, beadle of Bridevvell; his defence and answere to the Belman of London Discouering the long-concealed originall and regiment of rogues, when they first began to take head, and how they haue succeeded one the other successiuely vnto the sixe and twentieth yeare of King Henry the eight, gathered out of the chronicle of crackeropes, and (as they tearme it) the legend of lossels. By S.R. London: Printed [by John Windet] for Iohn Budge, and Richard Bonian, 1610. The copie of the Commission and Graunt, sent from Don Purloyningo to Corporall Fize and his Assistants (page unnumbered) ‘O ben mort Castle out & Towre, Where all the Roome coues slopne that we may tip the lowre, Whē we haue tipt the lowre & fenc’t away the duds, Then binge we to the bowsing ken, Thats cut the Robin Hood’.
413. 1610 (May 17) Linton, Southern Lowlands, Scotland: John Middlemest of Shairpsrig, George Davison of Hoisla, and George Ker of Linton are accused of playing the Sheriff, Little John, and Robin Hood [Mill, Medieval Plays, 258].
414. 1612 William Vaughan (1577-1641), Approved directions for health, both naturall and artificiall deriued from the best physitians as well moderne as auncient. Teaching how euery man should keepe his body and mind in health: and sicke, how hee may safely restore it himselfe. Diuided into 6. sections 1. Ayre, fire and water. 2. Meate, drinke with nourishment. 3. Sleepe, earely rising and dreames. 4. Auoidance of excrements, by purga. 5. The soules qualities and affections. 6. Quarterly, monethly, and daily diet. Newly corrected and augmented by the authour. The fourth Edition. London: Printed by T. S. for Roger Iackson, and are to be solde at his Shop neere the Conduit in Fleetestreete. 1612. NATVRALL AND ARTIFICIAL DIRECTIONS FOR HEALTH. The fourth Section. Of Purgations. CHAP. 7. What is the vse of Tobacco? (page 81) ‘They recount tales of Robin Hood, of Donzel del Phoebo, &c. as I haue else-where written in my Preface to my first Circle of the Spirit of Detraction’. See also, no. 396 above.
415. 1613 Michel de Montaigne (1533-1592), John Florio (1553?-1625), William Hole (d. 1624), engraver. Essays vvritten in French by Michael Lord of Montaigne, Knight of the Order of S. Michael, gentleman of the French Kings chamber: done into English, according to the last French edition, by Iohn Florio reader of the Italian tongue vnto the Soueraigne Maiestie of Anna, Queene of England, Scotland, France and Ireland, &c. And one of the gentlemen of hir royall priuie chamber. London: Printed by Melch. Bradvvood for Edvvard Blount and William Barret, 1613. THE ESSAYES OF MICHAEL Lord of Montaigne. The third Booke. The twelfth Chapter. (page 595) ‘Some aleadge Plato, and some mention Homer, that never saw them, or as they say in English, many a man speakes of Robin hood, that never shot in his how’.
416. 1614 Thomas Freeman (b. 1590 or 91), Rubbe, and a great cast Epigrams. By Thomas Freeman, Gent. Imprinted at London: [By Nicholas Okes], and are to bee sold [by L. Lisle] at the Tigers Head, 1614. Rub and a great Cast. Epigram 5I. ‘So many men do talke of Robin Hood, Who neuer yet shot arrow in his bow’.
417. 1614 Thomas Ravenscroft (1592?-1635?), A briefe discourse of the true (but neglected) vse of charact’ring the degrees, by their perfection, imperfection, and diminution in measurable musicke, against the common practise and custome of these times Examples whereof are exprest in the harmony of 4. voyces, concerning the pleasure of 5. vsuall recreations. 1 Hunting, 2 hawking, 3 dauncing, 4 drinking, 5 enamouring. By Thomas Rauenscroft, Bachelor of Musicke. London: Printed by Edw: Allde for Tho. Adams, 1614. Rounds or Catches of foure Uoices. Cannons in the vnison. A Round of three Country dances in one (page unnumbered) ‘RObin Hood Robin Hood said little Iohn, come dance before the Queene a. In a redde Petticote and a greene iacket, a white hose and a greene a. vt supra’. Freemens Songs of 3. Voices. BASSVS (page unnumbered) 10 ‘And there of him they made {repeat} good yeoman Robin hood’. BASSVS (page unnumbered) 10 ‘And there of him they made {repeat} good yeoman Robin hood, Scarlet, and little Iohn, and little Iohn, hey ho’. Freemens Songs of 3. Voices. BASSVS (page unnumbered) 10 ‘And there of him they made {repeat} good yeoman Robin hood’. BASSVS. (page unnumbered) 10 ‘And there of him they made {repeat} good yeoman Robin hood, Scarlet, and little Iohn, and little Iohn, hey ho’.
418. 1615 Richard Brathwaite (1588?-1673), A strappado for the Diuell Epigrams and satyres alluding to the time, with diuers measures of no lesse delight. By Misosukos, to his friend Philokrates. At London: Printed by I. B[eale] for Richard Redmer and are to be sold at the west dore of Pauls at the Starre, 1615. A good Patrons Anagram: is Patren. Anag. Parent. An euill ones Patrone. Anag. Ropean’t. A Satyre (page 63) ‘With a Beere-brewers Grace, as for his bloud, He saies he can deriu’t from Robin hood, And his May-Marian, and I thinke he may, For’s Mother plaid May-Marian tother day’.
419. 1615 John Foxe (1516-1587), Thomas Mason (1580-1619?), Christs victorie ouer Sathans tyrannie Wherin is contained a catalogue of all Christs faithfull souldiers that the Diuell either by his grand captaines the emperours, or by his most deerly beloued sonnes and heyres the popes, haue most cruelly martyred for the truth. With all the poysoned doctrins wherewith that great redde dragon hath made drunken the kings and inhabitants of the earth; with the confutations of them together with all his trayterous practises and designes, against all Christian princes to this day, especially against our late Queen Elizabeth of famous memorie, and our most religious Soueraigne Lord King Iames. Faithfully abstracted out of the Book of martyrs, and diuers other books. By Thomas Mason preacher of Gods Word. London: Printed by George Eld and Ralph Blower, 1615. THE THIRD BOOKE Containing the next 300. yeares, from the raigne of King EGBERTVS, vnto WILLIAM the Conquerour (page 31) ‘but as concerning the Miracles which are read in the Church of Winchester, of this Swithinus, them I leaue to be read together with the Iliads of Homer, or tales of Robin Hood’. See also, nos. 197 and 226 above.
420. 1615 Anthony Munday (1553-1633), Metropolis coronata, the triumphes of ancient drapery: or, Rich cloathing of England, in a second yeeres performance In honour of the aduancement of Sir Iohn Iolles, Knight, to the high office of Lord Maior of London, and taking his oath for the same authoritie, on Monday, being the 30. day of October. 1615. Performed in heartie affection to him, and at the bountifull charges of his worthy brethren the truely honourable Society of Drapers, the first that receiued such dignitie in this citie. Deuised, and written, by A.M. citizen, and draper of London. Printed at London: By George Purslowe, 1615. See also, The Downfall and Death of Robert Earl of Huntington and nos. 373 and 378 above.
421. 1615 William Martyn (1562-1617), The historie, and liues, of the kings of England from VVilliam the Conqueror, vnto the end of the raigne of King Henrie the Eight. By William Martyn Esquire, recorder of the honorable citie of Exeter. London: Printed [by William Stansby] for Iohn Bill, William Barret, and Henrie Fetherstone, 1615. THE HISTORIE OF KING RICHARD THE FIRST (page 50) ‘In the beginning of this Kings Raigne, certaine Out-lawes, to the number of one hundred and more, being resolued and desperat men (whose chiefest leaders were named Robin Hood and Little Iohn) robbed and spoyled in diuers places of this Land. They neither hurted, nor much wronged anie, except they would runne themselues into danger by resistance. They attempted against none, – but against such, as being rich, gayned by vsurie; or gaue no entertainement by good Hospitalitie to their Neighbours, and to the poore. They spared all women, and were bountifull benefactors to such as stood in need. Thus they continued diuers moneths; vntill their chiefest Leader Robin Hood, by meanes of a sharpe sicknesse (being let bloud, and being betrayed) bled himselfe to death. And then the whole Rout of this theeuish Companie was dispersed, and the Malefactors secretly repaired home to their owne houses’.
422. 1615 Brandsby, Yorkshire: The play of Robin Hood performed in the churchyard and church, with local recusants taking the parts of Robin Hood and the Sheriff [Hugh Aveling, Northern Catholics: The Catholic Recusants of the North Riding of Yorkshire 1558-1790 (London, Dublin, and Melbourne: Geoffrey Chapman, 1966). 289].
423. 1616 Samuel Sheppard (fl. 1616), The honest lavvyer Acted by the Queenes Maiesties Seruants. Written by S.S. London: Printed by George Purslowe for Richard Woodroffe, and are to be sold at his shop neere the great north-dore of Paules, at the signe of the guilded Key, 1616. THE HONEST LAWYER. Act. Secund (page unnumbered) ‘Robin Hood, and the Pindar of Wakefield had not a stiffer bout. Shall we cling, like a couple of Eeles, not to bee dissolu’d but by Thunder?’
424. 1619 Henry Hutton, Follie’s anatomie. Or Satyres and satyricall epigrams VVith a compendious history of Ixion’s wheele. Compiled by Henry Hutton, Dunelmensis. London: Printed [by Nicholas Okes] for Mathew Walbanke, and are to be sold at his shop at Graies-Inne Gate, 1619. SATYRES (page unnumbered) ‘Will shame the riming sculler, Iack a Lent. Tis writ in print; perhaps you’l see’t anon, Twas made of Robin Hood and little Iohn. Twil be discouerd er ‘t be long’.
425. 1621 John Taylor (1580-1653), [Taylors goose] [describing the wilde goose]. [S.l. : E.A. for H. Gosson, sold by E. Wright, 1621]. The praise of the Gray Goose wing (page unnumbered) ‘Their names and fames haue worthily extold, Witnesse that Leash, that stout admired three, Braue Adam Bell, Clim Clough, Will Clowdeslee. I could capitulate, and write vpon Our English Robin Hood, and little Iohn, How with this feather they haue wone renowne’.
426. 1622 Alexander Cooke (1564-1632), Yet more vvorke for a Masse-priest. London: Printed by William Iones, and are to be sold by William Sheffard at his shop in Popes head Ally, 1622. (Page 7) ‘nor yet Abdias, whose liues of the Apostles, fabulis similiores sunt, quàm verae narrationi, are more like to tales of Robin Hood, then to truth, in Bellarmines opinion’.
427. 1622 John Taylor (1580-1653), An arrant thiefe, vvhom euery man may trust in vvord and deed, exceeding true and iust. With a comparison betweene a thiefe and a booke. Written by Iohn Taylor. London: Printed by Edw: All-de, for Henry Gosson, and are to bee solde in Panier-Alley, 1622. A THIEFE (page unnumbered) ‘One Bellin Dun, a famous Thiefe suruiu’d, From whom the Towne of Dunstable’s deriu’d: And Robin Hood with little Iohn agreed To rob the Rich men, and the Poore to feede’.
428. 1622 Stratford-on-Avon, Warwickshire: May games with morris dancing and a Robin Hood play [David Underdown, Revel, Riot and Rebellion. Popular Politics and Culture in England 1603-1660 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1985), 57].
429. 1625 James Hart, of Northampton, The anatomie of vrines Containing the conuiction and condemnation of them. Or, the second part of our discourse of vrines. Detecting and vnfolding the manifold falshoods and abuses committed by the vulgar sort of practitioners, in the iudgement of diseases by the vrines onely: together with a narrow suruey of their substance, chiefe colours, and manifold contents, ioyning withall the right vse of vrines. … Collected, as well out of the ancient Greeke, Latine, and Arabian authors, as out of our late famous physitians of seuerall nations: their authorities quoted and translated out of the originall tongues, together with some of the authors owne obseruations. By Iames Hart of Northampton. Neuer heretofore published. London: Printed by Richard Field for Robert Mylbourne, and are to be sold at his shop at the great south doore of Pauls, 1625. CHAP. III. That euen in diseases of the Liuer, and within the veines, the vrine doth often deceiue the most skilfull Physitian (page 36) ‘But now let vs proceed to a point surpassing vulgar capacitie, and which will seeme to many a strange Paradox, or a tale of Robin Hood: my meaning is concerning women with child, whether by the vrine onely conception may be discerned’.
430. 1625 Thomas James (1573?-1629), A manuduction, or introduction vnto diuinitie containing a confutation of papists by papists, throughout the important articles of our religion; their testimonies taken either out of the Indices expurgatorii, or out of the Fathers, and ancient records; but especially the parchments. By Tho. Iames, Doctor of Diuinitie, late fellow of New-Colledge in Oxford, and Sub-Deane of the cathedrall church of Welles. This marke noteth the places that are taken out of the Indices expurgatorij: and this [pointing hand], a note of the places in the manuscripts. [London]: Imprinted [by Isaac Jaggard] for Henry Cripps, and Henry Curteyne at Oxford, 1625. Of Funerals and Diriiges ‘OF these Funerals and Diriges I haue little to say, because Erasmus, Rhenanus, Wicelius, and others before me of their owne side, haue scored vp their abuses in cousening men with a tale of Robin Hood, or of some hood or other of Dominick or Francis, which is able to send them streight to Heauen’.
431. 1627 George Hakewill (1578-1649), An apologie of the povver and prouidence of God in the gouernment of the world. Or An examination and censure of the common errour touching natures perpetuall and vniuersall decay diuided into foure bookes: whereof the first treates of this pretended decay in generall, together with some preparatiues thereunto. The second of the pretended decay of the heauens and elements, together with that of the elementary bodies, man only excepted. The third of the pretended decay of mankinde in regard of age and duration, of strength and stature, of arts and wits. The fourth of this pretended decay in matter of manners, together with a large proofe of the future consummation of the world from the testimony of the gentiles, and the vses which we are to draw from the consideration thereof. By G.H. D.D. Oxford: Printed by Iohn Lichfield and William Turner, printers to the famous Vniversity, Anno Dom. 1627. CAP. 5. Wherein the principall objections drawne aswell from Reason as from authority and experience are fully answered (page 198) ‘Yet these fables no doubt infected the vulgar, as those of Guy of Warwick, Bevis of Hampton, Corineus and Gog-Magog, Robin Hood and little Iohn, Amadis of Gaule, Pontagruel, Gargantua, and the like haue since done’.
432. 1627-28 Woodstock, Oxfordshire: £7 7s. 1d. brought in by Robin Hood and Little John at Whitsun, in addition to £9 brought in by the Whitsun lord [Reference courtesy of A. F. Johnston].
433. 1628 Alexander Cooke (1564-1632), Worke, more vvorke, and a little more work for a masse-priest Reviewed and augmented by the authour. VVith an epistle of an vnknowne priest remaining in London, sent to the authour, excepting against fiue points therein. With the authours answere thereunto: returned vnto the priest within twelue dayes after the receipt of the priests exceptions. … London: Printed by William Iones, dwelling in Red-crosse-street, 1628. VVORKE AND MORE VVORKE FOR A MASSE PRIEST (page 95) ‘nor yet Abdias, whose liues of the Apostles, fabulis similiores sunt, quàm verae narrationi, are more like to tales of Robin Hood, then to truth, in Bellarmines opinion’.
434. 1628-1634 Sir Edward Coke (1552-1634), The Institutes of the Laws of England. Refers to Roberdsmen as followers of Robin Hood. See, The Many Robin Hoods 3.
435. ca.1630 Renowned Robin Hood: or, His famous archery truly related: with the worthy exploits he acted before Queen Katherine, he being an out-law man, and how she for the same obtained of the king, his owne, and his fellowes pardon. To a new tune. Printed at London: For Francis Groue, [ca. 1630]. See, Robin Hood and Queen Katherine.
436. 1630 John Taylor (1580-1653), All the vvorkes of Iohn Taylor the water-poet Beeing sixty and three in number. Collected into one volume by the author: vvith sundry new additions corrected, reuised, and newly imprinted, 1630. At London: Printed by I[ohn] B[eale, Elizabeth Allde, Bernard Alsop, and Thomas Fawcet] for Iames Boler; at the signe of the Marigold in Pauls Churchyard, 1630. TAYLORS GOOSE DESCRIBING THE VVILDE GOOSE, THE Tame Goose, the Taylors Goose, the VVinchester Goose, the Clack Goose, the Soleand Goose, the Huniburne Goose, Goose vpon Goose, the true nature and profit of all Geese, the honourable victories of the GrayGoose-wing, the worthinesse of the Pen, the Description of Goosetoft, and Goose Fayre, with the valour of the Gander. The prayse of the Gray Goose wing (page 107) ‘Their names and fames haue worthily ••told Witnesse that Leath, that stout admired three, Braue Adam Bell, Clim Clough, Will Clowdeslee. I could capitulate, and write vpon Our English Robin Hood, and little Iohn, How with this feather they haue wonne renowne’. An arrant Thiefe, whom euery Man may trust: In Word and Deed exceeding true and iust. With a Comparison betweene a Thiefe and a Booke. A THIEFE (page 123) ‘One Bellin Dun, a famous Thiefe surniu’d, From whom the cowne of Dunstable‘s deriu’d: And Robin Hood with little Iohn agreed To rob the rich men, and the poore to feede’.
437. 1631 Richard Brathwaite (1588?-1673), Whimzies: or, a nevv cast of characters. London: Printed by F[elix] K[ingston] and are to be sold by Ambrose Rithirdon at the signe of the Bulls-head in Pauls Church-yard, 1631. 1. An Almanack-maker (page 2) ‘But beleeve it, many have spoke of Robin Hood, that never shot in his bow. 6. A Forrester (page 41) ‘Hee Act . . .s bird, if Calysto’s egge bee rightly hatched. One would take him for the Living signe of Robin Hood with a Forrest bill in his hand’.
438. 1631 Nicholas Breton (1545?-1626?), The figure of foure, or A handfull of sweet flowers gathered out of diuers good grounds, and set together in this little garden within the figure of foure. London: Printed [by Eliot’s Court Press] for Iohn Wright, 1631. The Figure of Foure, OR A Handfull of sweet FLOWERS (page unnumbered) ‘Loue not a Tale of Robin Hood and his bow, beat not thy braines about the reading of a Riddle, listen to no Ballads of the Fox and the Crow, nor giue credit to newes till they be halfe a yeare old’. See also, nos. 310, 311, 375, 387, 388 and 389 above.
439. 1631 Michael Drayton (1563-1631), The battaile of Agincourt Fought by Henry the fift of that name, King of England, against the whole power of the French: vnder the raigne of their Charles the sixt, anno Dom. 1415. The miseries of Queene Margarite, the infortunate wife, of that most infortunate King Henry the sixt. Nimphidia, the court of Fayrie. The quest of Cinthia. The shepheards Sirena. The moone-calfe. Elegies vpon sundry occasions. By Michaell Drayton, Esquire. London: printed by A[ugustine]. M[athewes]. for William Lee, and are to be sold at the Turkes Head in Fleete-Streete, next to the Miter and Phænix, 1631. THE BATTAILE OF AGJN COVRT (page 22) ‘Olde [n. That famous out law . . .ed < . . .> ch in that Country, and is yet by many places there Celebrated] Nottingham an Archer clad in greene, Vnder a Tree with his drawne bowe that stood, Which in a checkquer’d Flagge farre off was seene, It was the picture of old Robin Hood, And [o. A.c..nted o..r the best Archers of England] Lancashire not as the least I weene, Thorough three Crowns, three arrows smeard wi < …> blood.’ See also, no. 370 above.
440. 1631 Francis Lenton (fl. 1630-1640), Characterismi: or, Lentons leasures Expressed in essayes and characters, neuer before written on. By F.L. Gent. London: Printed by I[ohn] B[eale] for Roger Michell, 1631. 13. A Lawyers Clarke (page unnumbered) ‘Hee is one who will doe more with a gray Goose wing, than euer Robin Hood could doe, and is very dangerous’.
441. 1632 The Pinder of Wakefield, (Huntington Library) an anonymous prose jest-book loosely based on the Pinder of Wakefield tales (see no. 230 above) and O. R. Reuter.
442. 1632 Martin Parker (c. 1600 – c. 1656), A True Tale of Robin Hood, printed for T. Cotes, sold by F. Grove, London (British Library copy, press-mark C.39 a. 52). It was entered to Francis Grove at Stationers Hall on 29 February 1632 (E. Arber, IV, 273), and reprinted in 1686 for Clark, Thackeray and Passenger (Bodleian Library) and later by various provincial presses. There are later editions by Joseph Ritson (1795, I, 126-48), John Mathew Gutch (1847, II, 84-106), and Francis James Child (1888, III, 227-33). Parker’s ‘True Tale’ is derived from many different sources, which include Richard Grafton’s chronicle tradition (see no. 275 above), and a wide variety of current ballad literature. Parker’s references to ‘the abbot of Saint Maries’ probably derives from the Gest, and he was familiar with several tales which found their way into the later Robin Hood Garlands, such as Robin Hood and the Bishop, Robin Hood and Queen Katherine, and The Noble Fisherman (see 1662 below). At the end of Parker’s tale there is a version (one of many) of Robin Hood’s epitaph at Kirklees (see Robin Hood’s Grave 2). The ‘True Tale’ took a permanent place in the canon of Robin Hood ballads after its inclusion in the first edition of Joseph Ritson’s Robin Hood of 1795. See also, The Rhymes of Robin Hood 5 and Dobson and Taylor, Rymes of Robyn Hood, London, 1976, pp. 187-90.
443. 1633 Saint Edmund Campion (1540-1581), Tvvo histories of Ireland. The one written by Edmund Campion, the other by Meredith Hanmer Dr of Divinity. Dublin: Printed by the Society of Stationers [and London: by Thomas Harper], M.DC.XXXIII. [1633]. THE CHRONICLE OF IRELAND: COLLECTED BY MEREDITH HANMER, Doctor of Diuinity. The second part (Page 179) ‘Now that the King is on his iourney abroad, let us talke a little (gentle Reader) of little Iohn at home: Stanihurst leads me into the history, and reporteth that Anno 1189. he came into Ireland, and sojourned at Dublin; the storie goeth (and especially in Hector Boetius, and Iohn Major, Antiquaries of Scotland) how that in those daies, there were many outlawes in the North parts of England; of these outlawes, Robin Hood, and little Iohn were Chiefetaines: It was said of Robin Hood that he was an Earle, and after outrages by him committed, he kept the woods; his company was of some hundred persons, all chosen and picked Archers, of singular strength to handle their weapons, and such as durst encounter with 400. others: they robbed none but the rich, as Tanners, and Grasiers, and Vsurers, and Bishops, Priests, and fat Abbots; they shed no bloud, they killed no man, releeved themselves and the poore also with their spoyles. Robin Hood after many theevish feats, fell sicke, went into a Nunnery in Scotland, to be let bloud, where he was betrayed, and bled to death: wherupon the company brake, and the crue dispersed themselves, every man to shift for himselfe; little Iohn came to Ireland, with many of his confederates, and found in the woods, enough to fit his humour, and fell so much to his old occupation, that he was faine to flye the land. In the end, he went to Scotland, and there died. There are memorable acts reported of him, which I hold not for truth, that he would shoot an arrow a mile off, and a great deale more; but them I leave among the lyes of the land’. A VIEVV OF THE STATE OF IRELAND, Written Dialogue-wise betweene Eudoxus and Irenaeus, By Edmund Spenser Esq. in the yeare 1596 (PAGE 101) [Iren] ‘This law was not made by the Norman Conqueror, but by a Saxon King, at what time England was very like to Ireland, as now it stands: for it was (as I tolde you) annoyed greatly with Robbers and Out-lawes, which troubled the whole state of the Realme, every corner having a Robin Hood in it, that kept the woods, and spoyled all passengers and Inhabitants, as Ireland now hath, so as me thinkes, this ordinance would fit very well, and bring them all into awe’. See also, no. 286 above.
444. 1633 John Downe (1570?-1631), George Hakewill (1578-1649), Certaine treatises of the late reverend and learned divine, Mr Iohn Downe, rector of the church of Instow in Devonshire, Bachelour of Divinity, and sometimes fellow of Emanuell Colledge in Cambridge. Published at the instance of his friends. Oxford: Printed by Iohn Lichfield for Edward Forrest, A.D. 1633. An advertisement to the Reader (page 68) ‘And thus you see, while simple Papists will beleeue nothing but what their guides tell them, what pretty tales of Robin Hood they devise for them’.
445. 1633 William Lithgow (1582-1645?), Scotlands vvelcome to her native sonne, and soveraigne lord, King Charles wherein is also contained, the maner of his coronation, and convocation of Parliament; the whole grievances, and abuses of the common-wealth of this kingdome, with diverse other relations, never heretofore published. Worthy to be by all the nobles and gentry perused; and to be layed vp in the hearts, and chests of the whole commouns, whose interests may best claime it, either in meane, or maner, from which their priuiledges, and fortunes are drawne, as from the loadstar of true direction. By William Lithgovv, the bonaventure, of Europe, Asia, and Africa. Edinburgh: Printed by Iohn Wreittoun. Cum privilegio, [1633]. SCOTLANDS WELCOME TO HER NATIVE SONNE AND SOVERAIGNE LORD, KING CHARLES (page unnumbered) ‘With merryment and laughter; tell a Tale, Of Robin Hood, and Wallace; make their Ale’.
446. 1634 John Fletcher (1579-1625), William Shakespeare, (1564-1616) aut, The two noble kinsmen presented at the Blackfriers by the Kings Maiesties servants, with great applause: written by the memorable worthies of their time; Mr. Iohn Fletcher, and Mr. William Shakspeare. Gent. Printed at London: By Tho. Cotes, for Iohn Waterson: and are to be sold at the signe of the Crowne in Pauls Church-yard, 1634. PROLOGVE (page unnumbered) ‘Then Robin Hood? This is the feare we bring; For to say Trut . . . , it wa . . .e an endlesse thing’.
447. ca. 1636 Richard Brathwaite (1588?-1673), Barnabœ itinerarium, Mirtili & Faustuli nominibus insignitum viatoris solatio nuperrimè editum, aptissimis numeris redactum, veterique Tono Barnabæ, publicè decantatum. [London: J. Haviland, ca. 1636]. Itineris Borealis Pars I (page unnumbered) ‘Veni Nottingam, tyrones, Sherwoodenses sunt latrones, Instar Robin Hood & serui, Scarlet, & Iohannis parui; Passim, sparsim peculantur, Cellis, syluis depraedantur’.
448. 1638 Richard Brathwaite (1588?-1673), Barnabees journall under the names of Mirtilus & Faustulus shadowed: for the travellers solace lately published, to most apt numbers reduced, and to the old tune of Barnabe commonly chanted. By Corymbœus. [London: Printed by John Haviland, 1638]. Barnabae Itinerarium, Anglo-Latinum. Itineris Borealis: Pars Prima. MIRTILUS & FAUSTULUS Interlocutores (page unnumbered) ‘Veni Nottingam, tyrones, Sherwoodenses sunt Latrones, Instar Robin Hood & Servi, Scarlet, & Johannis Parvi; Passim, sparsim peculantur, Cellis, Sylvis depraedantur’. Barnabees JOVRNALL. His Northerne Journey: Third part (page unnumbered) ‘Thirst knowes neither meane nor measure, Robin Hoods Well was my treasure’.
449. 1638 John Taylor (1580-1653), Bull, beare, and horse, cut, curtaile, and longtaile. VVith tales, and tales of buls, clenches, and flashes. As also here and there a touch of our beare-garden-sport; with the second part of the merry conceits of wit and mirth. Together with the names of all the bulls and beares. London: Printed by M. Parsons, for Henry Gosson, and are to be sold at his shop on London Bridge, 1638. Heere followes the Names of the Bulls and Beares at the Beare Garden now (page unnumbered) The Beares are, 1 Ned of Canterbury. 2 George of Cambridge. 3 Don Iohn. 4 Ben Hunt. 5 Nan Stiles. 6 Beefe of Ipswich. 7 Robin Hood. 8 Blind Robin.
450. 1639 John Clarke (d. 1658), Paroemiologia Anglo-Latina in usum scholarum concinnata. Or proverbs English, and Latine, methodically disposed according to the common-place heads, in Erasmus his adages. Very use-full and delightful for all sorts of men, on all occasions. More especially profitable for scholars for the attaining elegancie, sublimitie, and varietie of the best expressions. London: Imprinted by Felix Kyngston for Robert Mylbourne, and are to be sold at the signe of the Vncorne [sic] neere Fleet-bridge, 1639. Iactantia (page 141) ‘All’s not Gospell that comes out of his mouth, His words are but wind. Nothing but Say-soes. Many talke of Robin Hood that never shot in’s bow. Can’t you farewell but you must cry roast?’ Vanitas (page 314) ‘Tales of Robin Hood. What’s that to us? Travellers and Poets may lie by authority. What have I not beene, and yet am nothing, what am I?’
451. 1640 Henry Burton (1578-1648), A replie to a relation, of the conference between William Laude and Mr. Fisher the Jesuite. By a witnesse of Jesus Christ. [Amsterdam]: Imprinted [at the Cloppenburg Press], anno MDCXL. [1640]. THE REPLIE TO THE RELATORS EPISTLE DEDICATORY TO THE KING (Page 67) ‘the people is no way edified, as not knowing whether they sing a Song of Robin Hood, or play a Scotish Jigge’.
452. 1640 William Vaughan, 1577-1641, The Church militant historically continued from the yeare of our Saviours Incarnation 33. untill this present, 1640. By William Vaughan, Knight. London: Printed by Tho. Paine for Humfrey Blunden, at the Castle in Corn-hill. 1640. THE CONCLVSION TO THE READERS (page 341) ‘And much too blame are those of Carnall Brood, Who loath to taste of Intellectuall Food, Yet surfeit on Old Tales of Robin Hood, Of Friers Cowles, or of Saint Benets Hood, Of Patricks Broiles, or of Saint Georges Launce, Of Errant Knights, or of the Fairy Daunce’. See also, no. 396 above.
453. 1641 Joseph Hall (1574-1656), A survay of that foolish, seditious, scandalous, prophane libell, the protestation protested. London: [s.n.], 1641. Epist. 2. Timoth. Chap. 3. (page 18) ‘Did your Separatists ever produce any thing upon this subject, but lazie indigested fables, as farre from learning as their authors from sense. King Arthurs storie, a tale of Robin Hood, or the Bookes of Chivalrie, were ever thought more profitable non-sense, more judicious stuffe’.
454. 1641 Ben Jonson (c. 1572 – c. 1637), The Sad Shepherd, an incomplete Robin Hood pastoral play. Jonson was well acquainted with William Shakespeare (see no. 365 above).
455. 1643 Sir Richard Baker (1568-1645), A chronicle of the Kings of England, from the time of the Romans goverment [sic] unto the raigne of our soveraigne lord, King Charles containing all passages of state or church, with all other observations proper for a chronicle. London: Printed for Daniel Frere …, 1643. THE LIFE and RAIGNE OF KING RICHARD THE FIRST. His Acts and Troubles after his returning from the Holy Land (page 89) ‘In this time there was a trouble at home, though not to the King, yet to the kingdome: for Robin Hood accompanied with one little Iohn, and a hundred stout fellowes more, molested all passengers upon the High-way; of whom it is said, that he was of Noble bloud, at least made Noble, no lesse then an Earle, for some deserving services: but having wasted his estate in riotous courses, very penury forced him to take this course; in which yet it may be said he was honestly dishonest, for he seldome hurt any man, never any woman, spared the poore, and onely made prey of the rich: till the King setting forth a Proclamation to have him apprehended, it hapned he fell sicke at a certaine Nunnery in Yorkshire, called Birckleys; and desiring there to be let bloud, was betraid, and made bleed to death’.
456. 1644 A breviate of a sentence given against Jerome Alexander Esquire, an utter barrester of Lincolns-Inne, in the court of Star-chamber, the 17th day of November, in the second yeer of the raign of our soveraign Lord King Charls, of England, Scotland, France, and Ireland, &c. With exceptions taken to the said sentence, to unfold the iniquity thereof. With a short narrative of divers other passages and oppressions, wherewith he hath been also grieved in other times of his life, both before and since. Printed for the satisfaction of his friends, against those many calumnies and aspertions raised thereupon to blemish him in their opinion, and in the opinion of all others with whom he hath to do. London: [s.n.], Printed anno Dom. 1644. To the Reader (page unnumbered) ‘telling Stories of strange things, to those that cannot contradict him in his relations, which when rightly understood, are but tales of Robin Hood, by him that never shot in his bow’.
457. 1646 Thomas Edwards (1599-1647), The third part of Gangræna. Or, A new and higher discovery of the errors, heresies, blasphemies, and insolent proceedings of the sectaries of these times; with some animadversions by way of confutation upon many of the errors and heresies named. … Briefe animadversions on many of the sectaries late pamphlets, as Lilburnes and Overtons books against the House of Peeres, M. Peters his last report of the English warres, The Lord Mayors farewell from his office of maioralty, M. Goodwins thirty eight queres upon the ordinance against heresies and blasphemies, M. Burtons Conformities deformity, M. Dells sermon before the House of Commons; … As also some few hints and briefe observations on divers pamphlets written lately against me and some of my books, … London: Printed for Ralph Smith, at the Bible in Cornehill., 1646. A New and further DISCOVERY OF The Errors, Heresies, Blasphemies and Proceedings of the Sectaries of these times. A Relation and Discovery of the Libertinisme and Atheisme, horrible fearfull uncleannesses of severall kinds, Drunkunnesse, generall Loosenesse and licentiousnesse of living, Cosening and Deceiving both of particular persons and of the State and Kingdome, fearfull Lying, Jugling and falsifying of promises . . . . (page 225) ‘so many thousand fresh men come out of Scotland into England, and Informations and Examinations printed of strange things the Scats will do, and the King hath spoken of since he went to them, reports of stories of Robin Hood and little John, of Cocks and Bulls, plots that would be discovered of the Scots, and some great Noble men’.
458. 1647 Robert Baron (b. 1630), Erotopaignion, or, The Cyprian academy by Robert Baron of Grayes-Inne, Gent. London: Printed by W.W. and are to be sold by J. Hardesty, T. Huntington, and T. Jackson …, 1647. To his ever Honoured Friend Mr. Robert Baron upon his Cyprian Academy (page unnumbered) ‘Away you Criticks which are wont to Jeere, Or else King Arthur with his Knights shall come, And Robin Hood shall strike his paper drum, In his defence, brave Guy shall bring a long, St. George for England with a warlick throng’.
459. 1648 John Goodwin (1594?-1665), Neophytopresbyteros, or, The yongling elder, or, novice-presbyter. Compiled more especially for the Christian instruction and reducement of William Jenkin, a young presbyter, lately gone astray like a lost sheep from the wayes of modesty, conscience and truth. And may indifferently serve for the better regulation of the ill governed Society of Sion Colledge. Occasioned by a late importune pamphlet, published in the name of the said William Jenkin, intituled Allotrioepiskopos; the said pamphlet containing very little in it, but what is chiefly reducible to one, or both, of those two unhappy predicaments of youth, ignorance, & arrogance. Clearly demonstrated by I.G. a servant of God and men in the glorious Gospel of Jesus Christ. Wherein also the two great questions, the one, concerning the foundation of Christian religion: the other, concerning the power of the naturall man to good supernaturall, are succinctly, yet satisfactorily discussed. With a brief answer in the close, to the frivolous exceptions made by C B. against Sion Colledge visited, in a late trifling pamphlet, called, Sion Colledge what it is, &c. [London]: Printed for Henry Overton in Popes-head-Alley, 1648. THE NOVICE-PRESBYTER INSTRUCTED. 2. Mr. Jenkin demonstrates himselfe defective in Clerk-ship, and matter of learning, in these passages, with their fellows. (Page 49) ‘He is ever and anon up with Jesuits, Arminians, Remonstrants: but I can hardly beleeve that this great talker of Robin Hood, ever shot in his Bow’.
460. 1648 Mathias Prideaux (1622-1646?), John Prideaux, (1578-1650), An easy and compendious introduction for reading all sorts of histories: contrived, in a more facile way then heretofore hath been published, out of the papers of Mathias Prideaux Mr of Arts and sometime fellow of Exeter Colledge in Oxford. Oxford, Printed for LEONARD LICHFIELD, Printer to the Ʋniversity, M.DC.XLVIII. Plantagenets Ʋndevided. DINASTY. V (page 317) ‘In his absence [Richard I] the emulation between William Longshampe Bishop of Elye left Viceroy, And Iohn the Kings Brother (who deservedly with others stormed at it) brought all things into a Combustion; so that in these stormes brake out the famous Out-lawes, Robin Hood and Little John, of whom read Grafton. As also on William with the Longbeard, a notable Imposter then deluded the credulous people. This mans Valour an old Pees of theirs expresses’. Plantagenets Ʋndevided. DINASTY. V. (page 322) 5. ‘Lastly upon remissnesse in Government, and neglect of execution of Iustice, the breaking out of such Out-Lawes, as were Robin Hood and Little John, with their Comrades, or starting up of such Impostors and Villaines, as were’.
461. 1649 William Cavendish, Duke of Newcastle (1592-1676), The country captaine and the Varietie, two comedies written by a person of honor ; lately presented by His Majesties servants at the Black-Fryars. London: Printed for Hum. Robinson … and Hum. Hoseley …, 1649. Act. IIII. Scaene I (page 53) Gal. ‘Begar you have de Gypsey complexion, and looke like de sign of-de Robin Hood and maid a Marian’. Mo. ‘Robin Hood in thy face, does he maid a Marian me?’
462. 1649 A Bartholmevv Fairing, new, new, new: sent from the raised siege before Dublin, as a preparatory present to the great thanksgiving-day. To be communicated onely to Independents. London: [s.n.], Printed in the yeer, 1649. Play. Actus 5tus. The Song (page 27) ‘Here shall be plenty of kisses then, And young mayds may kisse young men. Here shall be lusty Troopers sent, To recruit the Mayds Regiment. And every barn that shall be seen, A Robin hood, or John a-Green’.
463. 1651 John Goodwin (1594?-1665), Confidence dismounted. Or a letter to Mr Richard Resburie of Oundle in North-Hamptonshire, upon occasion, partly of a title page prefixed before a small treatise of his concerning election & reprobation, conflicting of six sermons preached by him about three years since, and lately published; the said title page bearing in front these words, some stop to the gangrene of Arminianism, lately promoted by Mr John Goodwin, in his book intituled Redemption Redeemed; partly also, a short preface or epistle prefixed by the said Mr Resbury to that his treatise. London: Printed by John Macock, for Henry Cripps and Lodowick Lloyd, and are to be sold at their shop in Popes head Alley, 1651. Confidence Dismounted; OR A Letter to MrRichard Resbury (page 12) ‘Sir, I fear that in speaking these things you fall into the condemnation of the English Proverb, which saith, that many talk of Robin Hood, who never shot in his Bow’.
464. 1652 Enstone, Oxfordshire: A Latin account of a visit by ‘Eric Rosekrantsii et Petrie Reedtsii’ to Enstone on June 21 describes villagers celebrating games ‘quos sua lingua Rabben hut vocabant’ [A. Rhodes, ”’Howde Men’: Robin Hood’s Men,” Notes and Queries ser, 11 no. 1 (June 18, 1910), 494].
465. 1653 William Twisse (1578?-1646), The riches of Gods love unto the vessells of mercy, consistent with his absolute hatred or reprobation of the vessells of wrath, or, An answer unto a book entituled, Gods love unto mankind … in two bookes, the first being a refutation of the said booke, as it was presented in manuscript by Mr Hord unto Sir Nath. Rich., the second being an examination of certain passages inserted into M. Hords discourse (formerly answered) by an author that conceales his name, but was supposed to be Mr Mason … OXFORD: Printed by L. L. and H. H. Printers to the University, for Tho: Robinson. Anno Salutis M. DC. LIII.
THE SECOND PART OF THE FIRST BOOK, Wherein are Examined those Arguments against the Absolutenesse of DIVINE REPROBATION, WHICH Mr HORD Took to be of a CONVINCING NATURE. OXFORD, Printed by Leonard Lichfield Printer to the Vniversity. M. D. C. LIII. The Second Part of this Discourse, consisting of ARGUMENTS CONVINCING, whereof there are Five sorts. The First sort of Convincing Reasons Drawn from Scripture. DISCOURSE. SECT. VI. TWISSE. Consideration (page 208) ‘But this Author carryeth himselfe so throughout, that he would have this worke to be the work of mans free will, not of God, any other way than by perswasion, admonition, exhortation, and concourse; many talke of Robin Hood that never shot in his Bow’.
466. 1654 Edmund Gayton (1608-1666), Pleasant notes upon Don Quixot by Edmund Gayton, Esq. London: Printed by William Hunt, 1654. FESTIVOVS NOTES VPON DON QUIXOT. BOOK I. CHAP. VI. TEXT (page 21) ‘But had you heard of Bevis of Southampton, the Counter-scuffle, Sir Eglamore, Iohn Dory, the Pindar of Wakefield, Robin Hood, or Clem of the Cluff, these no doubt had been recommended to the Vatican, without any Index expurgatorius, or censure at all’. FESTIVOVS NOTES VPON DON QUIXOT. BOOK III. CHAP. IX. TEXT (page 128) ‘But that you may see in what a stout Accent, with that Princely Gate, what undaunted Countenance a Don can make an escape, take Sanctuary, or else, like Robin Hood, befor the green Hills’. FESTIVOVS NOTES VPON DON QUIXOT. BOOK IV. CHAP. XXII. TEXT (page 275) ‘so likewise men may, if they be dispos’d to be merry, seem to discredit the stories of Bevis of Southampton, Iohn a-Green, and Robin Hood’.
467. 1654 John Sheffield (fl. 1643-1647), The rising sun, or, The sun of righteousnesse shining upon the sons of unrighteousnesse a theological sun-dyal wherein is to be seen the rising, motion, influence and manifold operations of Christ upon the soul … as also the description of the true believer … as also the highest degrees and full growth and grace are here delineated … London: Printed by Th. Maxey for Sa. Gellibrand, at the Golden Ball in Pauls Church-yard, 1654. CHAP. XX All the godly are such as fear the name of God (page 205) ‘But upon this occasion of this rare (indeed sole) example of the Thief on the Crosse, we may use that Proverb, Many talk of Robin Hood who never shot in his bow’.
468. Seventeenth Century Roger Dodsworth mentions Robert Locksley. See, The Many Robin Hoods 5.
469. 1655 Thomas Fuller (1608-1661), The church-history of Britain from the birth of Jesus Christ until the year M.DC.XLVIII endeavoured by Thomas Fuller. London: Printed for Iohn Williams …, 1655. THE CHURCH-HISTORY OF BRITAINE [Ann. Reg. Bliz. 43] CENT: XVII. [Ann. Dom. 1601] (Page 18) ‘As for you, [This the King spake smiling] Dr. Reynolds, many men speak of Robin Hood, who never shot in his Bow. If you had a good Wife your selfe, you would think all worship and honour you could doe her, were well bestowed on her’.
470. 1655 John Sergeant (1622-1707), Schism dis-arm’d of the defensive weapons, lent it by Doctor Hammond, and the Bishop of Derry by S.W. At Paris: By M. Blageart, 1655. THE THIRD PART. SECT. 5. (page 286) ‘Unlesse the Catholikes were once thus in you, how could you cast them out? What a weakness is this to think that Robin Hood, Little Iohn, and a few Outlawes, doe King Richard and all England a great deal of favour in not casting them out of their Rebel-commonwealth, as no true members of it, and denying them the protection▪ of their seditious counter-lawes; under which Lawes, and in which Common-wealth, neither the King nor his good subjects were ever reputed’.
471. 1655 Robert Davenport, King John and Matilda: A Tragedy. London, Pennycuicke, 1655. This play, written by Robert Davenport and published by the actor Andrew Pennycuicke, is similar to The Death of Robert Earl of Huntington, the second of Anthony Munday’s two Robin Hood plays (see, no. 378 above).
472. 1656 Richard Flecknoe (d. 1678?), The diarium, or journall divided into 12 jornadas in burlesque rhime, or drolling verse : with divers other pieces of the same author. London: Printed for Henry Herringman …, 1656. OTHER PIECES OF THE SAME AUTHOR. Doctor FOR and AND: A Dialogue betwixt Nobody, the Doctors Admirer, and Somebody, that laughed at him (page 93) ‘Amongst the learned Rabble in the street, Whilst Robin Hood (there) for and Little Iohn, With Frier Tuck, for and Maid-marrian, Were troul’d in Ballad, and since like that wise.’
473. 1656 WIT AND DROLLERY, JOVIAL POEMS. Never before Printed. By Sir J. M. Ja: s. Sir W. D. J. D. And other admirable Wits. London: Printed for NATH: BROOK, at the Angel in Cornhil, 1656. A mock-song (page 21) 1. ‘OH Love, whose power and might, No Creature ere withstood, Thou forcest me to write, Come turne about Robin Hood’.
474. 1657 Little Iohn and the four beggers, a new merry song of Robin Hood and little John, shewing how Little John went a begging, and how he fought with four beggers, and what a prize he got of the four beggers, the tune is, Robin Hood and the begger. [S.l.]: Printed for William Gilberston, [1657]. See, Little John and the Four Beggers.
475. 1658 John Bramhall (1594-1663), Schisme garded and beaten back upon the right owners shewing that our great controversy about Papall power is not a quaestion of faith but of interest and profit, not with the Church of Rome, but with the Court of Rome : wherein the true controversy doth consist, who were the first innovators, when and where these Papall innovations first began in England : with the opposition that was made against them. Gravenhagh [Netherlands]: Imprinted by John Ramzey, 1658. A SVRREIOINDER or Defence of the Bishop of Derrys Reply to the Appendix of Mr. William Serjeant. Sest. I. Cap. II. (page 44) ‘and all the Storyes of King Arthur and Robin Hood, for it may be he hath received all these from his Elders by immediate Tradition’. SECT. IX. That the Pope and Court of Rome are most guilty of the Schisme (page 447) ‘A Contradiction? I see many men talke of Robin Hood, who never shot in his Bowe: talke of Contradictions, who know not what they are’.
476. 1658 Thomas Bancroft (fl. 1633-1658), Time’s out of tune, plaid upon however in XX satyres. London: Printed by W. Godbid, 1658. SATYRE VI. Against Lying (page 37) ‘Bold Robin Hood could shoot, I askt the posts, And other passengers what news i’ th’ Coasts’.
477. 1658 Sir Aston Cokain (1608-1684), A chain of golden poems embellished with wit, mirth, and eloquence : together with two most excellent comedies, (viz.) The obstinate lady, and Trappolin suppos’d a prince. London : Printed by W.G. and are to be sold by Isaac Pridmore …, [1658]. To Mr. James Stronge Bachelour, upon his wonderful Poem called Joanareidos (page unnumbered) ‘Old Robin Hood your western dames excel, Scarlet, and little John, and Adam Bell, (page unnumbered) Clem of the Clough, and William Cloudeslee, And all the out-laws of the Greenwood tree. Had Guy of Warwicke and the bold Sir Bevyes, Stukely, and Jonny Armstrong made their levies, Of the most valiant Souldiers of their time’.
478. 1659 James Howell (1594?-1666), Paroimiographia Proverbs, or, Old sayed savves & adages in English (or the Saxon toung), Italian, French, and Spanish, whereunto the British for their great antiquity and weight are added … London: Printed by J.G., 1659. PROVERBS, OR OLD SAYED-SAVVES, AND ADAGES IN THE ENGLISH TOUNG (page 9) ‘Tales of Robin Hood are good for fools’ (page 14) ‘VVould you eat your cake, and have your cake? A tale of Robin Hood. A tale of Tom Thumb’. SOME OF OLD JOHN HEIVVOODS RHIMES, Which run for the most part in PROVERBS & ADAGES of old Ferne yeers. The Complaint of one who had a Shrow to his Wife (page 23) ‘But many a man speaketh of Robin Hood (page 24) That never shot in his bow.’
479. 1660 The gang or The nine worthies and champions, Lambert, &c. To the tune of Robin Hood. London: Printed for Charls Gustavus, [1660].
480. 1660 William Winstanley (1628?-1698), England’s vvorthies. Select lives of the most eminent persons from Constantine the Great, to the death of Oliver Cromwel late Protector. London: Printed for Nath. Brooke, at the sign of the Angel in Cornhill, 1660. Englands Worthies, Select Lives of the most Eminent PERSONS of the Three Nations, from Constantine the Great, to the Death of the late Lord Protector, Oliver Cromwell. The Life of RICHARD the First (page 66) ‘In this Kings dayes, lived that famous Out-law Robin Hood, accompanied with one called little John, and a hundred stout fellows more; who (as Sir Richard Baker saith) molested all Passengers upon the High way; of whom it is reported, that he was of Noble Blood, at least made Noble, no less then an Earl for some deserving services: but having wasted his Estate in Riotous courses, very penury forced him to take this course; in which yet it may be said he was honestly dishonest, for he seldome hurt any man, never any woman, spared the poor, and onely made prey of the rich; till the King setting forth a Proclamation to have him apprehened: it happened he fell sick at a certain Nunnery called Brickleys in York shire; and desiring there to be let blood, was betrayed, and made bleed to death. Of all Thieves (saith Major) this same was the Prince, and the most gentle Thief’.
481. 1660-1661 Peter Heylyn (1600-1662), Ecclesia restaurata, or, The history of the reformation of the Church of England containing the beginning, progress, and successes of it, the counsels by which it was conducted, the rules of piety and prudence upon which it was founded, the several steps by which it was promoted or retarded in the change of times, from the first preparations to it by King Henry the Eight untill the legal settling and establishment of it under Queen Elizabeth : together with the intermixture of such civil actions and affairs of state, as either were co-incident with it or related to it. London: Printed for H. Twyford, T. Dring, J. Place, W. Palmer, …, 1660-1661. The Parentage, Birth, and first Fortunes of the Princesse ELIZABETH, The second Daughter of King Henry the Eighth, before her coming to the CROWN. With a true Narrative of the first Loves of King Henry the Eighth, to Queen Anne Bollen. The Reasons of his alienating of his first affections, and the true causes of her woful and calamitous death (PAGE 90) ‘their yearly Rents then valued at the sum of thirty two thousand pounds and upwards, their movable goods, as they were sold at Robin Hood’s penny-worths’.
482. 1661 Pietro Aretino, (1492-1556), Puttana errante. The fifth and last part of the wandring whore a dialogue between Magdalena, a crafty bawd, Julietta, an exquisite whore, Francion, a lascivious gallant, and Gusman a pimping hector : discovering their diabolical practises at the Half-Crown Chuck-Office : with an additional list of the names of the crafty bawds, common whores, wanderers, pick-pockets, night-walkers, decoys, hectors, pimps and trappanners … [London?: s.n.], 1661. THE WANDRING WHORE CONTINUED. A new Additional List of the Names. Crafty Bauds, &c (page unnumbered) ‘Robin Hood and Little John, in Holborn’.
483. 1661 Robin Hood and His Crew of Souldiers, an anonymous play acted in Nottingham on Charles II’s coronation day.
484. 1662 Thomas Fuller (1608-1661), The history of the worthies of England who for parts and learning have been eminent in the several counties : together with an historical narrative of the native commodities and rarities in each county. London: Printed by J.G.W.L. and W.G. for Thomas Williams …, 1662. NOTTINGHAM-SHIRE. Proverbs (page 315) ‘ Many talk of Robin Hood, who never shot in his Bow. That is, many discourse (or prate rather) of matters wherein they have no skill or experience. This Proverb is now extended all over England, though originally of Nottingham-shire extraction, where Robin Hood did principally reside in Sherwood Forrest. He was an Arch robber, and withall an excellent Archer; though surely the [Draytons Poly-Olbion, song 26. p.] Poet gives a twang to the loose of his Arrow, making him shoot one a cloth-yard long, at full forty score mark, for compass never higher than the breast, and within less than a foot of the mark. But herein our Author hath verified the Proverb, talking at large of Robin Hood, in whose Bow he never shot. One may justly wonder that this Archer did not at last hit the mark, I mean, come to the Gallows for his many robberies, but see more hereof in the Memorable Persons of this County. To s. . .ll Robin Hoods penny-worths. It is spoken of things sold under half their value; or if you will, half sold half given. Robin Hood came lightly by his ware, and lightly parted therewith; so that he could afford the length of his Bow for a yard of Velvet. Whithersoever he came, he carried a Fair along with him, Chapmen crowding to buy his stollen Commodities. But seeing The receiver is as bad as the thief, and such buyers are as bad as receivers, the cheap Penny-worths of plundered goods may in fine prove dear enough to their Consciences’.
485. 1662 Gratiae theatrales, or, A choice ternary of English plays composed upon especial occasions by several ingenious persons; VIZ. THORNY-Abbey, or The LONDON-Maid; a Tragedy, by T.W. / The Marriage-Broker, or The Pander; a Comedy, by M. W. M. A. / GRIM the Collier of CROYDON, or The Devil and his Dame; with the Devil and St. Dunstan: a Comedy, by I.T. LONDON, Printed by R. D. and are to be sold at the sign of the Black Bear in S. Paul‘s Church-yard. 1662. THE PROLOGUES To the ensuing Plays. The Prologue to the MARRIAGE – BROAKER (page unnumbered) ‘We therefore hope ’twill please: and reason good, Since ‘t doth present no tale of Robin Hood’.
486. 1662 Francis Howgill (1618-1669), THE Rock of Ages Exalted above Rome’s imagined Rock On which her CHURCH Is builded: She proved not to be the onely Church of Christ; her corrupt Doctrines reproved not to be Apostolick, but contrary to the true Church of Christ in the Apostles Dayes. Also, Divers Arguments answered, which may convince the Papists that they are not the true Church. Wherein a Book is also answered, called, A Catechism against all Sectaries; Newly published by C. M. in the Year 1661. By Francis Howgil, a Member of that Church which is coming out of the wilderness. London: Printed for G. C. at the west end of Pauls, 1662. The Rock of Ages exalted above Rome’s imagined Rock on which her Church is builded, &c. (page 52) ‘as this Author, who would sell Licences and Pardons for reading the Scriptures, as they have done for eating Flesh in Lent; but a story of Robin Hood, a Comedy, or a Play is more frequently read by the Members of the Church of Rome, which begets into loosness and prophaneness’.
487. 1662 The noble birth and gallant atchievements of that remarkable oulaw Robin Hood; together with a true account of the many merry and extravagant exploits he play’d, in twelve several stories, newly collected into one volume by an ingenious antiquary. Printed at London, for Thomas Vere and William Gilbertson (British Library), with editions of 1678, 1685 and c. 1690. It contains ‘The Noble Parentage, and the Atchievements of Robin Hood’ and prose versions of twelve of the Robin Hood ballads from the common Garland – a garland being an anthology, a published collection of tales. This anonymous work is considered to be one of the first prose accounts of Robin Hood’s life (apart from the ‘Sloane Life’ of Robin Hood in the British Library, see no. 397 above), a forerunner to 564, 565, and 572 below. A copy of the 1678 edition of the ‘noble birth’ was edited by William John Thoms in 1828, with further editions of 1858 and 1906 (see, 618 below).
488. 1663 Robin Hoods Garland: or Delightful Songs, printed at the Bible in Giltspur Street without Newgate, London, for W. Gilbertson (Bodleian Library). Seventeen ballads, and the earliest datable copy of the many editions of Robin Hood’s Garland, still being printed in great quantities in the 1820s.
489. 1664 Richard Hannis, Aime for the archers of St. Georges Fields containing the names of all the marks in the same fields, with their true distances according to the dimensuration of the line. London: Printed by N. Howell for Robert Minchard and Benjamin Brownsmith …, 1664. Rules to be observed and Practised by all those that exercise Shooting in the Long Bow. List of marks (pages 10, 39, 47, 49, 54, 57, 70, 83). Eight references to Robin Hood. A Table of the Names of the Marks in St. Georges Fields (page unnumbered). One reference to Robin Hood.
490. 1665 G. S., Aut Helmont, aut asinus: or, St. George untrust being a full answer to his Smart scourge. London: printed for R. Lowndes, at the White Lion in S. Pauls Churchyard, 1665. St. GEORGE ƲNTRƲST (page unnumbered) ‘not all those demonstrations thou promisest the world will make your book salable at two pence a volume, so long as men can buy at a cheaper rate the tale of Tom Thumb, or Robin Hood and little John’.
491. 1665 George Wither (1588-1667), Three Private MEDITATIONS Which being, for the most Part, of Publick Concernment, are therefore Published, by their Author GEO. WITHER. The First, is a Private Thanksgiving, consisting of three Hymns, whereby, GOD is magnified for his Mercy vouchsafed in the late Ingagement between the English and the Dutch, in June 1665. Composed after Celebrating the Publick Thanksgiving commanded by the King. The Second, is a Sacrifice of Praise and Prayer, by him offered to Almighty GOD, for his providential respect, to Him, his Wife and Children, during his Imprisonment in the disgraceful Goal of Newgate, when left destitute of all ordinary means of subsistance, by being deprived both of his Estate and Liberty. The Third, Intituled NIL ULTRA, is a Soliloquium, wherein, this Author, expresses the improbability, of an effectual proceeding further, to prevent the Sins & Plagues increasing, by ought, which he can offer to consideration. Imprinted in the Year, 1665. [London: s.n.], 1665. A Private THANK-OBLATION Consisting of Three Hymns, whereby Almighty GOD is magnified for his Mercy vouchsafed in the late Ingagement between the English and the Dutch, in June 1665. after Celebration of the Publick Thanksgiving commanded by the King. ARESOLVE, Occasioned by somewhat spoken concerning this Thank- Oblation, and this Authors other Writings (page 17) ‘That, were to follow their absurd example Who worship GOD and Baal within one Temple, Or Chroni•cle the Deeds by HERO’s done, With Tales of Robin Hood, and Little John: For these respects, I know men Sober-witted Will me excuse for what may seem omitted; And, as for those men, who so prudent are not, Whether, they me excuse, or no, I care not’.
492. 1668 David Lloyd, (1635-1692), Memoires of the lives, actions, sufferings & deaths of those noble, reverend and excellent personages that suffered by death, sequestration, decimation, or otherwise, for the Protestant religion and the great principle thereof, allegiance to their soveraigne, in our late intestine wars, from the year 1637 to the year 1660, and from thence continued to 1666 with the life and martyrdom of King Charles I. London: Printed for Samuel Speed and sold by him … [and] by John Wright … John Symmer … and James Collins …, 1668. THE Life and Death OF JOHN Lord DIGBY, Earl of Bristol (page 581) 3. ‘Colonel Iohn Digby, the excellent Archer and Improver of Aschams Toxophelus, but many talk of Robin Hood that never shot in his Bow’.
493. 1668 Thomas Shadwell (1642?-1692), The sullen lovers, or, The impertinents a comedy acted by His Highness the Duke of Yorkes servants. In the Savoy: Printed for Henry Herringman at the Sign of the Anchor in the Lower-Walk of the New < >. 1668. THE Sullen Lovers: OR, THE IMPERTINENTS. ACT. II (page 16) Car. ‘O! are you so, its a hard Case, but pray you, Sir, leave off, I had rather hear a silenc’d Parson preach sedition then you talk seriously of Love, wou’d you cou’d see how it becomes you; why you look more Comically then an old fashion’d fellow singing of Robin Hood or Chevy Chace’.
494. 1669 The New academy of complements erected for ladies, gentlewomen, courtiers, gentlemen, scholars, souldiers, citizens, country-men, and all persons, of what degree soever, of both sexes : stored with variety of courtly and civil complements, eloquent letters of love and friendship : with an exact collection of the newest and choicest songs à la mode, both amorous and jovial, Compiled by the most refined Wits of this Age. London: Printed for Samuel Speed, neer the Inner Temple-gate in Fleetstreet. 1669. Songs Alamode, Composed by the most Refined Wits of this Age (page 229) Mock-Song 216. ‘OH Love! whose power and might, No creature e’re withstood, Thou forcest me to write, Come turn about Robin Hood. Sole Mistriss of my heart, Let me thus far presume, To crave in this request, A black patch for the Rhume’.
495. 1670-1697 Robin Hood and the Tanner. Or, Robin Hood met with his Match: A merry and pleasant S•ng. Relating the gallant and fierce Combate between Arthur Bland, a Tanner of Nottingham, and Robin Hood the greeaest Archer in England. Tune is, Robin Hood and the Stranger. [London]: Printed for A.M. and W.O., [between 1670 and 1697]. See, Robin Hood and the Tanner.
496. 1670 Sir Thomas Culpeper (1626-1697), The necessity of abating usury re-asserted in a reply to the discourse of Mr. Thomas Manly entituled, Usury at six per cent. examined, &c. Together with a familiar and inoffensive way propounded for the future discovery of summes at interest, that so they may be charged with their equal share of publick taxes and burthens, the long defect whereof hath exceedingly fomented usury, embased land, and much decay’d the better half of the kingdom. By Sr. Thomas Culpeper, Jun. Knight. London: printed by T.L. for Christopher Wilkinson, at the Black-boy against S. Dunstans Church in Fleet-street, 1670. THE PREFACE [T. C.] (page 26) ‘When he hath tried the hazards of an East-India Vayage, he may the better measure his demands by it: But I doubt he finds it easier and better pastime to talk of Robin Hood, then (page 27) draw his bow.’
497. 1670? Robin Hoods progresse to Nottingham … to the tune of Bold Robin Hood. London: Printed for F. Coles, T. Vere, and J. Wright, [1670?]. See, Robin Hoods Progress to Nottingham.
498. 1670 The first known edition of Robin Hood’s Garland, Containing his Merry Exploits, and the Several Fights which he, Little John, and Will Scarlet had, upon several occasions . Some of them never before Printed (Thomas Robins (fl. 1672-1685). This work contains sixteen ballads and there is another edition of 1689 (Huntington Library). Joseph Ritson mentions an old wooden cut ‘preserved on the title of a penny-history, (Adam Bell, &c.) printed at Newcastle in 1772,’ which he thought represented a morris dance consisting of: A bishop, Robin Hood, The potter or beggar, Little John, Friar Tuck and Maid Marian. According to John Mathew Gutch, this was not a representation of a morris dance, but the woodcut that originally appeared on the title page of this garland, which probably shows the principal characters, such as: Robin Hood, Little John, Queen Catherine, the bishop, the curtal frier, (not Tuck), and the beggar. See, John Mathew Gutch, A Lytell Geste of Robin Hode, with other Ancient & Modern Ballads and Songs Relating to this Celebrated Yeoman, Vol. I, London, 1847, PP. 363-64.
499. 167-? The unfortunate forrester, or, Fair Elener’s tragedy. Shewing how Lord Thomas, once a bold forrester, fell in love with the fair Lady Elener, but his mother would not suffer him to marry her, but told him of another that was far richer: then the Lord Thomas, not willing to be undutiful to his mother, appoints his wedding day, and invites fair Elener to come to his wedding: who contrary to her mothers knowledge came, having seen his bride she stab’d her self, which Lord Thomas seeing, took the same dagger, and killed himself. Tune is, Chevy Chase: with allowance. London: Printed for W. Thackeray, T. Passenger, and W. Whitwood., [167-?]. The Unfortunate Forrester, Or, Fair Elener’s Tragedy (page 553) ‘In shooting too his aim was good, the Kings Deer he did slay, He did excel bold Robin Hood, and often won the day’.
500. 1671 Pierre Corneille (1606-1684), Nicomede a tragi-comedy translated out of the French of Monsieur Corneille by John Dancer as it was acted at the Theatre-Royal, Dublin. London: Printed for Francis Kirkman, 1671. A True, perfect, and exact Catalogue of all the Comedies, Tragedies, Tragi-Comedies, Pastorals, Masques and Interludes, that were ever yet Printed and Published, till this present year 1671. all which you may either buy or sell, at the Shop of Francis Kirkman, in Thames-street, over-against the Custom House, London. [R] (page 13) ‘Robin Hoods Pastoral Maygames. Robin Conscience. Robin Hood and his crew of Souldiers’.
501. 1672 Andrew Marvell (1621-1678), The rehearsal transpros’d, or, Animadversions upon a late book intituled, A preface, shewing what grounds there are of fears and jealousies of popery. The Second Edition, Corrected. LONDON: Printed by A. B. for the Assings of John Calvin and Theodore Beza, at the Sign of the Kings Indulgence, on the South side of the Lake Lemans, 1672. Animadversions upon the Preface to Bishop Bramhall’s Vindication, &c. (page 106) ‘So you know he answers all the Controversial Books of the Calvinists that ever have been written, with the Tale of Robin Hood, and the migh . . . y Bramble on the South-side of the Lake’.
502. 1674-1679 Londons ordinary: or, Every man in his humour. To a pleasant new tune. [London]: Printed for F. Coles, T. Vere, J. Wright, and J. Clarke., [between 1674-1679].
503. 1674-1679 The Noble fisher-man, or, Robin Hood’s preferment shewing how he won a prize on the sea, and how he gave one half to his dame, and the other to the building of alms-houses : tune of, In summer time. [London]: Printed for F. Coles, T. Vere, J. Wright, and J. Clarke, [between 1674 and 1679]. See, The noble Fisherman or Robin Hoods preferment.
504. 1674-1679 Robin Hood and the bishop. Shewing how Robin Hood went to an old womans house, and changed cloaths with her to escape from the bishop: and how he robbed him of all his gold, and made him sing mass. To the tune of, Robin Hood and the stranger. [London]: Printed for F. Coles, T. Vere, J. Wright, and J. Clarke., [between 1674 and 1679]. See, Robin Hood and the Bishop.
505. 1674 Thomas Deloney (1543?-1600), The royal garland of love and delight containing the lives of sundry kings, queens, and princes : with other love songs and sonnets full of delight. London: Printed by E.C. for W.T. and are to be sold by John Hose, …, 167[4]. The delicate wooing between two Royal Lovers (page unnumbered) ‘Tune of, Robin Hood is to the Greenvvood gone. I Salute thée swéet Love, with Title of grace, For Cupid commands me in heart to rejoice . . . .’
506. 1675 John, Smith (fl. 1675-1711), Christian religion’s appeal from the groundless prejudices of the sceptick to the bar of common reason by John Smith. London: Printed for Nathanael Brook, at the Angel in Cornhil, near the Royal Exchange. 1675. Christian Religion’s APPEAL To the BAR of Common Reason, &c. The Third Book. CHAP. III (page 21) 1. ‘As to Matters of Fact, there is as wide a difference betwixt our and their reports (in point of the credibility of the evidence) as is betwixt the Fables of Tom. Thumb, the Tales of Robin Hood; and the most authentick Chronicles’.
507. 1675 Thomas Thompson, Henry Hedworth, William Penn (1644-1718), The Quakers quibbles in three parts : first set forth in an expostulatory epistle to Will. Pfnn [i.e. Penn] concerning the late meeting held to Barbycan between the Baptists and the Quakers, also the pretended prophet Lod. Muggleton and the Quakers compared : the second part, in reply to a quibbling answer to G. Whiteheads, entituled The Quakers plainness … : the third part, being a continuation of their quibbles … London: Printed for F. Smith …, 1675. The Third Part OF THE QUAKERS QUIBBLES. The Conclusion (page unnumbered) ‘But come once more to turn about [Robin Hood] W. Pen now hath the Scripture (positively, says Mr. Keith) as a Secondary Rule of Faith and Practice; and yet, to step half-way back again, and Janus-like, look two ways at once, it is but much like the SHADOW of the true Rule’.
508. 1676 Thomas Binning, A light to the art of gunnery wherein is laid down the true weight of powder, both for proof and action, of all sorts of great ordnance : also the true ball and allowance for wind, with the most necessary conclusions for the practice of gunnery, either in sea or land-service : likewise the ingredients and making of most necessary fire-works, as also many compositions for the gunner’s practice, both at sea and land. London: Printed by John Darby for the author, and are to be sold by Andrew Forrester …, 1676. CHAP. XXXIII. Questions for the Practice of what hath been formerly taught (page 144) ‘for I doubt it is with divers that have writ of Gunnery, as that the Proverb will hold good, viz. Many Men speak of Robin Hood, that never shot in his Bow. So I doubt some have writ they know not what themselves, never being experimented’.
509. 1676 Francis Howgill (1618-1669), The dawnings of the gospel-day and its light and glory discovered by Francis Howgil. [London?: s.n.], 1676. THE Rock of Ages EXALTED ABOVE ROME’s Imagined Rock, ON WHICH HER CHURCH IS BUILDED (page 516) ‘but a Story of Robin Hood, a Comedy or a Play is more frequently read by the Members of the Church of Rome’.
510. 1676 Charles Molloy (1646-1690), De jure maritimo et navali, or, A treatise of affairs maritime and of commerce in three books. London: Printed for John Bellinger … George Dawes … and Robert Boulter …, 1676. CHAP. X. Of Bills of Exchange (page 261) ‘having no correspondence there, the Banker desires him to draw his Bill, to be paid at double or treble usance, at Cales, by Robin Hood, or John-a-Noakes (any seign’d person) at the price the Exchange is then curant’.
511. 1677 John Shirley (1648-1679), The life of the valiant & learned Sir Walter Raleigh, Knight with his tryal at Winchester. LONDON: Printed by J. D. for Benj. Shirley, and Richard Tonson, under the Dial of St. Dunstans Church in Fleetstreet, and under Grays-Inn Gate next Grays-Inn Lane, 1677. To the Indictment Sir Walter Raleigh pleaded Not Guilty (page 101) Raleigh. ‘Is it not strange for me to make my self Robin Hood, or a Kett, or a Cade? I knowing England to be in better Estate to defend it self than ever it was’. (Page 112) Attourney. ‘Raleigh has a deeper reach than to make himself, as he said, Robin Hood, a Kett, or Cade, yet I never heard that Robin Hood vvas a Traytor; they say he vvas an Outlavv’.
512. 1677 John Webster (1610-1682), The displaying of supposed witchcraft wherein is affirmed that there are many sorts of deceivers and impostors and divers persons under a passive delusion of melancholy and fancy, but that there is a corporeal league made betwixt the Devil and the witch … is utterly denied and disproved : wherein also is handled, the existence of angels and spirits, the truth of apparitions, the nature of astral and sydereal spirits, the force of charms, and philters, with other abstruse matters. By John Webster, Practitioner in Physick. London: Printed by J. M. and are to be sold by the Booksellers in London. 1677. THE DISPLAYING OF SUPPOSED WITCHCRAFT. CHAP. V. (page 69) ‘Forth we go again, in the mean time the Oyntment had ended his working, and the old Trot being awaked, and having put on her cloaths, begins to tell tales of Robin Hood, saying, That she had passed over Seas and Mountains, and then gives us false answers’.
513. 1678 John Ray (1627-1705), A COLLECTION OF English PROVERBS Digested into a convenient Method for the speedy finding any one upon occasion; WITH Short ANNOTATIONS. Whereunto are added Local Proverbs with their Explications, Old Proverbial Rhythmes, Less known or Exotick Proverbial Sentences, and Scottish Proverbs. The Second Edition Enlarged by the Addition of many hundred English, and an Appendix of Hebrew Proverbs, with Annotations and Parallels. By J. Ray, M.A. and Fellow of the Royal Society. Cambridge: Printed by John Hayes, Printer to the University, for W. Morden. 1678. Proverbs that are entire Sentences (page 196) R. ‘He loves roast-meat well, that licks the spit. Many talk of Robin Hood, that never shot in his bow. And many talk of little John that never did him know. Tales of Robin Hood are good enough for fools. That is, many talk of things which they have no skill in, or experience of. Robert Hood was a famous robber in the time of King Richard the first: his principal haunt was about Shirewood forest in Notingham-shire. Camden calls him, praedonem mitissimum. Of his stollen goods he afforded good penny-worths, Lightly come lightly go’. Proverbial Phrases and forms of Speech that are not Entire Sentences (page 267) R. He makes Robin Hoods pennyworths. ‘This may be used in a double sense; either he sells things for half their worth: Robin Hood afforded rich pennyworths of his plunder’d goods; or he buyes things at what price he pleases: The owners were glad to get any thing of Robin Hood, who otherwise would have taken their goods for nothing’. Proverbial Similies, in which the quality and subject begin with the same letter (page 285) ‘As gant as a greyhound. As glad as a fowl of a fair day. To go like a cat upon a hot bake stone. To go out like a candle in a snuff. As good as George of Green. This George of Green was that famous Pinder of Wakefield who fought with Robin Hood & little John both together, and got the better of them, as the old ballade tells us’. Proverbial speeches of persons given to such vices or vertues as follows (page 384) M. ‘Mony speaks of Robin Hood, that never shot in his bow’.
514. 1679 Francis Beaumont (1584-1616), John Fletcher (1579-1625), Fifty comedies and tragedies written by Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher, Gentlemen ; all in one volume, published by the authors original copies, the songs to each play being added. London: Printed by J. Macock, for John Martyn, Henry Herringman, Richard Marriot, 1679. The Two Noble Kinsmen. PROLOGUE (page 425) ‘From me the witless; chaff of such a writer, That blasts my Bayes, and my fam’d Works makes lighter, Than Robin Hood, this is the fear we bring, For to say Truth, it were an endless thing’.
515. 1679 William, Howell, (1638?-1683), Medulla historiæ Anglicanæ being a comprehensive history of the lives and reigns of the monarchs of England from the time of the invasion thereof by Jvlivs Cæsar to this present year 1679 : with an abstract of the lives of the Roman emperors commanding in Britain, and the habits of the ancient Britains : to which is added a list of the names of the Honourable the House of Commons now sitting, and His Majesties Most Honourable Privy Council, &c. London: Printed for Abel Swalle, and are to be sold by him at the Ʋnicorn, at the West End of S. Pauls. 1679. MEDƲLLA Historiae Anglicanae. NORMANS. Richard I (page 148) ‘The Knights Templers shall have Pride, the White Monks Covetousness, and the Clergy Lechery; and there have you my three Daughters bestowed amongst you. Now lived Robin Hood an outlawed Noble, and Little John, who with an Hundred stout fellows more, molested all passengers by the way, yet only robbed and made prey of the rich, selling good pennyworths when they had done’.
516. 1680 Nicholas Cox (fl. 1673-1721), Francis Kirkman (1632-ca. 1680), An exact catalogue of all the comedies, tragedies, tragi-comedies, opera’s [sic], masks, pastorals and interludes that were ever yet printed and published till this present year 1680. Oxon: Printed by L. Lichfield … for Nicholas Cox …, 1680. An Exact Catalogue of all the Comedies, Tragedies, &c. that were Printed and Published, till the Year 1675. And now continued (with some few Omissions in the former Catalogue) to this present year, 1680. [R] (page 12) ‘Robin Hood’s Pastoral Maygames. Robin Hood and his crew of Souldiers’.
517. 1680 Richard Head (1637?-1686?), The English rogue continued in the life of Meriton Latroon, and other extravangants comprehending the most eminent cheats of most trades professions. The second part. Licensed Feb. 22. 1669. London: printed for Francis Kirkman, and are to be sold by William Rands in Duck-lane, 1680. CHAP. III. (page 47) ‘I have hard the Clark of our parish say, who I assure you was a well read man, that Robin Hood that famous thief was in his yonger days Earl of Huntington & that Alexander the great was no better then a th ef in robbing other Princes of their Kingdoms and Crowns’ (page 50) ‘I thought my self no less then a second Robin Hood < > little Iohn, and thereupon resolved to put in speedy ecution my athers dictates which yet proved very fortunate to me, as you will find by that which lows’.
518. 1680 William Winstanley (1628?-1698), The new help to discourse or, Wit, mirth, and jollity. intermixt with more serious matters consisting of pleasant astrological, astronomical, philosophical, grammatical, physical, chyrurgical, historical, moral, and poetical questions and answers. As also histories, poems, songs, epitaphs, epigrams, anagrams, acrosticks, riddles, jests, poesies, complements, &c. With several other varieties intermixt; together with The countrey-man’s guide; containing directions for the true knowledge of several matters concerning astronomy and husbandry, in a more plain and easie method than any yet extant. By W. W. gent. The Second Edition. London: Printed by T. S. and sold by the Book-sellers of London and Westminster, 1680. Page 64 An. ‘Because every one desires the name of Virtuous, although he do not deserve it, according to the Poet: Virtue we praise, but practise not her good, (Athenian-like) we act not what we know; So many men do talk of Robin Hood, Who never yet shot arrow from his Bow’. A brief Epitome or Chronical-discourse of the Kings of England, since the Norman Conquest (page 153) ‘Hoc volo, non alia Richardum marte perire, Ut qui Francigenis Balistae, primitus usum Tradidit; ipse sui rem primitus experiatur, Quamque aliis docuit, in se enim sentiat artis. It is decreed thus must great Richard die, As he that first did teach the French to dart, An Arbalist; ’tis just he first should try, The strength, and taste the Fruits of his own Art. In his days lived those Outlaws, Robin Hood, Little John, &c’.
519. 1681 Sir Roger L’Estrange (1616-1704), A hue and cry after Dr. T.O. London: Printed for Alex. Banks, 1681. (Page unnumbered) ‘That Famous History of Tom Thumb, Guzman, The Spanish-Rogue, French-Rogue, Don Thomazo Dangerfieldo, English-Rogue, All the Famous Histories of Robin Hood and Little-Iohn, The History of Wat Tyler and Jack Straw’.
520. 1681 Homer alamode, the second part, in English burlesque, or, A mock-poem upon the ninth book of Iliads. London: Printed by S. Roycroft, for Dorm in Newman, at the Kings Arms in the Poultry, 1681. A MOCK-POEM Upon the Ninth Book OF HOMER’s ILIADS (page 63) ‘To Gammer Evans, and old Ide, ‘ Who when he was alive defi’d ‘ The stoutest Cudgel-play’rs, and coo’d ‘ Shoot with a Bow like Robin Hood’. A MOCK-POEM Upon the Ninth Book OF HOMER’s ODRSSES (page 7) ‘The Cicons rais’d their Neighbour Cicons. Who in great multitudes did run, Like Robin Hood and Little John’.
521. 1682-1700 Robin Hood newly reviv’d. To a delightful new tune, which concludes with the ballad Robin Hood and the Scotchman (A). [London]: Printed for Alex. Milbourn at the Stationers-Arms in Green-Arbor-Court in the Little Old-Baily [between 1682 and 1700]. Robin Hood newly reviv’d is identified by Joseph Ritson with Robin Hood and the Stranger (which has the second part as Robin Hood, Will Scadlock, and Little John: Or, a narrative of their victories obtained against the prince of Aragon and the two giants; and how Will Scadlock married the princess. Tune of Robin Hood; or, Hey down, down, a down’.
522. 1682 Bulstrode Whitlocke (1605-1675 or 6), Arthur Annesley, Earl of Anglesey (1614-1686), Memorials of the English affairs, or, An historical account of what passed from the beginning of the reign of King Charles the First, to King Charles the Second his happy restauration containing the publick transactions, civil and military : together with the private consultations and secrets of the cabinet. London: Printed for Nathaniel Ponder, at the Sign of the Peacok, in the Poultry, near the Church, MDC LXXXII. MEMORIALS OF THE ENGLISH AFFAIRS, During the REIGN of King Charles the First. Anno 1644. (page 110) ‘They upon advice together thought it not fit for them to receive an Answer in that manner, not being acquainted what it was, nor a Copy of it (as was usual in the like cases) sent with it unto them, and upon this they desired to be excused from receiving that Answer so sealed, and made an Address to His Majesty, that they might know what his Answer was, and have a Copy of it; to which His Majesty replied, What is that to you, who are but to carry what I send, and if I will send the Song of Robin Hood and Little John you must carry it? to which the Commissioners onely said that the business about which they came and were to return with His Majestie’s Answer was of somewhat more consequence than that Song’.
523. 1683 Robert Dixon (d. 1688), Canidia, or, The witches a rhapsody, in five parts. London: Printed by S. Roycroft for Robert Clavell …, 1683. CANIDIA, OR The Witches. A RHAPSODY. CANTO IX. (page 59) ‘Of our Profession, none so good, To tell Stories of Robin Hood. These are our Collegues and Brothers, Vestals are our Sisters and Mothers.’ CANTO XII (page 99) ‘For this and such like stories are as good, As the Tales of Tom Thumb, or Robin Hood’.
524. 1683 Thomas Shipman (1632-1680), Carolina, or, Loyal poems by Tho. Shipman, Esq. LONDON: Printed for Samuel Heyrick, at Grayes-Inn-Gate in Holborn, and William Crook, at the Green Dragon without Temple-Bar. 1683. The PARTHIAN ARCHER. 1666 (page 114) ‘Make all men shoot, like Robin Hood; Whose steady aim such credit got, It never mist to cleave the Mott’. REPOSE. 1674 (page 152) ‘Dian, Apollo, Archers good; And Cupid is their Robin Hood’.
525. 1683 Christopher Ness (1621-1705), The Devils patriarck, or, A full and impartial account of the notorious life of this present Pope of Rome Innocent the 11th wherein is newly discovered his rise and reign, the time and manner of his being chosen Pope, his prime procession, consecration and coronation, the splendour and grandeur of his Court, his most eminent and gainful cheats, by which he gulls the silly people, his secret and open transactions with the papists in England, Scotland, France and Ireland, and other Protestant countreys to this very day : together with the rest of the hellish policies and infamous actions of his wicked life. London: Printed for John Dunton at the Black-Raven in the Poultrey. 1683. The Notorious LIFE Of this present POPE of ROME, [INNOCENT, XI.] (page 86) ‘My Son, Give me thy Heart. You shall have Robin Hood Penniworths, enough for your Money in all Conscience: because you are all Friends, you shall all be very Kindly Used, and so Farewel’.
526. 1684 George Sandys (1578-1644), Anglorum speculum, or The worthies of England, in church and state Alphabetically digested into the several shires and counties therein contained; wherein are illustrated the lives and characters of the most eminent persons since the conquest to this present age. Also an account of the commodities and trade of each respective county, and the most flourishing cities and towns therein. London: printed for Thomas Passinger at the three Bibles on London-Bridge, William Thackary at the Angel in Duck-lane, and John Wright at the Crown on Ludgate-Hill, 1684. Nottingham-shire. Proverbs (page 558) ‘I. Many talk of Robin Hood who never shot in his Bow. That is, many prate of Matters wherein they have no skill. Robin Hood an excellent Archer and Arch-robber did chiefly reside in Sherwood Forrest in this County. II. To sell Robin Hoods penny-worths. That is, stoln goods under half their value’. Memorable Persons (page 561) ‘Rob. Hood, a Gentle Thief, robbed Peter to pay Paul plundring Clergymen, but relieving the (page 562) poor and distressed. His principal residence was in Shirewood Forrest in this County, tho his Bay is still remembred in York-shire. He complemented Passengers out of their Purses, tho he never asked the Keeper’s leave for Killing of Deer, and disposing of the Venison amongst the Vicinage. He played his pranks in the Reign of R. 1. about 1100. So much for Robin Hood’.
527. 1684 John Gadbury (1627-1704), Cardines cœli, or, An appeal to the learned and experienced observers of sublunars and their vicissitudes whether the cardinal signes of heaven are not most influential upon men and things proved by X. remarkable genitures, &c. in a reply to the learned author of Cometomantia wherein the character of Gassendus is defended and sundry other starry truths are justified. London printed: [s.n.], MDCLXXXIV [1684]. To the Impartial Readers (page unnumbered) ‘Many can talke of Robin Hood, that cannot shoot in his Bow’.
528. 1685? Robin Hood and the shepherd: shewing how Robin Hood, little John and the shepherd fought a sore combate. Tune is, Robin Hood and Queen Katherine. [London: s.n., 1685?]. See, Robin Hood and the Shepherd.
529. 1685 Robin Hood’s delight: or, A merry combate fought against Robin Hood, little John and Will. Scarlet, and three stout keepers in Sherwood Forrest. To the tune of, Robin Hood and Queen Katherine, or, Robin Hood and the shepherd. [London]: Printed for William Thackery at the Angel in Duck lane., [1685]. See, Robin Hoods Delight.
530. 1686 Simon Gunton (1609-1676), The history of the Church of Peterburgh wherein the most remarkable things concerning that place, from the first foundation thereof, with other passages of history not unworthy publick view, are represented. LONDON, Printed for Richard Chiswell, at the Rose and Crown in S. Paul’s Church-Yard, MDCLXXXVI. THE HISTORY OF THE CHURCH OF PETERBURGH (page 4) ‘there are two long stones yet standing upon a balk in Castor-field near unto Gunwade-Ferry; which erroneous tradition hath given out to be two draughts of Arrows from Alwalton Church-yard thither; the one of Robin Hood, and the other of Little John; but the truth is, they were set up for witnesses, that the carriages of Stone from Bernack to Gunwade-Ferry, to be conveyed to S. Edmunds-Bury, might pass that way without paying Toll’.
531. 1686 J. D., Gent, A memorial for the learned, or, Miscellany of choice collections from most eminent authors in history, philosophy, physick, and heraldry. London: Printed for George Powell and William Powle …, 1686. A short MEMORIAL OF English History, Beginning before the Invasion of Britain by Julius Caesar, and from thence continued to the year 1686. BRITAIN (page 15) ‘RICHARD, from his exceeding Valour, sirnamed Coeur de Lion, was Crowned at Westminster.He spent great time in the Wars at the Holy Land, where he did many noble exploits; and as he was going, conquered Cyprus, where he solemnly took to Wife his beloved Lady Berengaria. He died of the wound of an Arrow, received * at the Siege of the Castle of Chaluz, belonging to the Viscount of Limoges, April 6th. 1199. and was buried at Charron. In the first year of his Reign he appointed Henry Fitz-Alwin to be the first Lord Mayor of London, being formerly governed by Portgraves. Now lived Robin Hood and Little John’. NOTABLE EVENTS In the Reign of King RICHARD the First (page 55) ‘In this Time there was a Trouble at home, though not to the King, yet to the Kingdom: For Robin Hood, accompanied with one little John, and a 100 stout Fellows more, molested all Passengers upon the High-way; of some it is said, that he was of noble Blood, at least made noble, no less than an Earl, for some deserving Services; but having wasted his Estate in riotous Courses, very Penury forced him to take this course; in which yet it may be said, that he was honestly dishonest; for he seldom hurt any Man, never any Woman, spared the Poor, and only made prey of the Rich; till the King setting forth a Proclamation to have him apprehended, it hapned he fell sick at a certain Nunnery in Yorkshire, called Berkleys, and desiring there to be let Blood, was betrayed, and bled to death’.
532. 1686 The second book of the Pleasant musical companion being a new collection of select catches, songs and glees: for two and three voices. The Second Edition, Corrected and much Enlarged. London: Printed for John Playford near the Temple Church, or at his House over against the Blue-Ball in Arundel-Street, 1686. The Third Part, containing Choice Songs for two Voices, Cantus & Bassus. A SONG made on the Power of Women (page unnumbered) ‘Tis no Story of Robin Hood, nor of his Bow-men, I mean to demonstrate the Power of Women, It is a Subject that’s very common; Which no body, &c’.
533. 1687 Miguel de, Cervantes Saavedra (1547-1616), John Phillips (1631-1706), The history of the most renowned Don Quixote of Mancha and his trusty squire Sancho Pancha now made English according to the humour of our modern language and adorned with copper plates by J.P. London: Printed by Thomas Hodgkin, and Sold by William Whitwood at the Golden Dragon in West-Smithfield, next the Crown Tavern. MDCLXXXVII. THE LIFE and ATCHIEVEMENTS Of the most Renown’d Don Quixote OF MANCHA. PART I. BOOK I. CHAP. VII (page 28) ‘And now Don Quixote assur’d of such a necessary Appurtenance, made it his business to furnish himself with Money: To which purpose, putting here to Sale, Mortgaging there, and all the while selling Robin Hood’s Pennoth’s, he got a good round Sum together’.
534. 1689-90 Sir Richard Cox (1650-1733), Hibernia anglicana, or, The history of Ireland, from the conquest thereof by the English, to this present time with an introductory discourse touching the ancient state of that kingdom and a new and exact map of the same. London: Printed by H. Clark, for Joseph Watts …, 1689-90. THE REIGN OF John Earl of Moreton, LORD of IRELAND, Afterwards King of England, Duke of Normandy, &c (page 44) ‘About this Time Robin Hood and Litle John were Famous Robbers in England; but their Company being dispersed, and Robin Hood taken, Litle John fled to Dublin, and shot an Arrow from Dublin-Bridge to the litle Hill in Oxman-Town, thence called Litle John’s Shot. He was called Litle John Ironically, for he was not less than fourteen Foot long (believe it who will). Hector Boetius affirms, The Hole of his Huckle Bone was so big, that he could thrust his Hand through it. He fled from Dublin to Scotland, where he dyed’.
535. 1689-1692 The famous battel between Robin Hood, and the Curtal fryar. To a new northern tune. [London]: Printed for W[illiam]. Thackeray, J[ohn]. Millet, and A[lexander]. Milbourn., [between 1689-1692]. See, Robin Hood and the Curtall Fryer.
536. 1690 Thomas Brown (1663-1704), The late converts exposed, or, The reasons of Mr. Bays’s changing his religion considered in a dialogue : part the second : with reflections on the life of St. Xavier, Don Sebastian King of Portugal, as also the fable of the bat and the birds. London: Printed for Thomas Bennet …, 1690. Will‘s Coffee-House in Covent-Garden. Crites, Eugenius and Mr. Bays. Bays (page 9) ‘You say true, Mr. Crites, ’tis Machiavel all over, for you may swear, a man in such a case will use the same discretion in choosing his Objections, as they say Robin Hood used in choosing his men, such as he can easily Cuff and Master when he pleases’.
537. 1690 Thomas Browne (1654?-1741), The case of allegiance to a king in possession. [London: s.n.], 1690. (Page 61) ‘This Person may be the head of a Rabble, a Jack Cade, a Robin Hood, a Massaniello, or who not?’
538. 1691 John Dunton ( 1659-1733), A voyage round the world, or, A pocket-library divided into several volumes … : the whole work intermixt with essays, historical, moral, and divine, and all other kinds of learning. London: Printed for Richard Newcome, [1691]. TO My much Esteemed Friend, Iohn Evander, AUTHOR of this BOOK, ENTITULED, A Voyage round the WORLD (page unnumbered) ‘And if my Verse Eternity can give, (As sure old Songs make Robin Hood to live).’
539. 1691 T. H. (Thomas Hale), Sir William Petty, (1623-1687), An account of several new inventions and improvements now necessary for England, in a discourse by way of letter to the Earl of Marlborough, relating to building of our English shipping, planting of oaken timber in the forrests, apportioning of publick taxes, the conservacy of all our royal rivers, in particular that of the Thames, the surveys of the Thames, &c. : Herewith is also published at large The proceedings relating to mill’d-lead-sheathing, and the excellency and cheapness of mill’d-Lead in preference to cast sheet-lead for all other purposes whatsoever. : Also A treatise of naval philosophy, written by Sir Will. Petty.The whole is submitted to the Consideration of our English Patriots in Parliament Assembled. London: Printed for Iames Astwood, and are to be Sold by Ralph Simpson at the Harp in St. Pauls Church-yard. MDCXCI. To the Right Honourable Iohn LORD Churchill, Baron Churchill of Sandridge, Viscount Churchill of Aymouth in the Kingdom of Scotland, Earl of Marlborough, and one of their Majesties most Honourable Privy Council (page lxxviii) ‘For upon a discourse I had with a most sk•lful Surveyor, on the occasion of my •elling h•m that I thought whoever b•rgain’d away that part of the Shoar that was before mention’d, viz. 80 Foot deep, and 100 Foot long, for 20 l. sold Robin Hood’s Penny worths of it’.
540. 17th century The Robin Hood ballads in the collection of Anthony a Wood (1632-1695) in the Bodleian Library; these represent a good portion of the ballads in the edition by Joseph Ritson. See, The Rhymes of Robin Hood 11.
541. 1691-92 Anthony à Wood (1632-1695), Athenae Oxonienses. An Exact HISTORY OF ALL THE Writers and Bishops Who have had their EDUCATION in The most ancient and famous University OF OXFORD, FROM The Fifteenth Year of King Henry the Seventh, Dom. 1500, to the End of the Year 1690. REPRESENTING The Birth, Fortune, Preferment, and Death of all those AUTHORS and PRELATES, the great Accidents of their LIVES, and the Fate and Character of their WRITINGS. To which are added, The FASTI or Annals, of the said University, For the same time. The First VOLUME, Extending to the 16th. Year of King Charles I. Dom. 1640. —Antiquam exquirite Matrem. Virgil. London: Printed for THO. BENNET at the Half-Moon in S. Pauls Churchyard. MDCXCI. Vol. I (page 509) ‘Staple of News, Com.—1625. Magnetick Lady, or humours reconciled, Com. Tale of a Tub, Com. Sad Shepherd, or a tale of Robin Hood, Trag’. See also, The Rhymes of Robin Hood 11.
542. 1692 Jacob Curate, The Scotch Presbyterian eloquence, or, The foolishness of their teaching discovered from their books, sermons and prayers and some remarks on Mr. Rule’s late Vindication of the kirk. London: Printed for Randal Taylor …, 1692. SECT. IV. Containing some few Expressions of the Presbyterian Prayers (page 114) ‘Now Lord, thou sees that many People go away from hearing thy word, but had we told them Stories of Robin Hood or Davie Lindsay, they had stay’d; and yet none of these are near so good as thy Word that I Preach’.
543. 1692 John Hawkins (17th cent), The English school-master compleated containing several tables of common English words, from one, to six, seven, and eight syllables, both whole and divided, according to the rules of true spelling; with prayers, and graces both before and after meat, and rules for childrens behaviour at all times and places, with several other necessaries suitable to the capacities of children and youth. Also brief and easie rules for the true and exact spelling, reading, and writing of English according to the present pronunciation thereof in the famous University of Oxford, and City of London. To which is added, an appendix containing the principles of arithmetick, with an account of coins, weights, measure, time, &c. Copies of letters, titles of honour, suitable for men of all degrees, and qualities, bills of parcels, bills of exchange, bills of debt, receipts, and several other rules and observations fit for a youths accomplishment in the way of trade. John Hawkins school-master at St. Georges Church in Southwark. London: printed by A. and I. Dawks for the Company of Stationers, 1692. Chap. 2. English Proverbs Alphabetically placed (page 78) T. ‘TAles of Robin Hood are fit for Fools’. An Appendix to the English School-master compleated, containing the Principles of Arithmetick, with an Account of Coins, Weights and Measures, Time, &c. Copies of Letters, and Titles of Honour, suitable for Men of all Degrees and Qualities, Bills of Parcels Bills of Exchange, Bills of Debt, Receipts, and several other Rules and Observations fi for a Youths Accomplishment in the way of Trade (page 121) A Table of some Words as are alike in sound but different in signification (page 122) T. ‘Tale of Robin Hood’.
544. 1693? A wonderful example of God’s justice shewed upon one Jasper Conningham a gentleman born in Scotland, who was of opinion, that there was neither God, nor Devil. To the tune of, O neighbour Robert. [London]: Printed for Alex. Milbourn at the Stationers-Arms in Green-Arbour-Court in the Little Old-Baily., [1693?]. Page 470 ‘Her Brother hearing her Godly Christian talk, Within the Garden as they alone did walk; Blasphemously replyed, as shameless as he stood, Saying she had declar’d a Tale of Robin Hood’.
545. 1693 Edmund Bohun (1645-1699), A geographical dictionary representing the present and ancient names of all the counties, provinces, remarkable cities, universities, ports, towns, mountains, seas, streights, fountains, and rivers of the whole world : their distances, longitudes, and latitudes : with a short historical account of the same, and their present state : to which is added an index of the ancient and Latin names : very necesary for the right understanding of all modern histories, and especially the divers accounts of the present transactions of Europe. London: Printed for Charles Brome …, 1693. S A. (page 367) ‘Scarborough, a strong Town in the North Riding of Yorkshire, and the Hundred of Pickering; not very large, but well built and inhabited; standing to the Sea, with a convenient Port for Trade; upon a craggy, steep, and almost inaccessible Rock, which the Sea washes on all sides but the West, where the passage is narrow, yet hath a strong Wall to secure it. This Rock upon the top of it presents us with a fair Plain of sixty Acres of ground, a Castle Royal garrisoned, and a Spring of fresh Water. Formerly a high stately Tower stood upon it, which served as a Landmark to Ships at Sea: but this in the last Civil Wars was demolished. Scarborough besides is made a noted place by its Spaw, and the Herring Fishery upon its Coasts: Between which and Whitby to the North lies the Bay of Robin Hood, the famous Robber in the Reign of K. Rich. 1’.
546. 1693 Henry Higden, The wary widdow, or, Sir Noisy Parrat a comedy: as it is acted at the Theatre Royal by Their Majesties servants. LONDON: Printed for Abell Roper, at the Mitre near Temple-Bar; and Tho. Rainy, Bookseller in Doncaster. M.DC.XCIII. THE Wary Widdow: OR, Sir Noisy Parrat. ACT. I. (page 5) Scar. ‘Such pretenders talk much of Robin Hood that never had the honour to shoot in his Bow, and give occasion to those that live at ease at home to rally poor Soldiers, that for their sakes expose themselves to hazzard and fatigues abroad’.
547. 1693 François Rabelais (ca. 1490-1553?, Sir Thomas Urquhart (1611-1660), The third book of the works of Mr. Francis Rabelais, Doctor in Physick. Containing the heroick deeds of Pantagruel the son of Gargantua. Now faithfully Translated into English, by the unimitable Pen of Sir Thomas Urwhart, Kt. & Bar. The Translator of the Two First Books. Never before Printed. LONDON: Printed for Richard Baldwin near the Oxford Arms in Warwick-Lane, 1693. CHAP. II. How Panurge was made Laird of Salmygoudin in Dypsodie, and did waste his Revenue before it came in (page 28) ‘I cannot be but rich enough. Every body cries up thrift, thrift, and good Husbandry; but many speak of Robin Hood that never shot in his Bow’.
548. 1694 François Rabelais (ca. 1490-1553?, Sir Thomas Urquhart (1611-1660), The works of F. Rabelais, M.D., or, The lives, heroic deeds and sayings of Gargantua and Pantagruel. Done out of French by Sir Tho. Urchard, Kt. and others. With a large account of the life and works of the author, particularly an explanation of the most difficult passages in them. Never before publish’d in any language. London, Printed for Richard Baldwin, near the Oxford Arms in Warwick-Lane, 1694. The Third Book of the Heroick Deeds and Sayings of the good Pantagruel. The AUTHOR‘s Prologue. CHAP. II. How Panurge was made Laird of Salmygoudin in Dypsodie, and did waste his Revenue before it came in (page 28) ‘Every body cries up thrift, thrift, and good Husbandry; but many speak of Robin Hood that never shot in his Bow’.
549. 1694 James Brome (d. 1719), An historical account of Mr. Rogers’s three years travels over England and Wales giving a true and exact description of all the chiefest cities, towns and corporations in England, Dominion of Wales, and town of Berwick upon Twede : together with the antiquities, and places of admiration, cathedrals, churches of note in any city, town or place in each county, the gentleman above-mentioned having made it his whole business (during the aforesaid time) to compleat the same in his travelling, : to which is annexed a new map of England and Wales, with the adjacent parts, containing all the cities and market towns bound in just before the title. London: Printed and sold by J. Moxon and B. Beardwell …, 1694. An ACCOUNT OF Mr. R. Rogers’s Three Years Travels OVER England and Wales. Nottinghamshire (page 90) ‘We went from hence to view the Chair of Robin-Hood, of which it follows. Having pleasured our selves with the Antiquities of this Town, we took Horse and went to visit the Well and ancient Chair of Robin-Hood, which is about a Mile within the Forest of Shirwood: Being placed in that Chair, we had a Cap, which, they say, was his, very formally put upon our Heads, and having performed the usual Ceremonies befitting so great a Solemnity, we received the Freedom of the Chair, and were incorporated into the Society of that renowned Brotherhood; but that we may not receive such Privileges without an honourable mentioning of the Persons that left them to Posterity; know, we must, that the Patent was bequeathed to the inferior Rangers of this Forest, by Robin-Hood and Little John, honourable Personages indeed, being the chief Lords of some most renowned Robbers in the Reign of King Richard the First: This same Robin-Hood entertained one Hundred tall Men, all (page 91) good Archers, with the Spoil he daily made himself Master of, whom four Hundred, tho’ every way well Accoutred to give Battel, durst scarce make an Onset. He suffered no Woman to be violated, oppress’d, oa any ways molested; poor Men’s Goods he spared, and did relieve them very liberally with what he got from the rich Carles: He killed none, and by this means he did, for a long time, keep up the Order of Knight Errants’.
550. 1694 Robert Ferguson (d. 1714), A letter to Mr. Secretary Trenchard discovering a conspiracy against the laws and ancient constitution of England : with reflections on the present pretended plot. [London: s.n., 1694]. (Page 17) ‘and the Crimes pretended to be witnessable by those Papers, can, according to Law, (may he be but allowed the benefit of it) no more hurt or prejudice him, than if they were Bagatelles or Stories of Robin Hood and Little John’.
551. 1694 Louis Moréri (1643-1680), Edmund Bohun (1645-1699). The great historical, geographical and poetical dictionary being a curious miscellany of sacred and prophane history : containing, in short, the lives and most remarkable actions of the patriarchs, judges, … heresiarchs, … emperors, … and all those who have recommended themselves to the world … together with the establishment and progress both of religious and military orders … ; [with] The genealogy of several illustrious families in Europe ; The fabulous history of the heathen gods and heroes ; The description of empires, kingdoms … London: Printed for . . .. , near Bride-Lane in Fleetstreet; Luke Meredith, at the Star in St. Paul’s Church-Yard; John Harris, at the Harrow in the Poultry; and Thomas . . . .ugh, at the Golden-Ball in St. Paul’s Church-Yard, MDCXCIV. H section HO (page unnumbered) ‘Hood (Robert) commonly called Robin Hood, a famous Robber in the Reign of K. Richard I. Had his principal Residence in Sherwood-Forest, in Nottinghamshire; but had another Haunt near the Sea, in the North-Ridings of Yorkshire, where Robin Hood’s Bay still retains his Name: Not that he was any Pirate, but a Land-Robber, who retreated to those unsuspected Places for his Security. As great a Robber as he was, being rather a merry than a mischievous Thief, and for the most part robbing none but the Rich. He had the good Luck to escape the Hand of Justice. In short, he never murther’d any thing but Deer; and then he feasted his Neighbours with the Venison’. Part S, Section SC. Scarborough (page unnumbered) ‘Between the Coasts of Scarborough and Whitby to the North, lyes the Bay of Robin Hood the Famous Robber in the Reign of King Richard I’. Part S, Section SH (page unnumbered) ‘Sherwood Forest, one of the four Principal Forests in England; it lyes in the West parts of Nottinghamshire, and is chiefly noted for Robin Hood and his Companions’.
552. 1695? Robin Hood and Allin of Dale. Or, A pleasant relation how a young gentleman being in love with a young damsel, which was taken from him to be an old knights bride, and how Robin Hood pittying the young mans case, took her from the old knight, when they were going to be marryed, and restored her to her own love again. Bold Robin Hood he did the young man right, and took the damsel from the doting knight. To a pleasant northern tune, or, Robin Hood in the Green-Wood stood,. [London]: Printed for Alex. Milbourn, Will. Ownley, Tho. Thackeray at the Angel in Duck-lane, [1695?]. See, Robin Hood and Allen a Dale.
553. 1696 Gerardus Croese (1642-1710), The general history of the Quakers containing the lives, tenents, sufferings, tryals, speeches and letters of the most eminent Quakers, both men and women : from the first rise of that sect down to this present time. London: Printed for John Dunton …, 1696. BOOK I (page 43) ‘Next to him was Philip Scafey, Minister of a Publick Church at a little Village in this same County, near to Whitby, called Robin Hood’s Bay upon the Sea-side’.
554. 1696 Elam Mossam, The famous tryal in B.R. between Thomas Neale, Esq. and the late Lady Theadosia Ivy the 4th of June, 1684, before the Right Honourable the late Lord Jeffreys, lord chief justice of England, for part of Shadwell in the county of Middlesex … together with a pamphlet heretofore writ … by Sir Thomas Ivy … [S.l.: s.n.], 1696. The Lady Ivy’s Tryal, For great Part of Shadwell, in the County of Middlesex (Page 31) L. C. I. ‘Robin Hood upon Greendale stood, therefore this must be your Land: That is all the Argument I can make of it. Your Boundaries do make it as plain as the Nose in a Man’s Face’.
555. 1696 John Seller (fl. 1658-1698), The history of England giving a true and impartial account of the most considerable transactions in church and state, in peace and war, during the reigns of all the kings and queens, from the coming of Julius Cæsar into Britain : with an account of all plots, conspiracies, insurrections, and rebellions … : likewise, a relation of the wonderful prodigies … to the year 1696 … : together with a particular description of the rarities in the several counties of England and Wales, with exact maps of each county. London: Printed by Job and John How, for John Gwillim, against Crossby-Square, in Bishopsgate-street, 1696. THE HISTORY OF ENGLAND. CHAP. IX. The Reigns of the Three Danish Kings, who were Sole Monarches of England, viz. Canute, Harrold, and Hardicanute; with the Memorable Things that happened in their several Reigns. The Reign of Canute, Sixteenth Sole Monarch of England, and first of the Danes, that Reigned here. Remarks on Huntingtonshire &c (page 176) ‘Huntington is a very pleasant Town, giving denomination to the Shire, standing on the Ouse, over which Liver (page 177) it has a commodious Bridge. It gives a fair Prospect into the Country, and has a great trading Market, and is adorned with Buildings of Antiquity: And of this Place Robin Hood, the famous Outlaw, is said to be Earl, in the Reign of King Richard the First’. THE HISTORY OF ENGLAND. CHAP. XI. An Account of the Norman Original, How they came to be called Normans; With a Description of the Dutchey of Normandy, &c. The Reign of King HENRY the Second, commonly called Henry Fitz-Empress. Remarks on Notinghamshire, &c (page 263) ‘In this County is the much noted Forrest of Shirwood, where Robin Hood held his chief Residence, and in it are bred a great many of those Hares called the Laner’. THE HISTORY OF ENGLAND. CHAP. XI. An Account of the Norman Original, How they came to be called Normans; With a Description of the Dutchey of Normandy, &c. The Reign of King RICHARD the First (page 276) ‘Also in this Reign flourished the famous Outlaws Robin Hood, or Robin of the Wood, and Little John, who Robbed and Spoiled (for they had a large Retinue) divers places, Inhabiting mostly the Woods; yet took nothing from the Poor, but on the contrary Relieved them with what they took from the Rich, and were bountiful Benefactors to such as stood in need of it; but this Gang was broke by the Death of Robin Hood, their Ring-Leader; who being let Blood for a Distemper (page 277) by a Fryer, the Treacherous Monastick let him Bleed to Death, and got by it the promised Reward of 500 Marks; tho’ soon after being taken by the rest, he was tied to a Tree and Shot to Death with Arrows’.
556. 1697 John Partridge (1644-1715), Defectio Geniturarum: Being an Essay toward the Reviving and Proving The True Old Principles of Astrology, Hitherto Neglected, Or, at leastwise, not Observed or Understood. In Four Parts. The First shewing the Ground and Cause of Error. The Second contains an Examination of those Nativities Printed by Morinus. The Third considers those done by Argol. And, The Fourth those Printed by Mr. Gadbury, in his Collection. Wherein Many things relating to this Science are Handled and Discoursed: But the principal End and Design of the Book is to prove the Power and sole Use Of the Hileg, in Cases of Life and Death. LONDON: Printed for Benj. Tooke at the Middle-Temple-gate in Fleetstreet. MDCXC VII. Defectio Geniturarum. CHAP. I. PROAEMIUM (page 16) ‘nor is every one an Astrologer that can talk of the Horoscope and Midheaven, the Lord of the Geniture, Pitted and Smoaky Degrees, Arks of Directions, Cardinal Signs on Angles, &c. There is many a one talks of Robin Hood, that never shot in his Bow’.
557. 1698 The Second part of Modern reports, being a collection of several special cases most of them adjudged in the Court of Common Pleas, in the 26, 27, 28, 29, & 30th years of the reign of King Charles II. when Sir. Fra. North was Chief Justice of the said court. To which are added, several select cases in the Courts of Chancery, King’s-Bench, and Exchequer in the said years. Carefully Collected by a Learned Hand. London: Printed by the Assigns of Rich. and Edw. Atkins Esquires, for Charles Harper at the Flower de Luce over against St. Dunstans Church in Fleetstreet, 1698. DE Term. Sancti Mich. Anno 28 Car. II. in Banco Regis. Read versus Dawson (page 140) ‘And Iustice Scroggs asked merrily, If Debt be brought upon a Bond and the Defendant pleads Robin Hood dwelt in a Wood, and the Plaintiff joyns Issue that he did not, this is an immaterial Issue, and shall there not be a Repleader in such Case after Verdict? Ad quod non fuit responsum’.
558. 1699 George Farquhar (1677?-1707), Love and a bottle a comedy, as it is acted at the Theatre-Royal in Drury-Lane by His Majesty’s servants. London: Printed for Richard Standfast … and Francis Coggen …, 1699. ACT II. SCENE Lovewell’s Lodgings. [Nimb] (page 19) ‘You talk of Robin Hood, who never shot in his Bow, Sir.—You Dancers are the Battledoors of the Nation.’ ACT IV. SCENE the Park. [Lyr] (page 41) ‘he shall be as famous in Ballad as Robin Hood, or Little John; my Muses shall haunt him like Demons; they shall make him more ridiculous than Don Quixote’.
559. 17th and 18th centuries A selection of Robin Hood broadside ballads. Apart from the Gest of Robyn Hode, Robin Hood and the Monk, Robin Hood and the Potter, and the ballads in the Percy Folio manuscript, most of the other Robin Hood ballads have survived in broadsides, chapbooks, and garlands from the seventeenth to nineteenth centuries. Many are preserved in the great collections of Wood, Pepys and Roxburgh, and have been reproduced in varying quantities in successive books, such as those of Thomas Evans, Joseph Ritson, John Mathew Gutch and Francis James Child. It should be pointed out that not a single extant Robin Hood printed ballad text can be dated to the sixteenth century.
A broadside is basically a sheet of paper (usually cheap) printed on one side only, forming one large page. With the introduction of the printing press the broadsides became inexpensive to produce and were printed in vast quantities. They were sold on the streets of London, in towns throughout England, and were printed and published by stationers. Many people could afford this cheap form of entertainment. Some were adorned with woodcuts, and some were printed with the names of familiar tunes to which they could be sung. They could also contain topics such as ancient battles, knights and ladies, ghosts, forced marriage, spurned love, current events, or even religious issues. One of the most common forms of printed material, the broadside has survived from the early sixteenth century right through the nineteenth century. By the 1620s one format had become dominant: ballads in two parts printed on a folio sheet (a large sheet of paper), with illustrative woodcuts, tune names, and black-letter type. Another change in the broadside ballad format occurred in the 1650s – two separate ballads were printed on one folio sheet, which would then be cut in half and the two ballads sold individually. See, R. B. Dobson & J. Taylor, Rymes of Robyn Hood, London, 1976, pp. 46-67; English Broadside Ballad Archive ‘The Heyday of the Broadside Ballad’, Eric Nebeker, 2007, (online).
Broadside ballads of Robin Hood are found in the collections of Anthony a Wood, Samuel Pepys, John Bagford, Richard Rawlinson, John Ker, 3rd Duke of Roxburghe, and Francis Douce. See, The Rhymes of Robin Hood 11.
560. 1700? Robin Hood, Will. Scadlock and Little John or, A narrative of their victory obtained against the Prince of Aragon, and the two giants: and how Will. Scadlock married the princess. Tune of, Robin Hood; or, Hey down, down a down. Licens’d and enter’d. London: Printed by and for W.O. and are to be sold by the booksellers., [1700?]. This ballad appears in the second part of Joseph Ritson’s Robin Hood and the Stranger.
561. 1700? Robin Hood’s rescuing Will. Stutly, from the sheriff and his men, who had taken him prisoner, and were going for to hang him, &c. To the tune of, Robin Hood and Queen Catherine, &c. Licensed and Entered according to Order. London: Printed by and for W.O. for A.M., and sold by the booksellers of Pye-corner and London-bridge, [1700?]. See, Robin Hood rescuing Will Stutly.
562. 1700 James Brome (d. 1719), Travels over England, Scotland and Wales giving a true and exact description of the chiefest cities, towns, and corporations, together with the antiquities of divers other places, with the most famous cathedrals and other eminent structures, of several remarkable caves and wells, with many other divertive passages never before published. London: Printed for Abel Roper …, Rich. Basset …, and Will. Turner …, 1700. AN ACCOUNT OF Mr. BROME’S Three Years TRAVELS, OVER England, Scotland, and Wales. A Narrative of his second Journey (page 85) ‘Having pleasured our selves with the Antiquities of this Town, we took Horse and went to visit the Well and ancient Chair of Robin Hood [Robin Hood’s Well and Chair in Sherwood Forest], which is not far from hence, within the Forest of Sherwood: Being placed in the Chair, we had a Cap, which they say was his, very formally put upon our Heads, and having perform’d the usual Ceremonies befitting so great a Solemnity, we receiv’d the freedom of the Chair, and were incorporated into the Society of that Renowned Brotherhood. But that we may not receive such Privileges without an honourable mentioning of the Persons that left them to Posterity, know we must that the Patent was bequeathed to the inferiour Rangers of this Forest by Robin Hood and Little John, honourable Personages indeed, being the chief Lords of some most Renowned Robbers in the Reign of King Richard the First, who descended from good Families, as some averr, but having wasted their Estates, betook themselves afterward to such profligate Courses. This same Robin Hood entertained One hundred tall Men, all good Archers, with the Spoil he daily made himself Master of, upon whom Four hundred, though very well accoutred to give Battel, durst scarce make an Onset: He suffered no Woman to be violated, oppressed, or any ways molested, poor Mens Goods he spared, and did relieve the necessitous very liberally with what he got from rich Carls and Misers, he killed none willfully, and by this means he did for a long time keep up the Order of his Knight Errants, till King Richard issuing out a Proclamation to apprehend him, it happened that he fell sick at a certain Benedictine Nunnery in Yorkshire, called Kirkeley, (built by Reynerus Flandrensis to the Honour of the Blessed Virgin) where being desirous to be let Blood, he was betrayed, and made bleed to Death’.
563. 1700 Monsieur de (Vincent) Voiture (1597-1648), Familiar and courtly letters written by Monsieur Voiture to persons of the greatest honour, wit, and quality of both sexes in the court of France ; made English by Mr. Dryden, Tho. Cheek, Esq., Mr. Dennis, Henry Cromwel, Esq., Jos. Raphson, Esq., Dr. -, &c. ; with twelve select epistles out of Aristanetus, translated from the Greek ; some select letters of Pliny, Jun and Monsieur Fontanelle, translated by Mr. Tho. Brown ; and a collection of original letters lately written on several subjects, by Mr. T. Brown ; to which is added a collection of letters of friendship, and other occasional letters, written by Mr. Dryden, Mr. Wycherly, Mr. -, Mr. Congreve, Mr. Dennis, and other hands. London: Printed for Sam. Briscoe, in Russel-street, Covent-garden, and sold by J. Nutt, near Stationers-hall, 1700. LOVE-LETTERS, WRITTEN By Mr.—to Madam—To Mr. B—in Covent-garden. An Account of a Journey to Exon, &c. Apr. 8. 1700 (page 252) ‘The Justice, notwithstanding the Government’s Care for the Reformation of Vice, was as drunk as a Dutch Captain before he engages, and, for the first Day, talk’d of nothing but Fox-hounds, March-beer, Warrants, Whipping-posts and Vagabonds, Hallowing as laudably in every interval of his Nonsence, as if he had been riding three quarter-speed at the very Heels of his Beagles, larding his other Qualifications now and then with a Scrap of an old Hunting Song, with a Hey down, ho down, &c. which gave me good reason to suspect he had been much more conversant with Robin Hood’s Balads than with Keeble’s Statutes, understanding the latter I believe as much as a German Jugler does Necromancy, or a Lord-Mayor State-Policy’.
564. 1700? The anonymous work The Whole life, and merry exploits of bold Robin Hood, Earl of Huntington, with apparently another edition in 1737. This is probably a forerunner to The History of the Lives of the Most Noted Highway-men, Foot-pads (see 565 below).
565. 1714 The first appearance of Robin Hood in criminal biography in The History of the Lives of the Most Noted Highway-men, Foot-pads, by Captain Alexander Smith (fl. 1714-1726), the name is possibly a pseudonym. There are several editions, which include various titles, volumes, and additions, including the editions of 1719 and 1720. It was reprinted by Arthur L. Hayward (1926 and 1933) from Smith’s 5th edition, published in three 12mo volumes, in 1719. Smith’s work is a forerunner to Captain Charles Johnson’s more famous A General History of the Lives and Adventures of the Most Famous Highwaymen, Murderers, Street-robbers, &c (see 572 below).
566. 1717 The first recorded Robin Hood theatrical event of the eighteenth century was Robin Hood and Little John, performed in 1717 at Bartholomew Fair. See, Robin Hood Musicals in Eighteenth Century London, Linda V. Troost, in Robin Hood in Popular Culture, Thomas Hahn, first published 2000, D.S. Brewer, Cambridge, p. 251.
567. 1724 The second recorded Robin Hood theatrical event of the eighteeenth century was The Adventures of Robin Hood, Earl of Huntington, and his Mate Little John, performed in 1724 at George Lee’s booth at Southwark Fair (see, 566 above). See also, Robin Hood Musicals in Eighteenth Century London, Linda V. Troost, in Robin Hood in Popular Culture, Thomas Hahn, first published 2000, D.S. Brewer, Cambridge, p. 251.
568. 1725 Sir Ralph Winwood, Memorials of Affairs of State (London, 1725). See, The Many Robin Hoods 4.
569. 1727 Robin Hood and the Duke of Lancaster, printed for J. Roberts in Warwick Lane, And sold by the booksellers of London and Westminster, 1727 (folio pamphlet in the British Library: 1490 f. 4). There is another of 1727? (British Library) printed by T. White, in Chancery-Lane (London), with other editions by John Mathew Gutch (1847, II, 397-40), and Milton Percival, Political Ballads illustrating the Administration of Sir Robert Walpole (Oxford Historical and Literary Studies, ed. C. H. Firth and W. Raleigh, Vol. VIII, Oxford, 1916), pp. 4-7). It was in the newspapers of the mid-eighteenth century that political ballads enjoyed their greatest vogue. Some poured scorn on the policies of a particular party, but many – like the ‘Duke of Lancaster’ – attacked the personal weaknesses of various political leaders, including the king himself. This political ballad with Sir Robert Walpole as Robin Hood, was first advertised in The Whitehall Evening Post for 19-21 January 1727. It relates probably not very accurately, the story of an incident that occurred in early 1727 during one of the many periods when rumour was rife that Sir Robert’s power was doomed. Walpole was to survive for many years before the ballad writers saw their favourite prophecy, ‘Robin Will Be Out At Last’, eventually fulfilled in 1742. See, Dobson and Taylor, Rymes of Robyn Hood, London, 1976, pp. 191-94.
570. 1727 John Dryden, Miscellany Poems. 5th ed. London, J. Tonson, 1727. [Vol. 6 contains ‘An Old Ballad of Bold Robin Hood.’]
571. 1730 Robin Hood, An Opera. As it is perform’d at Lee’s and Harper’s great theatrical booth in Bartholomew-Fair. With the musick prefix’d to each song, London: printed for J. Watts and sold by J. Roberts in Warwick Lane, 1730 (British Library). Robin Hood: An Opera, a ballad opera, incorporated the tunes of contemporary ‘folk’ ballads, although new lyrics were written for the play. One of the airs in the play used a well-known tune with lyrics newly-written for the production:
Air V. The Roger de Coverley
Cease away, my Boys, this ill-tim’d noise,
Away, away.
A friendless Jar all Peace destroys;
Let’s sport and play.
Be brisk and airy, dance and sing.
And then away,
With Shouts to make the Wood-Lands ring,
And hunt our Prey.
The ‘Roger de Coverley’ is the name of an old country dance and tune. Robin Hood: An Opera being a play that was acted on the makeshift ‘theatrical booths’ at the fair, meant that no music was required. The players could have sung the tunes a capella, and many of them would have been recognised by the audience and players without requiring an orchestra. In the play Robin Hood is the Earl of Huntingdon who is placed under arrest on the king’s orders. A scheming earl named Pembrook has decided that he wants to marry Matilda, who is Robin’s fiance and the king’s sister. To accomplish his goals, Pembrook has managed to convince the king to declare Robin an outlaw. Robin retreats to Sherwood Forest where he meets with Little John and the usual crew. While an outlaw, he steals from the rich and gives to the poor:
Enter a Poor Man, and his Wife, with a Child in her arms.
Outlaw. Stand –
Woman. Ah!
Outl. Deliver!
Wom. Ah Gentlemen! I have nothing to part with but my child; pray don’t take that from me.
Man. Ah Gentlemen! I have nothing to part from but my wife, take her and welcome.
Robin H. The Fellow does not know what he says; – here, here, good People, there is something to relieve your Poverty. [Gives a Bag.]
P. M. Why, Captain, there is an Hundred Pounds.
Rob H. So much the better, I will do ‘em more good; it is my own Share I part with, Friend, I give nothing away.
P. M. Now I think Two-pence or Three-pence between ‘em had been mighty handsome.
Man & Wom. Oh bless your Goodness, noble Master!
Rob. H. Let us ascend the Hill and seek our farther. Fortune with open Hands shall ever bless the Man who helps the Poor with his Success.
One character in the play was George-a-Green, the pindar or ‘pound keeper of Wakefield’ (see no. 230 above). The encounter between Robin and the pindar follows that which appears in the early modern ballads, another of those Robin-Hood-meets-his-match scenarios in which they fight and then the pindar joins Robin’s band:
Rob. Who’s he that dares to stop me in my Way?
Pin. Who am I that dares to hop and dance? Why I am the Jolly Pindar of Wakefield – and tho’ I’m a little grey in my Head, and dunny in my Ears, I have a Heart as sound as an Elm, and I don’t fear the best Lad of you all.
Rob. What means the sawcy Fool?
Pin. Sawce for Fowl – by’r Lady, and Sawce for Fish too – Will you take a Stroke with me . . .
[Pindar and Robin Hood fight. Pindar strikes the Staff out of his Hand.]
Pin. Nea, take up they Staff again, I scorn to shew foul Play.
Rob. Heartily hast thou fought – give me thy Hand and from this moment, Robin Hood’s thy Friend.
Pin. With all my Heart – here our divisions end.
See also, Operas, Musicals, and Pantomime, and Robin Hood: The Life and Legend of an Outlaw, Stephen Basdeo, Yorkshire – Philadelphia, 2019, pp. 49-52.
572. 1734 Captain Charles Johnson (fl. 1724-1731), whose name is possibly a pseudonym, apparently used the contributions of Alexander Smith (see 565 above), and Daniel Defoe (1661?-1731) for his General History of the Lives and Adventures of the Most Famous Highwaymen, Murderers, Street-robbers, &c, which contains a section entitled ‘The Life of Robin Hood’, with another edition in 1742.
573. 1735 Francis Peck (1692-1743), Robin Whood Turned Hermit. This ballad has survived in a single manuscript in a collection of ballads dated 1735, made by the Stamford priest and antiquary, Francis Peck (British Library, Add MS 28638). It is unique and was never included in the anthologies of Percy, Ritson, Gutch or Child. It cannot be described as ancient, and could be an eighteenth century fabrication. Another ballad, also in Peck’s manuscript, appears in Robin Hood: A Collection of Poems, Songs, and Ballads.
Robin Whood Turned Hermit is summarized by Peck:
‘This song is altogether founded upon Fact. Wherein the Author (first touching the former Circumstances of Robin Whood’s turning Fisherman, building an Hospital at Scarborough, the Flight of one hundred of his Men, and the staying of the other forty) brings Robin back to his remaining Friends, whom he thanks for their fidelity, then leads them from Sherwood for fear of Danger – from a greater Force coming upon them, and with them sculks about in other Places. At last coming to Lyndric a famous hill near Dale Abbey in Lancashire (sic) Robin Whood falls asleep and hath a strange Dream there. Which at his awaking, he relates to his Companions, and then tells them, that he is resolved forthwith to retire, and to turn Hermit. At his taking leave of them, he advises them all to repent and to betake themselves to better course; (especially Little John whom he also exhorts to have a great care how he sets his feet upon St. Michael’s ground for that will be very fatal to him whenere he does so). His last Message to his Lady Matilda. His Men depart, everyone to their Homes and Friends. Robin retires to Depe Dale, chuses the penitent Thief for his Patron, and spends the Remainder of his Time in great Penance and Devotion. He falls sick of fever, Repairs to Kirklees to be let Blood. A revengeful Friar cuts an artery instead of a vein; whereby he quickly bleeds to Death. The Lady Prioress and Nuns bury and lay a grave-stone over him.’
Peck makes further comments: ‘This song is, I think designed in a true Manner. Docet; delectat; flectit. It instructs; it pleases; it moves and affects the Reader.’ In a cancelled note he commented: ‘The song itself wholly new and never before printed.’
Robin Whood Turned Hermit is probably based in part, on Martin Parker’s True Tale of Robin Hood and other Robin Hood ballads, but it also contains a concoction of the deeds of an anonymous outlaw first recorded in a chronicle of the foundation of Dale abbey, written in the thirteenth century by Thomas of Muskham, who places the anonymous outlaw in the reign of Henry II (1154-89) when the whole of the area between the rivers Erewash and Derwent was royal forest. There can be no doubt that this anonymous outlaw was the model for Peck’s ballad, as he also dreamed of the Cross on Lyndric hill and repented, then dismissed his followers and went to Deepdale.
Peck published Muskham’s chronicle in his Desiderata Curiosa (2 Vols., London, 1732-1735), and a new edition ‘greatly corrected’ was published posthumously (2 Vols. in 1, London 1779). In both his summary of the ballad and in his first edition of the chronicle, Peck places Dale abbey in Lancashire – a surprising error that is corrected in the second edition. William Dugdale was the first to publish Muskham’s chronicle, somewhat inaccurately, and it has been published several times since. There is an English translation by Charles Kerry, which gives some information on the original manuscripts, and on the various other editions. There is more useful information in the edition by William Page, Avrom Saltman, and some interesting observations in the article by Richard Firth Green (2005).
Muskham’s chronicle tells us about an Uthlagus (outlaw), who was sleeping on the hill of ‘Lyndrik, which is the hill beyond the gate of our monastery towards the west.’ This hill in now called Linderidge, a low hill S. W. of the Abbey (Dale & Its Abbey Derbyshire, John Ward, Derby Leicester and Nottingham, 1891, p. 23). The ruins of Dale abbey, sometimes called Stanley Park (De Parco Stanley), are located in the village named after it, six miles north east of Derby, originally this area was known as Depedale. Dale abbey itself stands in an area once covered by Sherwood Forest, a couple of miles to the West of the Erewash, a river that marks the boundary between Nottinghamshire and Derbyshire. Given the locality, there has been some suggestion that Muskham’s outlaw could have been one of the early incarnations of Robin Hood himself, but this theory remains unproven. See also, J. C. Holt Robin Hood, London, 1982, pp. 180-81.
574. c.1741 Robin Hoods Garland. Printed by C. Dicey in Bow Church Yard. ( Bodleian Library).
575. 1743-6 William Stukeley, Palaeographia Britannica, 2 vols., London and Stamford. Number II, 1746, includes ‘The Pedigree of Robin Hood earl of Huntington’. See also, The Later Story 2.
576. 1749 Robin Hoods Garland, without place or printer. (Percy Papers, Harvard College Library).
577. 1751 Robin Hood: A New Musical Entertainment. As it is perform’d at the Theatre-Royal in Drury-Lane, a two-act play with accompanying music performed by the Society of the Temple of Apollo. Libretto only, by Moses Mendez; cf. Nicoll, A. A hist. of Eng. drama, 1660-1900, 1952: v. 3, p. 287. Composed by Charles Burney; cf. Nicoll: v. 3, p. 287. The opening song ‘As blithe as the linnet sings in the green wood’ remained popular into the nineteenth century, and it appeared in a Robin Hood garland, where it has the title ‘Bold Robin Hood’. The story itself is an adaptation of a late sixteenth-century ballad entitled Robin Hood and Allen a Dale. The plot has Robin meeting a poor lovesick man wondering in the forest, heartbroken because his lover is due to be married at her father’s behest to another man who is richer than him. By the end of the play, due to Robin’s intervention, the two lovers are eventually married in Sherwood Forest. Mendez’s play was performed at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane. Theatres Royal, or Patent Theatres were establishments that had been granted a monopoly on serious spoken drama by the king after the restoration. Other theatres that did not have a letter from the monarch authorising them to do so, were only permitted to play comedies, pantomimes, and melodramas. The first of these Patent Theatres were the ones in Drury Lane and Lincolns-Inn-Fields. Robin Hood in the eighteenth century was not just a figure encountered in low and vulgar ballads and plays, such as those performed at Bartholomew Fair, but also a figure that was easily incorporated into high culture as well. See also, Operas, Musicals, and Pantomime, and Robin Hood: The Life and Legend of an Outlaw, Stephen Basdeo, Yorkshire – Philadelphia, 2019, pp. 54-55.
578. c.1753 Robin Hoods Garland. Printed by W. & C. Dicey, in St Mary Aldermary Church Yard, Bow Lane, Cheapside, and sold at the Warehouse in Northampton. ( Bodleian Library)
579. 1765 Thomas Percy, Reliques of Ancient English Poetry (3 vols.), a collection of ballads and romances dating from the late medieval period to the seventeenth century. It includes the first printed text of Robin Hood and Guy of Gisborne, taken from a manuscript of verse, which Percy allegedly discovered whilst rescuing it from a maid who was going to use it to light a fire (see no. 104 above). This manuscript, known as the Percy Folio, is now in the British Library. Percy’s work was later criticised when it was discovered that parts of the collection were heavily revised and edited, presumably to appeal to a contemporary audience. The first correct, and still definitive edition of the Robin Hood ballads in the Percy Folio, appeared in Bishop Percy’s Folio Manuscript: Ballads and Romances, J. W. Hales and F. J. Furnivall, London, 3 vols. See, The Rhymes of Robin Hood 2 and 650 below. Reliques went through four editions during Percy’s lifetime and more than fifty editions have been published since. It has been described as a book that ‘changed the course of English literature.’ Its publication initiated a new interest in early British literary forms. In particular it was a powerful influence on Romantic literature in both Britain and Europe, inspiring Wordsworth, Blake, Coleridge, the brothers Grimm, Walter Scott, and later William Morris and the Victorian Romantics. It is recognised as ‘leaving a powerful impression on practically every major European writer from the end of the Enlightenment, through the rise of Classicism, and the Romantic movement, and on into the realist nineteenth century.’ Reliques is also noted for playing an important role in the development of folklore and folk-song studies, a cause taken up by later collectors and scholars. Reliques was also one of the first serious studies on the subject of British verse and poetry. Percy included four essays on the topic within his collection, these have continued to influence poets and academics to this day. See also, The Layton Collection: The Thomas Layton Trust & Layton’s Collection, Reliques of Ancient English Poetry, Thomas Percy, 1765 (online).
580. 1765-1769 William Blackstone, (1723-1780), Commentaries on the Laws of England. Mentions ‘persons in disguise….. who seem to have resembled the Roberdsmen, or followers of Robert Hood’. See, The Many Robin Hoods 3.
581. c. 1770 Robin Hood’s Garland: being a complete history of all the notable and merry exploits perform’d by him and his men on divers occasions: to which is added a preface, giving a more full and particular account of his birth, &c. then any hitherto published. London: R. Marshall. Contains twenty seven ballads from the common garland.
582. 1777 The Adventures of Robert Earl of Huntington, vulgarly called Robin Hood. Contains twenty four ballads from the common garland.
583. 1777 Thomas Evans, Old Ballads, Historical and Narrative (2 vols., London; and later editions of 1784 and 1810). Includes most of the Robin Hood ballads in the common garland.
584. 1783 Charles Dibdin’s horse enhanced version of Robin Hood, produced by Philip Astley at the Royal Circus and Equestrian Philharmonic Academy (Newspaper clipping dated 30 June 1783 in ‘Anecdotes of Archery: A Thing of Shreds and Patches,’ a scrapbook compiled by Joseph Haslewood, Osborn Collection, Beinecke Library). See, Robin Hood Musicals in Eighteenth Century London, Linda V. Troost, in Robin Hood in Popular Culture, Thomas Hahn, first published 2000, D.S. Brewer, Cambridge, p. 255.
585. 1783 F. G. Waldron, The Sad Shepherd, or, A Tale of Robin Hood: A Fragment Written by Ben Jonson; with a Continuation, Notes, and an Appendix. London, J. Nichols, 1783. [Waldron is the author of the continuation.]
586. 1784 Robin Hood; or Sherwood Forest: A Comic Opera, by Leonard MacNally. In the preface MacNally announces that his plot derived from ballad material: ‘The three principal ideas which combine the subject are not original, but borrowed from the ballads of Robin Hood, the Nut-brown Maid, and the Hermit of the Dale . . . The Hermit of the Dale is taken from a ballad called the Friar of Orders Grey, which is taken from an old Ballad called the Herdsman’. Robin Hood or Sherwood Forest, A comic opera, as performed with universal applause, at the Theatre-Royal, Covent Garden, with ‘Words by Leonard MacNally Esq., composed by William Shield’ appeared in 1785. See also, Operas, Musicals, and Pantomime.
587. 1786 The English Archer . . . Robin Hood. Paisley, printed by John Neilson for George Caldwell, Bookseller, near the Cross. (Bodleian Library).
588. Miscellany:
The English Archer, or . . . Robin Hood. York, printed by N. Nickson in Feasegate. (Bodleian Library).
Robin Hood’s Garland. Printed by L. How in Peticoat Lane. ( Bodleian Library).
Robin Hood’s Garland. London, J Marshall & Co., Aldermary Churchyard. (Harvard College Library).
Robin Hood’s Garland. London. R Marshall, in Aldermary Church Yard, Bow Lane. (Harvard College Library).
Captain Delany’s Garland. In a collection of folio sheet-ballads mostly dated 1775. Edinburgh (?). British Museum, 1346. m. 7. (9).
Robin Hood’s Garland. York, T. Wilson and R. Spence. ( Bodleian Library).
Robin Hood’s Garland. Preston, Printed and sold by W. Sergent. ( Bodleian Library).
Robin Hood’s Garland. Wolverhampton, Printed and sold by J. Smart. (Bodleian Library).
Robin Hood’s Birth, Breeding, Valor and Marriage, printed in Dryden’s Miscellany, VI, 346, ed. 1716.
The Robin Hood ballads in Collection of Old Ballads, London; Printed for J. Roberts 1723.
Robin Hood’s Progress to Nottingham among the ballads of Richard Heber (1773-1833).
Robin Hood and Little John, in a list of ballads printed for and sold by William Thackeray at the Angel in Duck-Lane, in 1689.
Robin Hood’s Birth, Breeding, Valor and Marriage, in a collection of old ballads formerly belonging to Thomas Pearson, esq, and subsequently to the duke of Roxburghe.
Robin Hood and Allin a Dale, from a black letter copy in major Pearson’s collection.
The Robin Hood Ballads in the collections of Samuel Pepys (1633-1703), at Magdalen College, Cambridge; Richard Rawlinson (1690-1755), in the Bodleian Library; Francis Douce (1757-1834), three fragments in his collection contain parts of the Gest, in the Bodleian Library; and John Bagford (1651-1716), whose collection became part of the Roxburghe collection of ballads. See, The Rhymes of Robin Hood 11.
589. 1786 Richard Gough, Sepulchral Monuments in Great Britain. See, Robin Hood’s Grave 7.
590. 1788 Marian: an opera as perform’d at the Theatre Royal Covent Gardens; compos’d and selected by W. Shield, the words by Mrs [Frances] Brooke, Longman Broderip [1788]. First performance May 22, 1788, London, Covent Garden, with Mrs. Billington as Marian. Marian: a comic opera, in two acts. Performed at the Theatre-Royal, Covent-Garden. By Mrs. Brookes ([Libretto only], London: Printed by A. Strahan, Printers-Street; for T.N. Longman and O. Rees, Paternoster-Row), appeared in 1800. The theater’s house composer, William Shield, who supplied the music for Leonard MacNally (see 586 above) was again responsible for the much-admired music in Marian. He and Mrs. Brooke had collaborated on the very successful afterpiece Rosina, and Marian was most likely intended as another work in this pastoral vein. See also, Operas, Musicals, and Pantomime and Robin Hood Musicals in Eighteenth Century London, Linda V. Troost, in Robin Hood in Popular Culture, Thomas Hahn, first published 2000, D.S. Brewer, Cambridge, p. 262.
591. 1791 Robert Southey, Harold, or, the Castle of Morford, the first Robin Hood novel (Bodleian MS Misc. Eng. e. 21. Summary Catalogue 31777), an unpublshed work. It was purchased by the Bodleian Library from the famous Bristol booksellers W. George’s Sons in 1895. The novel has been copied out, probably in the nineteenth century (Bodleian MS Misc. Eng. e. 114), so defects in the original manuscript have been cross-checked with the copy, by Stephen Basdeo, who plans to transcribe and publish Southey’s text. See, Reynolds’s News and Miscellany, History, Literature, Poetry, and Literary Criticism, The First Robin Hood Novel: Robert Southey’s ‘Harold, or the Castle of Morford’ (1791), Stephen Basdeo, on 18 Nov 2016 (online); Stephen Copley Research Report: Stephen Basdeo on Robert Southey, Robert Southey’s ‘Harold; or, The Castle of Morford’—The First Robin Hood Novel, by Stephen Basdeo, Associate Professor at the Richmond American International University (Leeds RIASA), 20th august 2018 (online); Reynolds’s News and Miscellany, History, Literature, Poetry, and Literary Criticism, A Never-Before-Seen Poem by Robert Southey, written in 1791, Stephen Basdeo and Mark Truesdale, on 5 Oct 2019 (online).
Another of Southey’s works was Robin Hood: a fragment (1847). The first Robin Hood novel to be published was the anonymous Robin Hood; A Tale of the Olden Time, a two-volume historical romance published in Edinburgh in July 1819. The publishers accounts state that £20 was paid to a ‘Mr Edwards’ for the copyright, which suggests that he was the author – however the entry for Mr. Edwards could allude to an agent of the publisher. Robin Hood scholars have generally referred to the author as anonymous. The novel’s central narrative is about an old woman named Goody, living in 1819, who tells her associates an old tale of Robin Hood, set during the 1190s. Her tale has been passed down from previous generations: Robin is the son of Alice Pevys and a commoner named Gilbert Hood. When Robin grows, he is informed of his destiny to inherit his uncle James’s Huntingdon estate. Robin discovers that his half-cousin, William Scarlet, has conspired with the monks of Fountain Vale Abbey to deprive him of his estates. See, Reynolds’s News and Miscellany, History, Literature, Poetry, and Literary Criticism, Bad Will Scarlet and the Good Sheriff: ‘Robin Hood: A Tale of the Olden Time’ (1819), Stephen Basdeo, on 24 Apr 2021 (online). For a list of fictional works see, Fictional Books.
592. 1792 Anecdotes of Archery; from the Earliest Ages to the Year 1791, by E. Hargrove. Contains a section on Robin Hood.
593. 1795 Merry Sherwood, or Harlequin Forrester (vocal score). See, Operas, Musicals, and Pantomime.
594. 1795 Joseph Ritson, Robin Hood: A Collection of all the Ancient Poems, Songs and Ballads, now extant, relative to that celebrated Outlaw (2 vols., London). There are many later editions, but those of 1820, 1832, 1846, 1862, 1884 and 1885 are the most significant. The first comprehensive collection of Robin Hood ballads and literary references: includes an edition of the Gest and the first printed text of Robin Hood and the Potter. See, The Rhymes of Robin Hood 4. In the course of his famous introduction to his Robin Hood entitled ‘The Life of Robin Hood,’ Ritson relied extensively on the Sloane Manuscript (see, no. 397 above).
595. 1796 The famous English archer; or Robert, Earl of Huntington, commonly called Robin Hood, Monaghan: printed by John Brown, 1796. Contains twenty five ballads from the common garland.
596. 1796 Sporting Mazagine, refers to Sir Edward Coke, in his third institute, page 197, where he speaks of Robin Hood, and says, that men of his lawless profession were from him called Roberdsmen. See, The Many Robin Hoods 3.
597. 1797 J. Throsby, Thoroton’s History of Nottinghamshire. See, Robin Hood’s Grave 7.
598. 18th and 19th centuries A selection of Robin Hood chapbooks. The earliest surviving Robin Hood chapbooks appear to be from the eighteenth century. Some are basically a copy of Martin Parker’s ‘True Tale of Robin Hood’ (see, 442 above) produced by different printers, using different woodcuts, and some included ballads from the garlands, the larger and more expensive books that contained between sixteen and twenty-seven different Robin Hood songs. Robin was not a favourite with chapbook printers, probably because it was impossible to condense his numerous adventures and exploits into their limited number of pages.
It was in France that the printing press first began to supply reading for the common people. At the end of the fifteenth century there was a large popular literature of farces, tales in verse and prose, satires and almanacs, stitched together so as to contain a few leaves, and circulated by itinerant booksellers, known as colporteurs. Most early English chapbooks are adaptations or translations of these French originals, and were introduced into England early in the sixteenth century. A type of German chapbook also derived from French examples, the Volksbücher began to flourish in Germany in the mid-16th century. Some were prose versions of medieval German verse romances; others contained tales of foreign origin. Chapbooks also circulated in Scotland, and with the colonization of America in the 17th and 18th centuries, they were some of the earliest works to be produced by American presses.
A chapbook is a small book that has survived in Britain from the sixteenth to nineteenth centuries. They contained many kinds of printed material such as popular tales, sensational histories, ballads, political and religious tracts, folk tales and nursery rhymes. Most chapbooks were five and a half inches by four and a quarter inches in size. These books were aimed chiefly at a rural and semi-literate readership and some sold for a penny or less. Enjoyed by adults as well as children (see, Children’s Books) they were generally illustrated with simple woodcuts – the durability of the wooden block enabled the same illustration to be used for multiple editions. Printers would often supply chapbooks to itinerant dealers, or chapmen, who peddled them on the streets and at markets and fairs, and like the broadsides, most were cheaply printed on poor quality paper. The title page served as the cover, and they often contained between twelve to twenty four pages, but chapbooks with more or fewer pages also existed. The limited number of pages was due to the printing and binding process – they were often Saddle stitched, meaning a stitch of thread or a wire staple was passed through the fold of the paper. Chapbooks were printed in London, Newcastle, York and Penrith, but also in Fintray, Newton Stewart and Inveraray, as well as Edinburgh, Falkirk, Stirling and Glasgow. The word ‘chapbook’ does not appear to have been noticed earlier than 1824, when Thomas Dibdin, the celebrated English bibliographer described a work as being ‘a chapbook, printed in rather a neat black-letter.’ The name probably derives from ‘chapmen’ the itinerant dealers who sold the books. Robin Hood chapbooks can be found in the British Library, Bodleian Library, King’s College, Newcastle University, the National Library of Scotland and McGill University, Canada.
The survival of many chapbooks is due to the collection of Samuel Pepys (see, The Rhymes of Robin Hood 11), he had them bound into small quarto volumes, which he called Vulgaria; also four volumes of a smaller size, which he lettered Penny Witticisms, Penny Merriments, Penny Compliments and Penny Godlinesses. Chapbooks gradually disappeared from the 1860s onwards, due to the amount of cheap printed material now available, such as newspapers, but also because there was strong competition from religious tract societies such as the Stirling Tract Enterprise, which regarded many chapbook publications as ‘ungodly’.
There was a revival of chapbooks in the twentieth century, especially as books of poetry in the 60’s and 70’s, where poets published small collections or individual poems in limited-run editions. In Britain, chapbooks saw a revival in the 70’s and 80’s thanks to the punk scene, where they became an important pre-internet means of forming and spreading punk culture, like zines and other sub-mainstream distribution channels across the world. These were often xeroxed, at later dates, printed from home printers and staple-bound. Today, chapbook production is a niche market that really only exists in literary circles among self-publishing writers and small, independent fiction publishers to whom the intimate, affordable nature of the chapbook is still appealing. See, Chap-books of the Eighteenth Century, John Ashton, London, 1882; Encyclopædia Britannica, Vol. 5, 1911, pp. 849-50; A Book about Chapbooks: The People’s Literature of Bygone Times, Harry B. Weiss, Pennsylvania, 1969; Antique Book Collecting, A Resource for Collectors of Books, Manuscripts, and Ephemera, ‘A Brief History of Chapbooks’, 2013 (online); King’s College London, ‘Chapbooks’, 2022 (online); Children and Chapbooks: A Middle Modern Encounter, Newcastle University Library Special Collections and Archives, (online); National Library of Scotland, ‘Chapbooks’, 2022 (online); Britannica, ‘Chapbook Literature, article revised and updated by Amy Tikkanen,’ 2022 (online).
599. 1804 Benjamin Tabart, Tabarts Collection of Popular Stories for the Nursery (1st edition, 3 vols., with another in 1812, 4 vols.). Appears to be the earliest of the many Robin Hood tales written specifically for children (see, Children’s Books).
600. 1804 Elizabeth Sarah Villa-Real Gooch, Sherwood Forest; or, Northern Adventures. A Novel. In Three Volumes. By Mrs. Villa-Real Gooch. Printed for S. Highley, London, 1804.
601. 1806 Robert Jamieson, Popular Ballads and Songs from tradition, manuscripts, and scarce editions (2 vols.). Volume two contains the first printed text of three Robin Hood ballads: Robin Hood and the Munke (see The Rhymes of Robin Hood 6), The Birth of Robin Hood – which according to Jamieson ‘was taken down from the recitation of Mrs Brown, and is here given without the alteration of a single word’, and Robin Hood and the Old Man – Jamieson tells us that ‘This fragment is given verbatim et literatim, from the folio MS. so often referred to in the Reliques of Ancient English Poetry’ (see 579 above). These three ballads also appear in A Lytell Geste of Robin Hode, with other ancient and modern ballads and songs, John Mathew Gutch (vol., 2, London, 1847) – here Gutch gives Robin Hood and the Munke the title ‘A Tale of Robin Hood’ (see also, 631 below). Robin Hood and the Old Man is given the title of ‘Robin Hood, A Beggar, & the Three Squires’ in Bishop Percy’s Folio Manuscript, J. W. Hales and F. J. Furnivall (vol 1, 1867-8, p. 13) (see also, 650 below). F. J. Child, in The English and Scottish Popular Ballads (1882-98), gives The Birth of Robin Hood the title ‘Willie and Earl Richard’s Daughter’ (vol., 2, p. 412) and Robin Hood and the Old Man the title ‘Robin Hood Rescuing Three Squires’ (vol., 3, p. 177). See also, 663 below.
602. 1808 Adventures of . . . Robin Hood. Falkirk, Printed and sold by T. Johnston. ( Bodleian Library).
603. 19th century The History of Robin Hood and the Beggar. Aberdeen. A. Keith (1810-35). (Bodleian Library).
604. 1810 Thomas Evans, and R.H. Evans, Old Ballads, Historical and Narrative, with Some of Modern Date; collected from rare copies and mss. By Thomas Evans. A New Edition, revised and considerably enlarged from public and private collections, by his son, R. H. Evans. In four volumes. London, 1810. [This is an expansion of Thomas Evans’s work by his son. The Robin Hood ballads appear in volume 2.] See, 583 above.
605. 1812 The Adventures of Robert, Earl of Huntingdon, commonly called Robin Hood, the famous English archer : being a complete history of all the merry adventures and valiant battles, printed and sold by William Warner, Baltimore, 1812.
606. 1813 Sir Walter Scott, Rokeby. The third canto contains an Allan-a-Dale song.
607. 1816 Dr. Thomas Dunham Whitaker, Loidis and Elmete. Leeds and Wakefield, 1816. Whitaker mentions Robin Hood’s grave slab at Kirklees, and concludes that ‘a cross without a sword can originally have covered none other than an ecclesiastic’. See, Robin Hood’s Grave 5.
608. 1819 Sir Walter Scott, Ivanhoe; A Romance (3 vols.), with Robin Hood as Locksley. This fictionalized historical novel was the first of Scott’s tales to use exclusively English scenes and subject, and became his most popular, contributing to the public perception of Robin Hood, Richard the Lionheart, and King John. The year 1820 appears on the title page of the first edition, by ‘The Author of Waverley’, but it was released in 1819. The Waverley novels were a series by Scott that before 1827 were published anonymously.
Sir Wilfred of Ivanhoe is banished by his father Cedric the Saxon, because of his love for Rowena, and he goes to serve King Richard on crusade in the Holy Land. In Richard’s absence, his brother John tries to seize the throne with the help of Norman barons. Richard has been imprisoned in a remote Austrian castle on his homeward journey, but he miraculously reappears to help Ivanhoe defeat John’s followers (which include the Templar, Sir Brian Bois-Guilbert and Sir Reginald Front-de-Boeuf) at the tournament at Ashby de la Zouch. At the tournament Sir Brian falls in love with Rebecca, a beautiful Jewess, who after a series of events, is taken captive by the Norman barons, along with her father Isaac, Rowena, the wounded Ivanhoe, and Cedric. They are imprisoned in Front-de-Boeuf’s Castle of Torquilstone. The King attacks the castle assisted by Robin of Locksley (Robin Hood), and his band of outlaws, and the prisoners are rescued. However, Rebecca the Jewess is carried off by Bois-Guilbert to the Preceptory of Templestowe, where the Grand Master of the Templars charges her with witchcraft. After a series of events Ivanhoe appears and opposes Bois-Guilbert. The two men charge at each other with lances, however Bois-Guilbert dies, apparently of natural causes. Rebecca leaves England with her father, and Ivanhoe and Rowena are married. Other characters in the story include Wamba the Fool; Gurth, the swineherd; and Friar Tuck. Scott’s Ivanhoe was to have later revisions and versions, and has formed the basis for numerous books, films, and Television series.
609. 1820 John Keats, Lamia, Isabella, the Eve of St. Agnes, and Other Poems. Contains the poem ‘Robin Hood: to a Friend‘, which Keats composed very quickly in 1818, after receiving two sonnets devoted to the forest outlaw from his friend John Hamilton Reynolds (see, 614 below). In reply Keats sent his poem together with the more famous Lines on the Mermaid Tavern, to Reynolds from Hampstead on 3 February. See, Rymes of Robyn Hood, Dobson and Taylor, 1976, pp. 198-9.
610. 1820 Leigh Hunt, ‘Robin Hood, A Child.’ The Indicator, 15 Nov. 1820, pp. 41-44.
611. 1820 Leigh Hunt, ‘Robin Hood’s Flight.’ The Indicator, 15 Nov. 1820, pp. 44-47.
612. 1820 Leigh Hunt, ‘Robin Hood, An Outlaw,’ The Indicator, 22 Nov. 1820, p. 52.
613. 1820 Leigh Hunt, ‘How Robin Hood and His Outlaws Lived in the Woods.’ The Indicator, 22 Nov. 1820, pp. 52-54.
614. 1821 John Hamilton Reynolds, The Garden of Florence; and Other Poems (see, 609 above).
615. 1822 Thomas Love Peacock, Maid Marian (see, Fictional Books).
616. 1822 James Robinson Planché (Author), Henry Rowley Bishop (Composer), ‘Maid Marian; or, Huntress of Arlingford’. London, Printed for John Lowndes, 36 Bow Street, Covent Garden. See, Operas, Musicals, and Pantomime 2.
617. 1827 A type facsimile of A Gest of Robyn Hode among the Chepman and Myllar prints printed by David Laing. This is not an exact reproduction of the original.
618. 1828 William John Thoms, A Collection of Early Prose Romances (3 vols., London). Volume two includes a copy of the 1678 edition of ‘The noble birth and gallant achievements of that remarkable outlaw Robin Hood‘ (see 487 above), as well as details of Robin Hood, which includes some information on the ballads, the writings of Joseph Ritson, John Leland, William Stukeley, and others, and a copy of the Sloane manuscript ‘life’ of Robin Hood (see no. 397 above). A second enlarged edition (3 vols., London) appeared in 1858. A new edition (1 vol., London) revised and enlarged, appeared in 1906 – it contains the whole of the Thoms series, and also stories by Professor Henry Morley.
619. 1828 Bernard Barton, ‘The Death of Robin Hood’ In A New Year’s Eve, and Other Poems. London: John Hatchard and Son, 1828, pp. 114-15.
620. 1829 Charles Henry Hartshorne, Ancient Metrical Tales: printed chiefly from original sources, London: William Pickering, 1829. Includes a printed text of Robin Hood and the Monk, which is given the title ‘A Tale of Robin Hood’ (p. 179). According to John Mathew Gutch (A Lytell Geste of Robin Hode, with other ancient and modern ballads and songs, vol., 2, p. 2), this ballad ‘has been discovered by the Rev. C. H. Hartshorne, and inserted in his Ancient Metrical Tales, 1829′. However, the first printed text of Robin Hood and the Monk, does in fact appear in Robert Jamieson’s Popular Ballads and Songs from tradition, manuscripts, and scarce editions (1806). See, 601 above.
621. 1832 Edward Barry, Thèse de littérature sur les vicissitudes et les transformations du cycle populaire de Robin Hood. Paris, Rignoux, 1832.
622. 1838-40 William Chappell, A Collection of National English Airs. Printed music of Robin Hood appears in the edition of 1839 – this is repeated in the edition of 1840, with a list of the several Robin Hood ballads relating to the music. This was afterwards expanded into his Popular Music of the Olden Time (1859, 2 vols.). Part of the latter edition was published under the title ‘The ballad literature and popular music of the olden time’. More Robin Hood music by Chappell (entirely revised by H. Ellis Wooldridge) appeared in Old English Popular Music (2. vols., 1893).
623. 1840 Pierce Egan, Robin Hood and Little John (see, Children’s Books).
624. 1841 Joseph Cundall, Robin Hood and his Merry Foresters (see Children’s Books).
625. 1843 G. P. R. James, Forest Days: A Romance of Old Times (see, Fictional Books).
626. 1844 W. H. Montgomery, Harlequin Robin Hood and Little John, or, Merrie England in the Olden Time. Arranged by T. Greenwood, composed by W.H. Montgomery. London, Star Press, 1844.
627. 1846 James Henry Dixon, Ancient Poems, Ballads, and Songs of the Peasantry of England. It contains (presumably) the first printed text of The Bold Pedlar and Robin Hood. As Dixon tells us ‘An aged female in Bermondsey, Surrey, from whose oral recitation the editor took down the present version, informed him that she had often heard her grandmother sing it, and that it was never in print; but he has of late met with several common stall copies’. There is a revised and much enlarged edition by Robert Bell (London, 1857). See also, The Bold Pedlar and Robin Hood.
628. 1846 Thomas Wright, ‘On the popular cycle of the Robin Hood ballads’, in Essays on subjects connected with the literature, popular superstitions, and history of England in the Middle Ages, 2 vols., London, 1846, I, pp. 164-211.
629. 1846 Thomas Wright, Essays on subjects connected with the literature, popular superstitions, and history of England in the Middle Ages‘. Vol. II, London, 1846, pp. 164-211, 208-11. See, The Many Robin Hoods.
630. 1846 J. H. Stocqueler, ‘Robin Hood and Richard Coeur de Lion’. British Library Add Ms 42,994, fols. 34-53. Pantomime, first performed at the Lyceum Theatre. See, Operas, Musicals, and Pantomime 2.
631. 1847 John Mathew Gutch, A Lytell geste of Robin Hode, with other ancient and modern ballads and songs (2 vols., London; with another edition of 1850). A large collection of Robin Hood literature, including all the ballads published by Joseph Ritson (see, 594 above) with a few extra, and ‘Modern Minor Pieces’ such as ‘Tunes to the Robin Hood ballads, edited by Dr. Rimbault’.
One ballad of particular interest in Gutch’s collection is Robin Hood’s Courtship with Jack Cade’s Daughter. It involves the courtship between Robin Hood and Joan Cade, a fictional daughter of the real fifteenth-century rebel, Jack Cade. Gutch states that ‘the marriage of Robin Hood with Jack Cade’s daughter is a valuable relic, for its graceful simplicity and poetic imagery’. Alexander Kaufman has pointed out that this so-called ‘valuable relic’ is actually a forgery perpetrated by James Maidment, who was born in London in 1793. He attended Edinburgh University between 1810 and 1816, and in 1817 was called to the Scottish bar. Maidment became a specialist in genealogical and also disputed peerage cases. From his early years he was interested in literary rarities, mostly of a Scottish nature, and he located and edited ‘ancient’ ballads which attracted a number of friends, most notably Sir Walter Scott and Charles Kirkpatrick Sharpe. Maidment also did editorial work for a number of literary societies: The Spottiswoode Society, and the Abbotsford, Hunterian, and Bannatyne Clubs, and F. J. Child relied on eight of Maidment’s texts for his English and Scottish Popular Ballads.
Maidment passed away in 1879, and his library was auctioned in 1880, which raised about £4,500. One of his publishers, Thomas George Stevenson who was also a close friend, published The Bibliography of James Maidment in 1883. This contained a chronological annotated bibliography of Maidment’s publications, extracts of contemporary obituaries for Maidment, and the notices of the sale of the auction. Stevenson’s bibliography also included the chapbook Two Ancient Ballads: ‘Robin Hood’s Courtship with Jack Cade’s Daughter’; and ‘The Freiris Tragedie.’ The notes for this are:
The place of publication was purposely falsified; and the Ballads were printed for the purpose of testing the knowledge of a literary friend [Robert Pitcairn], who believed that he could never be imposed upon by a fictitious ballad. NOT ABOVE A DOZEN COPIES WERE PRINTED. One of these having found its way to London, has been reprinted, with a beautiful illustration, by Mr. Gutch, in his very interesting collection, ‘A Lyttel Geste of Robin Hood, 1847,’ as a genuine Scottish ballad. The Frieris’ Tragedy has not been reprinted: it was written by a member of the Society of Writers to the Signet, whose name it is not necessary to mention.
This suggest that Maidment composed ‘Robin Hood’s Courtship’ but not the other. A summary of the events that led to the creation of this literary hoax is given by Kaufman:
In 1822, under the auspices of James Maidment (with the help of two other unnamed accomplices), the chapbook Two Ancient Ballads was created and printed for the purpose of testing the knowledge of a literary friend, Robert Pitcairn (1793-1855), Writer to the Signet, and author of Ancient Criminal Trials in Scotland (1833), who was sure that he could spot a forged text. The original imprint carried no date, but the printing information was “Aberdeen: Published and sold by William Robertson, High Street.” There was, however, never a “High Street” in Aberdeen, although there was a bookseller named William Robertson who had his store on Broad Street. This error, as ballad scholar George Milne Fraser points out, is “venial.” In reality, the chapbook was printed in Edinburgh in twelve or fifteen copies. Maidment and his friends were connected with one David Webster, a dealer of second-hand books who also wrote songs, had a liking toward antiquities, and was known then as a “Black Neb,” or ultraradical. Webster’s bookshop was on the south side of Edinburgh on Bistro Street. Robert Pitcairn, Maidment and his friends realized, would have to pass by Webster’s bookshop on his way home after socializing with Maidment and his companions in Edinburgh.
One day, Pitcairn passed by Webster’s store and saw the volume, Two Ancient Ballads, in the window and asked Webster, “Where did you get that thing in the window about Robin Hood?” Webster replied, “Oh, it came from Aberdeen, with that parcel of books.” Maidment quoted that Pitcairn “hastily exclaimed” to Webster “fearing probably the intrusion of some rival collector, “What’s your charge?” to which Webster responded, “Saxpence.” The coin was handed over to Webster who “recieived it with a grin.” Pitcairn quickly examined the contents of the Robin Hood poem and, noticing a number of irregularities, determined that the presence of these irregularities pointed not to the fabricated nature of the poem but rather to its originality. Meanwhile, Pitcairn was so overjoyed with his discovery that he exclaimed to his friends, “There can be no doubt of the authenticity of this beautiful ballad – its marks of antiquity are unmistakable.” His friends, however, could no longer keep their composure. They burst into laughter, and each pulled from his pocket a copy of this “rare production.” The men then exhibited their personal copies of the chapbook in front of Pitcairn and revealed them “to the eyes of their astonished friend. The defeat was complete, and, for the future, ‘Robin Hood’s Courtship’ was a sore subject.”
Some copies of the print run of 1822 were sold and ended up in the hands of contemporary collectors, editors, and antiquarians, including J. Walter K. Eyton, Esq., of Cheltenham, whose copy was loaned to Gutch, who even reprints a portion of the original preface. Gutch, quoting from Maidment’s preface, mentions ‘The editor has only to observe, that the name of the first ballad [‘Robin Hood’s Courtship’] occurs in Captain Cox’s celebrated black-letter collection, and was supposed to have been lost’ (see, Robin Hood’s Courtship with Jack Cade’s Daughter). Little is known about Captain Cox, and there is no evidence that he had ‘Robin Hood’s Courtship’ in his possession (see 300 above). Joseph Ritson, F.J. Child, and Robert Jamieson made no comment on the chapbook’s validity, but in 1847 Robin Hood’s Courtship was reprinted again in The Gentleman’s Magazine, the main author Sylvanus Urban, argued that it lends proof to Robin Hood’s popularity in Scotland. There is a reference to ‘Robin Hood’s Courtship’ in the Dictionary of National Biography (see, 671 below) and also in Lewis Spence’s article ‘Robin Hood in Scotland’ where he states ‘The ballad of ‘Robin Hood’s Courtship with Jack Cade’s Daughter’ was certainly composed in Scotland, and must have a respectable antiquity behind it’ (see 722 below).
Another forgery is Robin Hood and the Peddlers, the fourth ballad in a MS. formerly in the possession of John Payne Collier, which appeared in the editions of Gutch and Child. See, Robin Hood and the Pedlars, in Knight and Ohlgren, Robin Hood and Other Outlaw Tales, 626-32.
Midment’s publication of ballads include:
1824 A North Countrie Garland
1844 A New Book of Old Ballads
1859 Scottish Ballads and Songs
1868 Scottish Ballads and Songs, Historical and Traditionary
See, Lesley Coote and Valerie B. Johnson, Robin Hood in Outlaw/ed Spaces: Media, performance, and other new directions, ‘Strange genealogies: Robin Hood’s Courtship with Jack Cade’s Daughter and the creation of a fraudulent text, Alexander L. Kaufman, pp. 70-87, Routledge, 2017.
632. 1852 Joseph Hunter, The Great Hero of the Ancient Minstrelsy of England, ‘Robin Hood’. See also, The Many Robin Hoods 7.
633. 1852 H. K., ‘Robin Hood.’ Notes and Queries, No. 165, Saturday, December 25, 1852. Discusses Robin de Bois (Robin of the Wood).
634. 1853 William W. Campbell, An Historical Sketch of Robin Hood and Captain Kidd. NY, Charles Scribner, 1853. Contains an edition of the Gest and other Robin Hood references.
635. 1855 Leigh Hunt, Stories in Verse, includes four new Robin Hood ballads written by the author.
636. 1857 ‘The Lyttell Geste of Robin Hood.’ The R. I. Schoolmaster, Vol. 3, No. 7 (September, 1857), pp. 193-196.
637. 1857-9 Francis James Child, English and Scottish Ballads (eight volumes, Boston; and editions of 1864 and 1885-6). Volume five contains the next large collection of Robin Hood ballads after John Mathew Gutch (see 631 above), and the forerunner of Child’s more extensive collection (see, 663 below).
638. 1858 ‘New and Original Grand Christmas Comic Pantomime, Robin Hood’. Theatre Royal, Manchester. Printed at the Theatre Royal Press, 1858. See, Operas, Musicals, and Pantomime 2.
639. 1860 John Oxenford and G. A. Macfarren, Robin Hood: An Opera (see, Operas, Musicals, and Pantomime 2).
640. 1860 Edward Fitzball, Robin Hood, or, The Merry Outlaws of Sherwood: A Dramatic Equestrian Spectacle in Three Acts. London, T.H. Lacy, 1860.
641. 1862 F. C. Burnand, Robin Hood; or, the Forester’s Fate: An Extravaganza. London, T.H. Lacy, 1862. See, Operas, Musicals, and Pantomime 2.
642. 1864 J. R. Planche, ‘A Ramble With Robin Hood.’ Report of the Association of Architects, VII, 1864, pp. 157-74. Planche suggested that Robert Fitz Odo of Loxley in Warwickshire was the real Robin Hood. See, The Many Robin Hoods 6.
643. 1865 William Allingham, The Ballad Book: A Selection of the Choicest British Ballads (Cambridge; with an edition of 1898). Includes the Gest and three other Robin Hood Ballads.
644. 1865 Sebastian Evans, ‘Of Robin Hood’s Death and Burial.’ In Brother Fabian’s Manuscript; and Other Poems. London, Macmillan, 1865. pp. 51-59.
645. 1865 William James Linton, ‘An Hour of Robin Hood.’ In Claribel and Other Poems. London, Simpkin, Marshall & Co., 1865. pp. 202-03.
646. 1865 Joseph Ritson, et al. Robin Hood: ballads and songs relating to that celebrated outlaw; with anecdotes of his life, from Ritson and others. London, 1865. See, 594 above.
647. 1865 William James Linton, ‘An Hour of Robin Hood.’ Claribel and Other Poems. London, Simpkin, Marshall & Co., 1865, pp. 202-03.
648. 1867 John Mathew Gutch and John Hicklin, Robin Hood: A Collection of Poems, Songs, and Ballads. All the ballads in the common garland with a few new additions.
649. 1867 Gilbert R. Betjemann, The Babes in the Wood, or, Harlequin Robin Hood and his Merry Men. London: J. Miles, 1867.
650. 1867-8 Bishop Percy’s Folio Manuscript: Ballads and Romances, ed J. W. Hales and F. J. Furnivall (3 vols., London). The first correct, and still definitive edition of the Robin Hood ballads in the Percy Folio. See, The Rhymes of Robin Hood 2.
651. 1868 F. R. Goodyer, Once Upon a Time, or, A Midsummer Night’s Dream in Merrie Sherwood: Fairy Extravaganza. Nottingham, Allen, 1868. [Produced at the Theatre-Royal, Nottingham, April 13, 1868]
652. 1868 Wildwood Neville, The Life and Exploits of Robin Hood! Being a new compilation of the surprising adventures of this celebrated outlaw and his men! Together with a critical dissertation on the causes of his popularity, and the credibility of his recorded actions. Halifax, W. Nicholson and Sons, 1868.
653. 1870 Eliza Cook, ‘The Bow.’ In The Poetical Works of Eliza Cook. London, Frederi Warne and Co., 1870. P. 92.
654. 1871 Robert Reece, Little Robin Hood, or, Quite a New Beau!: An Original Anti-Historical Burlesque. London, T.H. Lacy, 1871.
655. 1871 ‘Robin Hood, or The Maid that was Arch and the Youth that was Archer.’ See, Operas, Musicals, and Pantomime 2.
656. 1871-99 The Roxburghe Ballads, Printed for the Ballad Society (9 vols., London). Provides printed texts of the Robin Hood ballads that are found in the three-volume collection of Roxburgh Ballads in the British Museum Library. This collection was bound in 1774 and was originally formed by Robert Harley, 1st Earl of Oxford and Mortimer (1661-1724). The Bagford Ballads, collected by John Bagford, (1651-1716) were included in Harley’s collection, which has been augmented by successive owners, including John Ker, 3rd Duke of Roxburgh (1740-1804). His library was auctioned in 1812, leading to the formation of the Roxburghe Club. See, The Rhymes of Robin Hood 11.
657. 1871 and 1872 ‘The Merrie Men of Sherwood Forest, or Forest Days in the Olden Time’. See, Operas, Musicals, and Pantomime 2.
658. 1872 Alexandre Dumas, Le Prince des Voleurs (see, Fictional Books).
659. 1873 Alexandre Dumas, Robin Hood Le Proscrit (see, Fictional Books).
660. 1874 Bon Gaultier, ‘Little John and the Red Friar: A Lay of Sherwood.’ In The Book of Ballads. Illustrated by Doyle, Leech, and Crowquill, 12th ed., London, William Blackwood and Sons, 1874. pp. 165-78. [‘Bon Gaultier’ is a pseudonym of Sir Theodore Martin and William Edmondstoune Ayyoun.]
661. 1879 Albert Dietrich, Robin Hood, op. 34. (see, Operas, Musicals, and Pantomime 2.
662. 1879 Stewart Gildersleeve, ‘Robin Hood, The Outlawed Earl.’ Beadle’s Half-Time Library, vol. IV, no. 98. New York, Beadle and Adams, 1879.
663. 1882-98 Francis James Child, The English and Scottish Popular Ballads (5 vols., Boston). An unabridged and unaltered republication appeared in 1965 – Volume III – Part V, 1888, pp. 39-233, contains Child’s extensive texts of the Robin Hood ballads. Volume II – Part IV, 1886, p. 412, contains the ballad ‘Willie and Earl Richard’s Daughter‘, which is called ‘The Birth of Robin Hood’ in Robert Jamieson’s Popular Ballads and Songs from tradition, manuscripts, and scarce editions (see, 601 above). Child did not see this ballad as being part of the traditional Robin Hood cycle.
664. 1883 Howard Pyle, The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood of great renown in Nottinghamshire (see, Children’s Books).
665. 1883 R. Fricke, ‘Die Robin-Hood-Balladen’, Archiv, LXIX, 1883, pp. 241-344.
666. 1885 H. C. Coote, ‘The Origin of the Robin Hood Epos’, Folk-Lore Journal, III, 1885, pp. 44-52.
667. 1886 W. F. Prideaux, ‘Who Was Robin Hood?’ Notes and Queries, 7th Series, II, 1886, pp. 421-24. See also, Robin Hood: An Anthology of Scholarship and Criticism. Ed. Stephen Knight. Cambridge, Brewer, 1999, pp. 51-57.
668. 1890 Reginald De Koven, Robin Hood: A Comic Opera (see, Operas, Musicals, and Pantomime 2).
669. 1890 G. Neilson, ‘Robin Hood’, Notes and Queries, 7th series, 9, 1890, p. 226.
670. 1890 Geoffrey Thorn, Babes in the Wood, or, Bold Robin Hood and His Foresters Good. London, London Printing & Pub. Alliance, 1890.
671. 1891 Sidney Lee, Dictionary of National Biography. Lee suggests that Robin Hood’s name ‘originally belonged to a mythical forest-elf’.
672. 1892 Alfred Tennyson, The Foresters: Robin Hood and Maid Marian, first produced in New York on 17 March 1892, a few months before Tennyson’s death. The play has clearly borrowed from the Gest and other ballads. It is in four acts and written in a mixture of prose and shakespearian blank verse. In the first act the sheriff promises to pay off Sir Richard’s debt if Marian will marry him. After Robin and Marian are compelled to part (2), the former is banished and agrees to become the leader of a group of King Richard’s partisans in Sherwood Forest (3). The second act sees the flight of Marian to the woods, and Robin’s encounter, disguised as an old woman, with the sheriff and Prince John. In the third act Marian is proclaimed and ‘crowned’ Queen o’ the Woods, and Robin meets and robs some beggars and friars, who have lied to him about the amount of money they carry. Finally, in the fourth and final act, King Richard, after beating Friar Tuck, Much and Robin successively at quarterstaff, resolves the situation; and all ends happily with the reappearance of Sir Richard’s son. See, Rymes of Robyn Hood, Dobson and Taylor, 1976, 243-49.
673. 1892 L. Frankel, ‘Zur Geschichte von Robin Hood’, Englische Studien, Leipzig, XVII, 1892, pp. 316-17.
674. 1894 F. B. Gummere, Old English Ballads (Boston). Includes the Gest and three other Robin Hood Ballads, with editions of 1899 and 1901.
675. 1896 F. J. Child, ‘English Ballads.’ Modern Language Notes 11, 1896, pp. 158-159.
676. 1896 Mabel Peacock, ‘The Hood-Game at Haxey, Lincolnshire.’ Folklore, Vol. 7, No. 4 (Dec., 1896), pp. 330-350.
677. 1897 Andrew Lang, A Collection of Ballads (London). Includes three Robin Hood ballads.
678. 1897 John Matthews Manly, Specimens of Pre-Shakespearean Drama. 2 vols. New York, Ginn and Co., 1897. [Prints the three surviving fragments of the earliest Robin Hood plays; ‘Robin Hood and the Knight,’ ‘Robin Hood and the Friar,’ and ‘Robin Hood and the Potter’ also appear in Child and in Ritson.]
679. 1897 Homer Smith, ‘Pastoral Influence in the English Drama.’ PMLA 12, 1897, pp. 355-460.
680. 1900 George Manville Fenn, Young Robin Hood. Philadelphia, Henry Altemus Co., 1900.
681. 1901 Reginald De Koven ‘Maid Marian’. New York, Edward Schuberth, 1901. See, Operas, Musicals, and Pantomime 2.
682. 1902 A. H. Thorndike, ‘The Relation of “As You like It” to Robin Hood Plays.’ The Journal of Germanic Philology, Vol. 4, No. 1 (1902), pp. 59-69.
683. 1903 Notes and Queries, Ninth Series, Volume XI, January-June, 1903. Various authors discuss Robin of the Wood and Robin des Bois.
684. 1904 English and Scottish Popular Ballads (edited from the collection of Francis James Child by H. C. Sargent and G. L. Kittredge, Boston). Includes texts of all the Robin Hood ballads printed by Child, but without critical apparatus (see, 663 above).
685. 1904 Alfred Noyes, ‘Sherwood’ in Poems. Edinburgh and London, 1904. Pages 7-9, provides the first publication in book form. Reprinted in Alfred Noyes, ‘A Song of Sherwood.’ In Collected Poems, 3 vols., New York, Frederick A. Stokes, 1913. I: 49-50.
686. 1906 Nora Chesson, ‘Robin Hood’s Good-Night.’ In Selected Poems by Nora Chesson. 5 vols. London, Alston Rivers, 1906. [Vol IV (Dirge for Aoine and Other Poems), p.xxv.]
687. 1906 Walter Morris Hart, ‘Professor Child and the Ballad.’ PMLA 21, 1906, pp. 755-807.
688. 1908 William Hall Clawson, ‘Ballad and Epic.’ The Journal of American Folklore 21, 1908, pp. 349-361.
689. 1908 Percy Stow (director), ‘Robin Hood and his Merry Men’. The first of many Robin Hood movies. See, Robin Hood Movies.
690. 1909 W. H. Clawson, The Gest of Robin Hood (University of Toronto Studies: Philological Series, Extra Volume). Part of an unpublished dissertation on the Robin Hood ballads, presented in 1907 in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Ph.D., Harvard university. cf. 3d prelim. leaf. A comprehensive but somewhat outdated study of the Gest.
691. 1910 Arthur Quiller-Couch, The Oxford Book of Ballads. Includes modernized versions of the Gest and eleven other Robin Hood Ballads.
692. 1910 M.I. Ebbutt, Hero-myths & Legends of the British Race. New York, T.Y. Crowell & Company, 1910. [Includes illustrations by J.H.F. Bacon, Byam Shaw, W.H. Margetson, Patten Wilson, and Gertrude Demain Hammond.] Chapter XV contains a stylized prose version of the Gest.
693. 1910 E. L. Wilson, and H. S. V. Jones. ‘Robin Hood and Little John.’ The Journal of American Folklore 90, 1910, pp. 432-434.
694. 1910 Ethel Lega-Weekes, “Howde Men’: Robin Hood’s Men at Chagford.’ Notes and Queries l l ser. no. l, 1910, p. 346.
695. 1911 Alfred Noyes, Sherwood, or, Robin Hood and the Three Kings: A Play in Five Acts. New York: Frederick A. Stokes, 1911. Contains characters from the Robin Hood ballads and other sources, including Anthony Munday’s plays of Robin Hood.
696. 1911 John Wesley Hales and Frederick John Snell, Encyclopædia Britannica/Robin Hood.
697. 1912 Henry Gilbert, Robin Hood and the Men of the Greenwood (see, Children’s Books).
698. 1912 Frank Sidgwick, Popular Ballads of the Olden Time, Fourth Series. Contains ‘Ballads of Robin Hood and Other Outlaws‘.
699. 1913 Frank Egbert Bryant, A History of English Balladry and Other Studies. R. G. Badger, Boston, 1913. Bryant discusses the ballads of Robin Hood.
700. 1914 E. F. Matheson, Robin Hood and His Merry Men. A two act play for children that borrows from the Gest and other Robin Hood ballads.
701. 1914 John Drinkwater, Robin Hood and the Pedlar. Music by James Brier; costumes by Miss B. Lindsay & H.N. Bradbear; dances arranged by Miss K.V. Okey. England?: Printed for private circulation, 1914. A ‘Georgian’ verse play ‘Performed at Bournville, June 25th, 1914’ and printed in The Collected Plays of John Drinkwater, Vol. I, 1925.
702. 1914 William Copland’s edition of the Gest, reproduced in facsimile in Old English Drama (Student’s Facsimile Edition).
703. 1918 Alfred Noyes, ‘The Matin-Song of Friar Tuck.’ In The New Morning and Other Poems. New York, Frederick A. Stokes, 1918. pp. 103-04.
704. 1918 Mabel Beatrice Olson, ‘Robin Hood Elements in Elizabethan Drama.’ AM degree, University of Chicago, 1918.
705. 1918 George Stevenson, Pieces from the Makculloch and the Gray MSS. Together with the Chepman and Myllar Prints. (The Scottish Text Society, Edinburgh/London). Pages 267-90 contain an edition of the Gest, from the Chepman and Myllar Prints.
706. 1919 J. M. Steadman Jr. ‘The Dramatization of the Robin Hood Ballads.’ Modern Philology: A Journal Devoted to Research in Medieval and Modern Literature 17, 1919, pp. 9-23.
707. 1919 Hyder E. Rollins, ‘Martin Parker, Ballad-Monger.’ Modern Philology, Vol. 16, No. 9 (Jan., 1919), pp. 449-474.
708. 1920 One of the earliest Robin Hood comics. See, Comics.
709. 1922 J. Edgar Park, The Merrie Adventures of Robin Hood and Santa Claus. Illustrated by W.H. Montgomery. Boston, Houghton Mifflin, 1922.
710. 1923 R. J. E. Tiddy, The Mummers Play (first published Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1923 and reprinted in 1972). Robin Hood Mummers plays recorded by Tiddy and published posthumously. See, Plays and the May Festivities 2.
711. 1923 Owen Davis, Robin Hood; or, The Merry Outlaws of Sherwood. A Play in Three Acts. New York, S. French, 1923.
712. 1923 Leigh Hunt, The Poetical Works of Leigh Hunt. Ed. H.S. Milford. London, Oxford University Press, 1923. [Contains ballads of Robin Hood written by Hunt. They vary in some details from the original publications in The Indicator.] See, 610, 611, 612, 613, above.
713. 1924 Henry Newbolt, Peacock, Scott, and Robin Hood. Newbolt discusses possible similarities between Sir Walter Scott’s Ivanhoe, and Thomas Love Peacock’s Maid Marian.
714. 1924 Anna Jean Mill, Mediaeval Plays in Scotland, St. Andrews University Publications, No. XXIV, Edinburgh, 1924; reissued by Benjamin Blom, Inc., New York and London, 1969. A large collection of documents relating to medieval drama in Scotland, with many depicting Robin Hood.
715. 1925 Henry Newbolt, The Greenwood: A Collection of Literary Readings Relating to Robin Hood. London: Thomas Nelson & Sons, 1925. Subjects include Sir Walter Scott, Thomas Love Peacock, Maid Marian, and Robin Hood.
716. 1926 Alfred Noyes, Robin Hood: A Play in Five Acts. A reissue of the 1911 play with alterations. See, 695 above.
717. 1926 Edward Abbott Parry, ‘Robin Hood, the Brigand.’ Chapter 5 in Vagabonds All. New York, Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1926. pp. 83-107.
718. 1926 Louise Pound, “American Text of ‘Robin Hood and Little John’.” American Speech: A Quarterly of Linguistic Usage 2, 1926, p. 75.
719. 1927 E. C. Vivian, Robin Hood and His Merry Men, a ‘Charming Colour Book’ for children; several later editions. See, Children’s Books.
720. 1927? E. C. Vivian, The Adventures of Robin Hood (see, Children’s Books).
721. 1928 J. C. Squire, Robin Hood: A Farcical Romantic Pastoral. First produced on August 4th, 1926, by the Fair Oak Players, at Rogate, Petersfield.
722. 1928 Lewis Spence, ‘Robin Hood in Scotland.’ Chambers’s Journal, 9th Series, XVIII, 1928, pp. 94-6.
723. 1929 Kenneth Hare, The Archer’s Chronicle and Greenwood Companion. An anthology which includes several items relating to Robin Hood.
724. 1929 Charles G. Norris, A Gest of Robin Hood. Music by Robert C. Newell. 1929. Performed by the Bohemian Club of San Francisco, July 31, 1954. Dir. Fred Orin Harris. San Francisco, Grabhorn Press, 1954.
725. 1930 William Rose Benet, ‘The Death of Robin Hood.’ Saturday Review of Literature, 15 Nov 1930, p. 1. Print.
726. 1931 Margaret Murray, The God of the Witches. London, Faber and Faber, 1931. Egyptologist Margaret Murray claimed that Robin Hood had been a mythological figure in the European witch cult.
727. 1932 Ula Waterhouse Echols, Robin Hood. Illustrated by James McCracken. Chicago: Albert Whitman, 1932.
728. 1932 Ronald Gow, Five Robin Hood Plays. London, Thomas Nelson and Sons, 1932.
729. 1933 A. H Smith, ‘Robin Hood’, Modern Language Review, XXVIII, 1933, pp. 484-5.
730. 1933 V. W. Walker, Robin Hood Literature in the Nottingham Public Libraries, Nottingham, 1933.
731. 1934 Michael Tippett, ‘Robin Hood’. A ballad opera. See, Operas, Musicals, and Pantomime 2.
732. 1935 C. C. Moreland, ‘Ritson’s Life of Robin Hood’, Publications of the Modern Language Association of America, L, 1935, pp. 522-36.
733. 1935 Howard Pyle, The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood. Illustrated by Howard Pyle. New York, Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1935. [Brandywine edition, with frontispiece by N.C. Wyeth]
734. 1935 Carroll C. Moreland, ‘Ritson’s Life of Robin Hood.’ PMLA 50, 1935, pp. 522-536.
735. 1935? Patrick Pringle, Stand and Deliver: Highwaymen from Robin Hood to Dick Turpin. Republished in 1991 by Dorset Press. ‘Stand and Deliver’ is the amazing story of Robin Hood, Dick Turpin, Sixteen String Jack, Jonathan Wild and the many other highwaymen of English history.
736. 1936 L. V. D. Owen, ‘Robin Hood in the Light of Research’, The Times, Trade and Engineering Supplement, xxxviii, no. 864 (new series), 1936, p. xxix. The argument was later expanded in a contribution to Chambers’s Encyclopaedia, 1950, XI, pp. 733-4. See, Hobbehod.
737. 1938 J. H. Gable, A Bibliograpy of Robin Hood (University of Nebraska, Studies in Language, Literature and Criticism, No. 17, 1938).
738. 1938 J. W. Ashton, “Rymes of … Randolf, Erl of Chestre.” ELH Vol. 5, No. 3, Sep., 1938, pp. 195-206.
739. 1938 One of the earliest Robin Hood board games. See, Board Games.
740. 1939 T. H. White, The Sword in the Stone. New York, Putnam’s, 1939. Wart, the young Arthur, has an adventure with Robin Hood.
741. 1939 J. Harris Gable, Bibliography of Robin Hood. The University of Nebraska Studies in Language, Literature and Criticism, No. 17. Lincoln, NE, University of Nebraska, 1939.
742. 1944 J. W. Walker, ‘Robin Hood Identified’, The Yorkshire Archaeological Journal, Part 141 (Being the first part of Volume XXXVI.) [Issued to members only.], Wakefield, MCMXLIV. This article expands on the Robin Hood of Wakefield theory first put forward by Joseph Hunter (see, 632 above). Walker developed his article into a book (The True History of Robin Hood, Wakefield, 1952). See, The Many Robin Hoods 8.
743. 1944 Alan Porter, The Sad Shepherd: The Unfinished Pastoral Comedy of Ben Jonson Now Completed by Alan Porter with a Foreword. New York, The John Day Company, 1944. See, 454 above.
744. 1947 Anne Malcolmson, Song of Robin Hood. Music arranged by Grace Castegnetta, Houghton-Mifflin, 1947.
745. 1948 G. E. Morris, ‘A Ryme of Robyn Hod’, Modern Language Review, XLIII, pp. 507-8. The first printed edition of a fragmentary poem of the early fifteenth century in Lincoln Cathedral Library MS. 132. ‘Robyn hod in scherewod stod hodud and hathud hosut and schod ffour/ And thuynti arowus he bar in hit hondus’. See, 4 above.
746. 1948-51 W.B. Crump, ‘The Site of Robin Hood’s Grave’, Y.A.J., XXXVII, 1948-51, pp. 105-6. See, Robin Hood’s Grave 10.
747. 1949 Orrin E. Klapp, ‘The Folk Hero.’ The Journal of American Folklore 64, 1949, pp. 17-25.
748. 1950 William Beattie, The Chepman and Myllar Prints. Nine Tracts from the First Scottish Press, Edinburgh, 1508. Followed by the Two Other Tracts in the Same Volume in the National Library of Scotland. A Facsimile with a Bibliographical Note (The Edinburgh Bibliographical Society). Pages 197-220 contain a facsimile of A Gest of Robyn Hode, originally among the Chepman and Myllar prints. See, Early Editions of the Gest.
749. 1950 M. J. C. Hodgart, The Ballads. Hutchinson University, London, 1950 (Second edition 1962, Reprinted 1964). Hodgart discusses Robin Hood ballads.
750. 1951 Percy Valentine Harris, The truth about Robin Hood: a refutation of the mythologists’ theories, with new evidence of the hero’s actual existence, London, 1951; new edition, Mansfield, 1973. Harris discusses Joseph Hunter’s Robin Hood of Wakefield theory (see, 742 above), and suggests that the names of the characters in the Gest, can be found in the Wakefield Court Rolls. See, The Many Robin Hoods 10.
751. 1951 W. E. Simeone, ‘The May Games and the Robin Hood Legend’, Journal of American Folklore, LXIV, 1951, pp. 265-74.
752. 1952 W. E. Simeone, ‘Still More about Robin Hood’, Journal of American Folklore, LXV, 1952, pp. 418-20.
753. 1952 R. M. Wilson, The Lost Literature of Medieval England. London, 1952, second edition, 1970. Randolf, earl of Chester, and ‘rhymes of Robin Hood’ discussed in pages 117-18.
754. 1952 Jess B. Bessinger Jr., ‘The Beginnings of the Robin Hood Tradition: With an Annotated Bibliographical Supplement to 1951.’ Dissertation, Harvard University, 1952.
755. 1952 Jay Williams, ‘More About Robin Hood.’ The Journal of American Folklore 65, 1952, pp. 304-305.
756. 1952 Elizabeth Swann, ‘Maid Marian and the Morris: The Connection of the Morris with the Robin Hood Legend.’ Journal of the English Folk Dance and Song Society, Vol. 7, No. 1 (Dec., 1952), pp. 20-25.
757. 1953 William E. Simeone, ‘The Historic Robin Hood.’ The Journal of American Folklore 66, 1953, pp. 303-308.
758. 1953 ‘Robin Hood’. The first of many television series. See, Television.
759. 1954 Orrin E. Klapp, ‘The Clever Hero.’ The Journal of American Folklore 67, 1954, pp. 21-34.
760. 1954 Albert B. Friedman, ‘Percy’s Folio Manuscript Revalued.’ The Journal of English and Germanic Philology, Vol. 53, No. 4 (Oct., 1954), pp. 524-531.
761. 1955 Percy Valentine Harris, ‘Who was Robin Hood?’, Folk-Lore Quarterly, LXVI, 1955, pp. 288-94.
762. 1955 MacEdward Leach, The Ballad Book. A large modern anthology, containing ‘Ballads of England and Scotland with American and Danish Variants’.
763. 1955 D. N. Kennedy, ‘Who was Robin Hood?’ Folk-Lore Quarterly, LXVI, 1955, pp. 413-15.
764. 1955 Bruce Grant, The Adventures of Robin Hood and His Merry Men. Illustrated by William Timmins. Chicago, Rand Mcnally & Co., 1955.
765. 1955 Barbara Lowe, ‘Robin Hood in the Light of History.’ Journal of the English Folk Dance and Song Society.Vol. VII. No. 4, 1955, pp. 228-38.
766. 1956 A. B. Friedman, The Viking Book of Folk Ballads of the English-Speaking World. Contains four ballads of Robin Hood.
767. 1956 Donald Ewin Cooke, The Silver Horn of Robin Hood. Philadelphia, Winston, 1956.
768. 1956 John Greenway, ‘Aunt Molly Jackson and Robin Hood: A Study in Folk Re-Creation.’ The Journal of American Folklore 271, 1956, pp. 23-38.
769. 1956 P. Valentine Harris, ‘Comment on Robin Hood.’ Folklore 67, 1956, p. 248.
770. 1956 P. Valentine Harris, ‘Who Was Robin Hood?’ Folklore 67, 1956, pp. 103-105.
771. 1956 M. Marcangelo, Violet Alford and Douglas Kennedy, ‘Robin Hood.’ Folklore 67, 1956, pp. 179-182.
772. 1956 Bacil F. Kirtley, ‘Theories and Fantasies Concerning Robin Hood.’ SFQ, 1956, pp. 108-115.
773. 1956 Barbara Lowe, ‘The Final Truth About Robin Hood?’ Folklore 67, 1956, pp. 106-109.
774. 1956 E. A. Horsman, The Pinder of Wakefield. English Reprints Series 12. Liverpool University Press, 1956.
775. 1957 W. E. Simeone, ‘Robin Hood Ballads in North America.’ Midwest Folklore, Vol. 7, No. 4 (Winter, 1957), pp. 197-201.
776. 1958 R. H. Hilton, ‘The Origins of Robin Hood’, Past and Present, 14 (1958), pp. 30-44.
777. 1958 W. E. Simeone, ‘Robin Hood and Some Other Outlaws’, Journal of American Folklore, LXXI, 1958. pp. 27-33.
778. 1958 William E. Simeone, ‘The Mythical Robin Hood.’ Western Folklore, Vol. 17, No. 1 (Jan., 1958), pp. 21-28.
779. 1958 Maurice Keen, ‘Robin Hood, a Peasant Hero’, History Today, VIII (1958), pp. 684-9.
780. 1958 Daniel G. Hoffmann, ‘A Little Geste.’ Sewanee Review 66, 1958, pp. 633-48.
781. 1958 Daniel G. Hoffman, ‘Robin Hood and the Prioress’ (Poem). The Sewanee Review, Vol. 66, No. 4 (Autumn, 1958), pp. 645-646.
782. 1958 Daniel G. Hoffman, ‘The Coming of Robin Hood’ (Poem). The Sewanee Review, Vol. 66, No. 4 (Autumn, 1958), pp. 641-645.
783. 1959 Lowry Charles Wimberly, Folklore in the English and Scottish Ballads. New York, F. Ungar, 1959.
784. 1959 Eric Hobsbawm, Social Bandits and Primitive Rebels. Glencoe III.: Free Press, 1959.
785. 1959-72 B. H. Bronson, The Traditional Tunes of the Child Ballads (4 vols.). Volume III, pp. 13-71, prints tunes and texts of the Robin Hood ballads with discussion.
786. 1960 J. C. Holt, ‘The Origins and Audience of the Ballads of Robin Hood’, Past and Present, 18 (1960), pp. 89-110.
787. 1961 J. C. Holt, ‘Robin Hood: some comments’, Past and Present, 19 (1961), pp. 16-18.
788. 1961 Maurice Keen, ‘Robin Hood-Peasant or Gentleman’, Past and Present, 19 (1961), pp. 7-15.
789. 1961 T. H. Aston, ‘Robin Hood.’ Past & Present, No. 20 (Nov., 1961), pp. 7-9.
790. 1961 Maurice Keen, The Outlaws of Medieval Legend. See, Historical Books.
791. 1961 Malcolm Anthony Nelson, ‘The Robin Hood Tradition in English Literature in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries.’ Dissertation Northwestern University, 1961.
792. 1961 W. E. Simeone, ‘The Robin Hood of Ivanhoe.’ The Journal of American Folklore 74, 1961, pp. 230-234.
793. 1962 William E. Simeone, ‘Renaissance Robin Hood Plays.’ Folklore in Action: Essays for Discussion in Honor of MacEdward Leach. Ed. Horace P. Beck. Philadelphia, PA, American Folklore Society, 1962, pp. 184-99.
794. 1963 J. C. T. Oates, ‘The Little Gest of Robin Hood: A Note on the Pynson and Lettersnijder Editions’, Studies in Bibliography, Charlottesville, Virginia, XVI, 1963, pp. 3-8.
795. 1964 N. A. Atwater, The Outlaw Tradition from Hereward the Saxon to Robin Hood. Unpublished Brown University thesis, 1964.
796. 1965 M. Hodgart, The Faber Book of Ballads. A small ballad anthology which has only two Robin Hood ballads.
797. 1965 Lionel Bart, ‘Twang!’ A musical. See, Operas, Musicals, and Pantomime 2.
798. 1966 J. B. Bessinger Jr, ‘Robin Hood: Folklore and Historiography, 1377-1500’, Tennessee Studies in Literature, XI, 1966, pp. 61-9.
799. 1966 K. L. Steckmesser, ‘Robin Hood and the American Outlaw: a Note on History and Folklore’, Journal of American Folklore, LXXIX, 1966, pp. 348-55.
800. 1967 Richard Hirsch, An Introduction to the Huntingdon Plays. Unpublished Brown University masters thesis, 1967.
801. 1968 Peter S. Beagle, The Last Unicorn, Ballantine Books, New York, 1968. A fantasy novel – Juvenile Literature.
802. 1968 Howard Pyle, The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood. Illustrated by Don Irwin. Santa Rosa, CA, Classic Press, 1968.
803. 1968 David C. Fowler, A Literary History of the Popular Ballad. Durham, NC, Duke University Press, 1968.
804. 1968 Bernth Lindfors, ‘Robin Hood Realism in South African English Fiction.’ Africa Today 15.4, 1968, pp. 16-18.
805. 1969 Ian Serraillier, Robin Hood and His Merry Men. Illustrated by Victor G. Ambrus. London, Oxford University Press, 1969.
806. 1969 Ernest Callenbach, ‘Comparative Anatomy of Folk-Myth Films: Robin Hood and Antonio das Mortes.’ Film Quarterly 23, 1969, pp. 42-47.
807. 1969 L. Moffitt Cecil, ‘Tom Sawyer: Missouri Robin Hood.’ Western American Literature 4, 1969, pp. 125-131.
808. 1969 Eric Hobsbawm, Bandits. New York, Delacorte Press, 1969.
809. 1970 W. R. Mitchell, The Haunts of Robin Hood, Clapham, Yorkshire, 1970.
810. 1970 Richard Middlewood Wilson, The Lost Literature of Medieval England. London, Methuen, 1970.
811. 1971 R. H. Hilton, ‘Robin Hood’, in Encyclopaedia Britannica (1971), XIX, pp. 394-5.
812. 1971 Robert E. Morsberger, ‘In Quest of Robin Hood.’ Rocky Mountain Review of Language and Literature 25, 1971, pp. 75-85.
813. 1971 David Parker, “Popular Protest in ‘A Gest of Robin Hood.’” MLQ 32, 1971, pp. 3-20.
814. 1971 Enzo Siciliano, ‘Non scherzare su Robin Hood (Ducent’anni di Walter Scott).’ Stampa 22, 1971, p. 3.
815. 1972 R. B. Dobson and J. Taylor, ‘The Medieval Origins of the Robin Hood Legend: A Reassessment’, Northern History, VII, 1972, pp. 1-30.
816. 1973 M. A. Nelson, The Robin Hood Tradition in the English Renaissance, Salzburg Studies in English Literature, Elizabethan Studies, No. 14; Salzburg University, 1973. Nelson continually draws attention to the fact that the Elizabethans raised the yeoman hero (Robin Hood) to the peerage.
817. 1973 L. V. D. Owen, ‘Robin Hood.’ Chambers’s Encyclopedia, New Revised Edition, 1973.
818. 1974 J. B. Bessinger Jr., ‘The Gest of Robin Hood Revisited.’ The Learned and the Lewed: Studies in Chacuer and Medieval Literature. Ed. L. D. Benson. Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press, 1974, pp. 355-69. See also, Robin Hood: An Anthology of Scholarship and Criticism. Stephen Knight, Cambridge, Brewer, 1999, pp. 39-50.
819. 1974 Joe R. Christopher, ‘The Death of Robin Hood.’ Eildon Tree 1, 1974, pp. 16-18.
820. 1974 J. M. R. Margeson, ‘Dramatic Form: The Huntington Plays.’ Studies in English Literature, 1500-1900 14, 1974, pp. 223-238.
821. 1974 William Kenneth Zellefrow, ‘The Romance of Robin Hood.’ Dissertation University of Colorado at Boulder, 1974.
822. 1975 John Ashberry, ‘Robin Hood’s Barn.’ Anæus 17 (Spring 1975), pp. 45-46.
823. 1976 R.B. Dobson & J. Taylor, Rymes of Robyn Hood (later editions of 1989 and 1997). See, Historical Books.
824. 1976 Alan Gribben, “How Tom Sawyer Played Robin Hood ‘By the Book’.” English Language Notes 13, 1976, pp. 201-04.
825. 1976 R. H. Hilton, Peasants, Knights, and Heretics: Studies in Medieval Social History. New York, Cambridge University Press, 1976, pp. 221-235. See also, Robin Hood: An Anthology of Scholarship and Criticism. Stephen Knight, Cambridge, Brewer, 1999, pp. 197-210.
826. 1976 Michael J. Preston, ‘The Robin Hood Folk Plays of South-Central England.’ Comparative Drama 10, 1976, pp. 91-100. See also, The Drama in the Middle Ages: Comparative and Critical Essays. Ed. Clifford Davidson, C.J. Gianakaris, and John Stroupe. New York, AMS, 1982, pp. 342-351.
827. 1977 P. Valentine Harris, ‘More about Robin Hood.’ Folklore, 88, No. 2, 1977, pp. 236-37.
828. 1977 Roberta Kevelson, Inlaws/Outlaws, A Semiotics of Systemic Interaction: ‘Robin Hood’ and the ‘King’s Law.’ Bloomington, Indiana University and Lisse, The Peter De Ridder Press, 1977.
829. 1977 M. J. Preston, M. G. Smith, and P. S. Smith. ‘The Lost Chapbooks.’ Folklore 88, 1977, pp. 160-164.
830. 1978 J. R. Maddicott, ‘The Birth and Setting of the Ballads of Robin Hood.’ English Historical Review 93, 1978, pp. 276-99. See also, Robin Hood: An Anthology of Scholarship and Criticism. Stephen Knight, Cambridge, Brewer, 1999, pp. 233-55.
831. 1978 George Parfitt, ‘Early Robin Hood Plays: Two Fragments and a Bibliography.’ Renaissance & Modern Studies 22, 1978, pp. 5-12.
832. 1978 W. R. Mitchell, Exploring the Robin Hood Country. Clapham, Yorkshire, 1978.
833. 1979 Marilyn Butler, ‘The Good Old Times: Maid Marian.’ Peacock Displayed. London, Routledge, 1979, pp. 140-55. See also, Robin Hood: An Anthology of Scholarship and Criticism. Stephen Knight, Cambridge, Brewer, 1999, pp. 141-153.
834. 1979 James M. Davis Jr, ‘The Three Personalities of Robin Hood.’ Mississippi Folklore Register 13, 1979, pp. 52-63.
835. 1979 Andrew McCall, The Medieval Underworld. London, H. Hamilton, 1979.
836. 1979 Richard E. Meyer, ‘The Legacy of Robin Hood.’ Southwest Folklore 3.4, 1979, pp. 23-31.
837. 1979 Yoshiko Ueno, ‘Robin Hood to gogatsu-sai.’ Oberon: Magazine for the Study of English and American Literature 18, 1979, pp. 15-31.
838. 1979 Yoshiko Uéno, ‘Robin Hood Plays and Pastoral: Two Huntingdon Plays and The Sad Shepherd.’ Studies in English Literature English Number 1979 (1979), pp. 19-36.
839. 1980 Joseph Falaky Nagy, ‘The Paradoxes of Robin Hood.’ Folklore 91, 1980, pp. 198-210. See also, Robin Hood: An Anthology of Scholarship and Criticism. Stephen Knight, Cambridge, Brewer, 1999, pp. 411-25.
840. 1980 Sam Sackett, ‘Jesse James as Robin Hood.’ Mid-America Folklore 8, 1980, pp. 38-43.
841. 1980 Richard Stapleford, ‘Robin Hood and the Contemporary Idea of the Law.’ Literature/Film Quarterly 8, 1980, pp. 182-87.
842. 1980 John M. Wasson, ‘The St. George and Robin Hood Plays in Devon.’ Medieval English Theatre 2, 1980, pp. 66-99.
843. 1981 David Wiles, The Early Plays of Robin Hood. Cambridge, D. S. Brewer, 1981. See, References to Robin Hood Plays.
844. 1981 M. A. Blackstone, Robin Hood and the Friar. Poculi Ludique Societas. Performance Texts 3. Toronto: Poculi Ludique Societas, 1981.
845. 1982 J. C. Holt, Robin Hood. See, Historical Books.
846. 1982 James W. Alexander, ‘Ranulf III of Chester: An Outlaw of Legend?’, Neuphilologische Mitteilungen, lxxxiii, 1982, pp. 152-7.
847. 1982 Bennett A. Brockman, ‘Robin Hood and the Invention of Children’s Literature.’ Children’s Literature: Annual of The Modern Language Association Division on Children’s Literature and The Children’s Literature Association 10, 1982, pp. 1-17.
848. 1982 Paul Gregory Kooistra, ‘American Robin Hoods: The Criminal as Social Hero.’ Dissertation University of Virginia, 1982.
849. 1982 Andrew Wawn, ‘Robin Hood and the Elizabethans: A Propagandist Note.’ Cahiers Elisabéthains: Late Medieval and Renaissance Studies 22, 1982, pp. 87-91.
850. 1983 Clive Endersby, Young King Arthur; and, The Adventures of Robin Hood: two plays for young audiences. Toronto, Playwrights Canada, 1983.
851. 1983 B. A. Brockman, ‘Children and the Audiences of Robin Hood.’ South Atlantic Review 48.2, 1983, pp. 67-83.
852. 1983 John Cech, ‘Pyle’s Robin Hood: Still Merry After All These Years.’ Children’s Literature Association Quarterly 8.2, 1983, pp. 11-14; 32.
853. 1983 R. W. Kaeuper, ‘An Historian’s Reading of the Tale of Gamelyn.’ Medium Aevum 52, 1983, pp. 51-62.
854. 1983 Richard Tardif, ‘The ‘Mistery’ of Robin Hood: A New Social Context for the Texts.’ Words and Worlds: Studies in the Social Role of Verbal Culture. Ed. Stephen Knight and Soumyen Mukherjee. Sydney, Association for Studies in Society and Culture, 1983, pp. 130-145. See also, Robin Hood: An Anthology of Scholarship and Criticism. Stephen Knight, Cambridge, Brewer, 1999, pp. 345-61.
855. 1983 R. B. Dobson and J. Taylor, ‘Robin Hood of Barnsdale: A Fellow Thou Has Long Sought.’ Northern History 19, 1983, pp. 210-20.
856. 1983 One of the earliest Robin Hood video games. See, Video Games.
857. 1984 Dennis Nielson, ‘Robin Hood: The Truth Behind the Green Tights.’ A pantomime. Samuel French & Son, 1984. See, Operas, Musicals, and Pantomime 2.
858. 1984 David Crook, ‘Some Further Evidence Concerning the Dating of the Origins of the Legend of Robin Hood.’ English Historical Review 99, 1984, pp. 530-34. See also, Robin Hood: An Anthology of Scholarship and Criticism. Stephen Knight, Cambridge, Brewer, 1999, pp. 257-61. See, William Robehod.
859. 1984 Douglas Gray, ‘The Robin Hood Ballads.’ Poetica 19, 1984, pp. 1-39. See also, Robin Hood: An Anthology of Scholarship and Criticism. Stephen Knight, Cambridge, Brewer, 1999, pp. 3-37.
860. 1984 J. C. Holt, ‘Robin Hood Revised.’ Johns Hopkins Magazine, 1984, pp. XII-XVI.
861. 1985 John Bellamy, Robin Hood an historical enquiry. See, Historical Books.
862. 1985 Ellen Kushner, Outlaws of Sherwood Forest, (Choose Your Own Adventure, #47). New York, Bantam, 1985. Print. Magically transported to Sherwood Forest, the reader must come to the aid of Robin Hood after the evil Sheriff of Nottingham captures Maid Marian. Choose Your Own Adventure is a series of children’s game books where each story is written from a second-person point of view, with the reader assuming the role of the protagonist and making choices that determine the main character’s actions and the plot’s outcome.
863. 1985 Peter R. Coss, ‘Aspects of Cultural Diffusion in Medieval England: The Early Romances, Local Society, and Robin Hood.’ Past and Present 108, 1985, pp. 35-79. See also, ‘Aspects of Cultural Diffusion in Medieval England: Robin Hood.’ Robin Hood: An Anthology of Scholarship and Criticism. Stephen Knight, Cambridge, Brewer, 1999, pp. 329-43.
864. 1985 Dean A. Hoffman, “‘With the Shot Y Wyll/Alle Thy Lustes to Full-Fyl’: Archery as Symbol in the Early Ballads of Robin Hood.” Neuphilologische Mitteilungen 86, 1985, pp. 494-505.
865. 1985 Rafael Portillo, ‘Manifestaciones dramáticas de origen folklórico en la Inglaterra medieval.’ Estudios literarios ingleses: Edad Media. Ed. J. F. Galván Reula. Madrid, Cátedra, 1985, pp. 223-236.
866. 1985 Peter Stallybrass, “‘Drunk with the Cup of Liberty’: Robin Hood, the Carnivalesque, and the Rhetoric of Violence in Early Modern England.” Semiotica 54, 1985, pp. 113-45. See also, The Violence of Representation: Literature and the History of Violence. Ed. Nancy Armstrong and Leonard Tennenhouse. London, Routledge, 1989, pp. 45-76. See also, Robin Hood: An Anthology of Scholarship and Criticism. Ed. Stephen Knight. Cambridge, Brewer, 1999, pp. 297-327.
867. 1985 Jim Bradbury, The Medieval Archer. Boydell Press, 1985. Contains a chapter on Robin Hood.
868. 1986 James D. Stokes, ‘Robin Hood and the Churchwardens in Yeovil.’ Medieval & Renaissance Drama in England: An Annual Gathering of Research, Criticism and Reviews 3, 1986, pp. 1-25.
869. 1986 Yoshiko Ueno, ‘Sherwood no Mori o Tazunete-Robin Hood Densetsu.’ Eigo Seinen 132, 1986, pp. 106-110.
870. 1986-87 Sally-Beth MacLean, ‘King Games and Robin Hood: Play and Profit at Kingston upon Thames.’ Research Opportunities in Renaissance Drama 29, 1986-87, pp. 85-94.
871. 1986-87 Jill P. May, ‘The Hero’s Woods: Pyle’s Robin Hood and the Female Reader.’ Children’s Literature Association Quarterly 11.4, 1986-87 Winter, pp. 197-200.
872. 1987 Jim Lees, The Quest for Robin Hood. Nottingham, Temple Printing, 1987. See, The Many Robin Hoods 6.
873. 1987 Nigel Gray, The One and Only Robin Hood. Illustrated by Helen Craig. Boston & Toronto, Little, Brown and Company, 1987.
874. 1987 Don Nigro, Robin Hood: A Play. New York, Samuel French, 1987. In a land where the rich get richer and the poor are starving, Prince John wants to cut down Sherwood Forest to put up an arms manufactory, a slaughterhouse and a tennis court for the well to do.
875. 1987 Dean Alan Hoffman, ‘The Minstrelsy of the Greenwood: The Medieval English Outlaw Ballad in Literary and Social History.’ Dissertation University of California, Riverside, 1987.
876. 1987 Stephen Knight, ‘Bold Robin Hood: The Structures of a Tradition.’ Southern Review: Literary and Interdisciplinary Essays 20, 1987, pp. 152-167.
877. 1987 Taimi M. Ranta, ‘Howard Pyle’s The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood: The Quintessential Children’s Story.’ Touchstones: Reflections on the Best in Children’s Literature: Fairy Tales, Fables, Myths, Legends, and Poetry. Ed. Perry Nodelman and Malcolm Usrey. West Lafayette, IN, Children’s Literature Association, 1987, pp. 213-20.
878. 1987 Albert Brown, Rothwell in the 900 years after Domesday. Rothwell Advertiser Press Ltd, Lambert’s Yard, Rothwell, Leeds, 1987. A small section in this booklet gives us a different slant on the Robin Hood of Wakefield theory. See, 632 above.
879. 1988 J. R. R. Adams, ‘The Robin Hood Ballads in Ulster.’ Ulster Folklife 34, 1988, pp. 79-82.
880. 1988 David Crook, ‘The Sheriff of Nottingham and Robin Hood: the Genesis of the Legend?’ in Thirteenth Century England II. Ed. P. R. Coss and S. D. Lloyd. Woodbridge, Boydell, 1988, pp. 59-68. See, The Many Robin Hoods 11.
881. 1988 Sally Beth MacLean, ‘King Games and Robin Hood: Play and Profit at Kingston upon Thames.’ Fifteenth-Century Studies 13, 1988, pp. 309-320.
882. 1988 Viggo Hjørnager Pedersen, ‘Make It New: Howard Pyle’s Robin Hood.’ A Literary Miscellany Presented to Eric Jacobsen. Ed. Graham D. Caie and Holger Nørgaard. Copenhagen, Department of English, University of Copenhagen, 1988, pp. 338-352.
883. 1989 J. Walker McSpadden, Robin Hood. Illustrated by Greg Hildebrandt. Morris Plains, NJ, Unicorn Publishing House, 1989. Adapted from the novel by J. Walker McSpadden. Robin Hood and His Merry Outlaws by J. Walker McSpadden, was originally published in 1891. See, Children’s Books.
884. 1989 John Barnard, “Keats’s ‘Robin Hood,’ John Hamilton Reynolds, and the ‘Old Poets’.” Proceedings of the British Academy 75, 1989, pp. 181-200. See also, Robin Hood: An Anthology of Scholarship and Criticism. Ed. Stephen Knight. Cambridge, Brewer, 1999, pp. 123-40.
885. 1990 J. Walker McSpadden, Robin Hood. Illustrated by Greg Hildebrandt. Morris Plains, NJ, Unicorn Publishing House, 1990. Adapted from the novel by J. Walker McSpadden. This is an abridgment that alternates one of Hildebrandt’s color plates with a page of text. See, 883 above.
886. 1990 Rudy Behlmer, ‘Robin Hood on the Screen: From Legend to Film.’ Behind the Scenes. Hollywood, Samuel French, 1990. See also, Robin Hood: An Anthology of Scholarship and Criticism. Stephen Knight, Cambridge, Brewer, 1999, pp. 441-60.
887. 1991 Barbara Green, The Outlaw Robin Hood: His Yorkshire Legend, Kirklees Cultural Services, Huddersfield, 1991. Second impression 1992. Examines the Yorkshire side of the legend including Robin’s grave at Kirklees.
888. 1991 Larry Blamire, Robin Hood. Boston, Baker’s Plays, 1991.
889. 1991 Timothy Taylor, Elaine the Fair. Jacksonville, NC, Horseshoe Press, 1991. A lusty rewrite of the legend. Robin Hood is an ex-Crusader whose pregnant Muslim lady had been slaughtered by the men of King Richard the Lionheart. Robin seeks revenge, and he has an obsessive love for Elaine the Fair, the most beautiful woman of the English court, who is married to Arthur the Assessor.
890. 1991 Eric R. Anderson, ‘Game and Reality in Medieval and Renaissance English Outlaw Narratives.’ Aethlon: The Journal of Sport Literature 8, 1991, pp. 73-88.
891. 1991 Margarete Pauline Wenzel, ‘Weite-enge-weite: Versuche, Ueber Robin Hood Zu Philosophieren.’ Dissertation Universitäet Wien, 1991.
892. 1992 Shannon Drake, Damsel in Distress. New York, Avon Books, 1992. Katherine de Montrain is the beautiful heiress who frolics with Robin Hood’s band as Lady Greensleeves.
893. 1992 Andrew Ayton, ‘Military Service and the Development of the Robin Hood Legend in the Fourteenth Century.’ Nottingham Medieval Studies 36, 1992, pp. 126-47. See, Robyn Hod Isle of Wight.
894. 1992 Barbara Hanawalt, ‘Ballads and Bandits: Fourteenth-Century Outlaws and the Robin Hood Poems.’ Chaucer’s England: Literature in Historical Context. Minneapolis, University of Minnesota Press, 1992, pp. 154-75. See also, Robin Hood: An Anthology of Scholarship and Criticism. Stephen Knight, Cambridge, Brewer, 1999, pp. 263-84.
895. 1992 Tom Hayes, The Birth of Popular Culture: Ben Jonson, Maid Marian, and Robin Hood. Pittsburgh, PA, Duquesne University Press, 1992.
896. 1992 Lutz Tantow, ‘Robin Hood aus Istanbul: Privatdetektiv Kemal Kayankaya im Gespräch mit Lutz Tantow.’ Die Horen: Zeitschrift fur Literatur, Kunst und Kritik 37, 1992, pp. 44-47.
897. 1992 Richard Wilson, “‘Like the Old Robin Hood’: As You Like It and the Enclosure Riots.” Shakespeare Quarterly 43, 1992, pp. 1-19.
898. 1992 Janet Meriwether Withers, ‘The Minstrel in the Manuscript: Echoes of Orality in Middle English Poetry.’ Dissertation Emory University, 1992.
899. 1992 Andrew Sinclair, The Sword and the Grail. Crown Publishers, 1992. Sinclair believed that cross on Robin Hood’s grave slab at Kirklees was a Templar Cross, ‘implying that he (Robin Hood) was a knight of that Military Order’. See, Robin Hood’s Grave 5.
900. 1993 Rick Fenn and Peter Howarth, ‘Robin, Prince of Sherwood.’ See, Operas, Musicals, and Pantomime 2.
901. 1993 Arthur Freeman, Robin Hood: the ‘Forresters’ Manuscript. London, Bernard Quaritch, 1993.
902. 1993 H. Philip Bolton, ‘Playing Rob Roy as Robin Hood.’ Scott in Carnival. Ed. J. H. Alexander and David Hewitt. Aberdeen, Association for Scottish Literary Studies, 1993, pp. 478-90.
903. 1993 Stephen Knight, ‘Robin Hood and the Royal Restoration.’ Critical Survey 5, 1993, pp. 298-312.
904. 1993 John Matthews, ‘The Games of Robin Hood.’ Robin Hood, Green Lord of the Wildwood. Ed. John Matthews. Oxford, Gothic Image Publications, 1993. See also, Robin Hood: An Anthology of Scholarship and Criticism. Stephen Knight, Cambridge, Brewer, 1999, pp. 393-410.
905. 1993 Jill P. May, ‘They’re Still Family Heroes: Robin Hood and Popeye in Feature-Length Films.’ The Antic Art: Enhancing Children’s Literary Experiences Through Film and Video. Ed. Lucy Rollin. Fort Atkinson, WI, Highsmith, 1993, pp. 51-62.
906. 1993 Colin Richmond, ‘An Outlaw and Some Peasants: The Possible Significance of Robin Hood.’ Nottingham Medieval Studies 37, 1993, pp. 90-101. See also, Robin Hood: An Anthology of Scholarship and Criticism. Ed. Stephen Knight. Cambridge, Brewer, 1999, pp. 363-76.
907. 1993 Lisa Schubert, ‘Managing a Multicultural Work Force in Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves.’ The Centennial Review 37, 1993, pp. 571-92.
908. 1993 Steve Wilson, Robin Hood: The Spirit of the Forest. Neptune Press, 1993. Wilson looks at the mythical aspects associated with Robin Hood. Wilson examines several Hindu, Egyptian, Celtic and Norse myths for clues to the origins of the original legend, and finds several parallels in these ancient myths not only to Robin Hood, but also to King Arthur.
909. 1993-1995 George Swan, “Robin Hood’s ‘Irish Knife’: Irony in the Guy of Gisborne Ballad.” University of Mississippi Studies in English 11-12, 1993-1995, pp. 51-80.
910. 1994 Stephen Knight, Robin Hood a Complete Study of the English Outlaw. See, Historical Books.
911. 1994 Clayton Emery, ‘Dowsing the Demon.’ 1994. Made available through the University of Rochester Robin Hood Project, with his permission. This short story includes the characters Robin, Marian, Sheriff Martin, and Denis.
912. 1994 Thomas R. Mitchell, “Keats’s ‘Outlawry’ in ‘Robin Hood’.” SEL: Studies in English Literature, 1500-1900 34, 1994, pp. 753-69.
913. 1994 Joan B. Williamson, ‘The Roman de Renart and Walt Disney’s Robin Hood.’ Reinardus: Yearbook of the International Reynard Society/Annuaire de la Société Internationale Renardienne 7, 1994, p. 229.
914. 1995 Graham Phillips & Martin Keatman, Robin Hood the Man Behind the Myth. See, Historical Books.
915. 1995 Esther M. Friesner, Sherwood Game. Riverdale, New York, Baen, 1995.
916. 1995 Kevin Carpenter, Robin Hood: The Many Faces of that Celebrated English Outlaw. Oldenburg, Bibliotheks – und Informationssystem der Universität Oldenburg, 1995.
917. 1995 Jens-Ulrich Davids, ‘Die Prozession der Galgenstricke.’ Robin Hood: The Many Faces of that Celebrated English Outlaw. Ed. Kevin Carpenter. Oldenburg, Bibliotheks – und Informationssystem der Universität Oldenburg, 1995, pp. 107-120.
918. 1995 Barrie Dobson and John Taylor, “‘Rymes of Robin Hood’: The Early Ballads and the Gest.” Robin Hood: The Many Faces of that Celebrated English Outlaw. Ed. Kevin Carpenter. Oldenburg, Bibliotheks – und Informationssystem der Universität Oldenburg, 1995, pp. 35-44.
919. 1995 James C. Holt, ‘Robin Hood: The Origins of the Legend.’ Robin Hood: The Many Faces of that Celebrated English Outlaw. Ed. Kevin Carpenter. Oldenburg, Bibliotheks – und Informationssystem der Universität Oldenburg, 1995, pp. 27-34.
920. 1995 Bianca Jung, ‘Faszination des Mittelalters.” Robin Hood: The Many Faces of that Celebrated English Outlaw. Ed. Kevin Carpenter. Oldenburg, Bibliotheks – und Informationssystem der Universität Oldenburg, 1995, pp. 53-63.
921. 1995 Stephen Knight, ‘The Emergence of Robin Hood as a National Hero.’ Robin Hood: The Many Faces of that Celebrated English Outlaw. Ed. Kevin Carpenter. Oldenburg, Bibliotheks – und Informationssystem der Universität Oldenburg, 1995, pp. 45-52.
922. 1995 Klaus H. Köhring, ‘Die Amerikanisierung des Robin Hood: Form und Funktion amerikanischer Volkshelden.’ Robin Hood: The Many Faces of that Celebrated English Outlaw. Ed. Kevin Carpenter. Oldenburg, Bibliotheks – und Informationssystem der Universität Oldenburg, 1995, pp. 121-134.
923. 1995 Jill P. May, ‘Howard Pyle’s American Interpretation of British Legend.’ Robin Hood: The Many Faces of that Celebrated English Outlaw. Ed. Kevin Carpenter. Oldenburg, Bibliotheks – und Informationssystem der Universität Oldenburg, 1995, pp. 79-86.
924. 1995 Robin McKinley, ‘Ordinary Heroes / Gewöhnliche Helden.’ Robin Hood: The Many Faces of that Celebrated English Outlaw. Ed. Kevin Carpenter. Oldenburg, Bibliotheks – und Informationssystem der Universität Oldenburg, 1995, pp. 96-100.
925. 1995 Thomas H. Ohlgren, ‘Teaching Robin Hood at the University: A Practical Guide.’ Robin Hood: The Many Faces of that Celebrated English Outlaw. Ed. Kevin Carpenter. Oldenburg, Bibliotheks – und Informationssystem der Universität Oldenburg, 1995, pp. 145-154.
926. 1995 Dieter Petzold, ‘Der Rebell im Kinderzimmer: Robin Hood in der Kinderliteratur.’ Robin Hood: The Many Faces of that Celebrated English Outlaw. Ed. Kevin Carpenter. Oldenburg, Bibliotheks – und Informationssystem der Universität Oldenburg, 1995, pp. 65-78.
927. 1995 Heike Rautenhaus, ‘Robin Hood, vom Sherwood ins Klassenzimmer: Zur Behandlung des Mythos im Englischunterricht.’ Robin Hood: The Many Faces of that Celebrated English Outlaw. Ed. Kevin Carpenter. Oldenburg, Bibliotheks – und Informationssystem der Universität Oldenburg, 1995, pp. 155-163.
928. 1995 Jeffrey Richards, ‘Robin Hood on the Screen.’ Robin Hood: The Many Faces of that Celebrated Outlaw. Ed. Kevin Carpenter. Oldenburg, Bibliotheks -Informationssystem der Universität Oldenburg, 1995, pp. 135-144. See also, Robin Hood: An Anthology of Scholarship and Criticism. Ed. Stephen Knight. Cambridge, Brewer, 1999, pp. 429-40.
929. 1995 Tilman Röhrig, ‘Und er fand den Pfeil / And He Found the Arrow.’ Robin Hood: The Many Faces of that Celebrated English Outlaw. Ed. Kevin Carpenter. Oldenburg, Bibliotheks – und Informationssystem der Universität Oldenburg, 1995, pp. 101-105.
930. 1995 Gudrun Stenzel, ‘Robin Hood und Maid Marian: Eine abenteuerliche Romanze?’ Robin Hood: The Many Faces of that Celebrated English Outlaw. Ed. Kevin Carpenter. Oldenburg, Bibliotheks – und Informationssystem der Universität Oldenburg, 1995, pp. 87-95.
931. 1995 Robert Talbot, ‘The Wakefield Master, Robin Hood, and the Agrarian Struggle of the Latter Middle Ages.’ Dissertation Duke University, 1995.
932. 1995 Kristin Vincke, ‘Zwischen historischem Dokument, Sozialromantik und Kitsch: Räuber im Spielfilm.’ Schurke oder Held? Historische Räuber und Räuberbanden. Ed. Johannes Brümmer. Sigmaringen, Thorbecke, 1995, pp. 227-37.
933. 1995 Masa Ikegami, ‘“The Language and the Date of “A Gest of Robyn Hode.” Neuphilologische Mitteilungen, Vol. 96, No. 3 (1995), pp. 271-281.
934. 1996 Gary Yershon, The Adventures of Robin Hood. Bristol, Gary Yershon, 1996.
935. 1996 Stephanie Lynn Barczewski, “‘Nations Make their Own Gods and Heroes’: The Legends of King Arthur and Robin Hood in British Political Culture, 1789-1901.” Dissertation, Yale University, 1996.
936. 1996 Nancy Mason Bradbury, “The ‘Tale of Gamelyn’ as a Greenwood Outlaw Talking.” Southern Folklore 53, 1996, pp. 207-23.
937. 1996 Christopher Hill, ‘Robin Hood.’ Liberty Against the Law. Harmondsworth, Penguin, 1996. See also, Robin Hood: An Anthology of Scholarship and Criticism. Ed. Stephen Knight. Cambridge, Brewer, 1999, pp. 285-95.
938. 1996 Stephen Knight, ‘Robin Hood: Men in Tights: Fitting the Tradition Snugly.’ Pulping Fictions: Consuming Culture Across the Literature/Media Divide. Ed. Deborah Cartmell, I. Q. Hunter, Heidi Kaye, and Imelda Welehan. London, Pluto Press, 1996. See also, Robin Hood: An Anthology of Scholarship and Criticism. Ed. Stephen Knight. Cambridge: Brewer, 1999, pp. 461-67.
939. 1996 Stephen Knight, ‘Outlaw Myths; or, Was Robin Hood Alone in the Woods?’ Myth and Its Legacy in European Literature. Ed. Neil Thomas and Françoise Le Saux. Durham, University of Durham, 1996, pp. 39-48.
940. 1996 Tim Lundgren, ‘The Robin Hood Ballads and the English Outlaw Tradition.’ Southern Folklore 53, 1996, pp. 225-47.
941. 1996 Evelyn M. Perry, ‘The Battle to Possess Sherwood.’ The Journal of American Folklore 109, 1996, pp. 437-440.
942. 1996 Jenny Rebecca Rytting, ‘Famous in Legend and Story: Robin McKinley’s Portrayal of Heroes.’ MA Thesis, Acadia University, 1996.
943. 1996 Graham Seal, The Outlaw Legend: A Cultural Tradition in Britain, America and Australia. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1996.
944. 1997 Stephen Knight and Thomas Ohlgren, Robin Hood and Other Outlaw Tales. See, Historical Books.
945. 1997 Lucas Mikael Darche Aykroyd, ‘Deception and Impersonation in the Robin Hood Tradition: A Comparison of Medieval and Nineteenth-Century Approaches.’ MA Thesis, University of Victoria, 1997.
946. 1997 Anne K. Kaler, ‘Who Is That Monk in the Hood? Friar Tuck, Francis of Assisi, and Robin Hood.’ Journal of Popular Culture 30, 1997, pp. 51-74.
947. 1997 Christine Richardson, ‘The Figure of Robin Hood Within the Carnival Tradition.’ Records of Early English Drama Newsletter 22, 1997, pp. 18-25.
948. 1997 Claire Sponsler, ‘Counterfeit in Their Array: Cross-Dressing in Robin Hood Performances.’ Chapter Two of Drama and Resistance: Bodies, Goods, and Theatricality in Late Medieval England. Minneapolis, University of Minnesota Press, 1997, pp. 24-49.
949. 1998 Stephen Knight, Robin Hood: The Forresters Manuscript, British Library Additional MS 71158. With a Manuscript Description by Hilton Kelliher. Cambridge, D. S. Brewer, 1998. The Forresters manuscript was discovered in 1993, at an auction house, by A. R. Heath, a Bristol bookseller. It was sold to the London book-dealer Bernard Quaritch, and ended up in the British Library. First published in 1998, the manuscript contains only twenty-two Robin Hood ballads, which includes two versions of Robin Hood and the Pinder of Wakefield. The twenty-two ballads are numbered from 1 to 21 on the manuscript’s table of contents. The first and last ballads on the list have the title Robin Hood and the Forresters, which gives the manuscript its name. The sixteen ballads that appear in the Robin Hood garlands of 1663 and 1670 (see, 1663 and 1670 above) are found in the manuscript, but only the last four of the Forresters texts are copied from the garland of 1670. Of the other twelve ballads that correspond with the garland contents, only Robin Hood and the Begger and Robin Hood and Will Scathlock appear to have any textual links with the garlands. They and the other ten Forresters ballads that appear in the two early garlands are often quite similar to the separately sold sheets printed on one side, which were known as broadsides. See, 559 above.
The watermarks on the pages, and the fact that the last four texts derive from the 1670 edition of Robin Hood’s Garland, suggests that the manuscript was written in the 1670s. The writing in the manuscript appears to be the work of two people, a supervisor, and a scribe. According to Knight, ‘The unusual feature of two scribes working on a short manuscript suggests that the supervisor was a person of leisure, who found the mechanics of copying taxing, and from ballad 5 on usually employed a professional to complete each text’. Some of the texts have only minor differences from ballads already known, but at least two, Robin Hoods Fishing and Robin Hood and Queen Catherin, are superior to the copies in The English and Scottish Popular Ballads by Francis James Child. Some of the other texts are quite different from familiar versions, such as Robin Hood and the Old Wife, Robin Hood and the Butcher and Robin Hood and the Pinder 1. Three other Forresters ballads are quite unique: Robin Hood and the Bride is somewhat similar to Robin Hood and Allin a Dale, and Robin Hood and the Sheriffe and Robin Hood and the King were based on a ballad which had not previously been recorded until well into the eighteenth century. The stories of Robin Hood and the Bride and Robin Hood and Will Scathlock as well as that of the Pinder, all existed before the Sloane ‘Life’ of about 1600 (see, 397 above). However these ballads in their Forresters form, are closer to the Sloane ‘Life’ than the surviving printed ballads, which indicates that Forresters had some access to a source older and less edited than the sources for the printed texts – older sources that were perhaps in manuscript form.
Apart from the last four ballads which are copied from the 1670 garland, it is uncertain as to the actual sources, printed or otherwise, that were used by the supervisor of the Forresters manuscript. Knight speculates that the ‘Forresters manuscript itself might well have been prepared with the intention of using it as copy for a new garland’, a project perhaps abandoned after the appearance of the 1670 garland.
Knight sees the Forresters manuscript as making ‘the history of seventeenth-century Robin Hood ballads significantly different from the settled state which had been read from the survivals reported by Child. With the new manuscript, more was known about the texts; a new light was cast on scholarly and creative activity in this area; some problems were solved; some enigmas were revealed.’ On the other hand, there are no entirely new ballads in the collection, and it could be said that the manuscript was simply an attempt to produce a new Robin Hood garland, using resources available at the time – this does not diminish its importance as a valuable source for the tales of Robin Hood. See also, Flinders Academic Commons, Graham Tulloch, Department of English, Flinders University (online).
950. 1998 Thomas H. Ohlgren, ‘A Gest of Robyn Hode.’ In Thomas Ohlgren, Medieval Outlaws: Ten Tales in Modern English. Phoenix Mill, Sutton, 1998. pp. 216-238.
951. 1998 David Blamires, Robin Hood: A Hero For All Times. Manchester, The John Rylands University Library of Manchester, 1998.
952. 1998 Clare Blatchley, ‘The Theme of Exile in Robin Hood.’ MA Thesis, Southern Connecticut State University, 1998.
953. 1998 Lois Potter, Playing Robin Hood: The Legend as Performance in Five Centuries. Newark, DE, University of Delaware Press, 1998.
954. 1998 Edwin Davenport, ‘The Representation of Robin Hood in Elizabethan Drama: George a Greene and Edward I.’ Playing Robin Hood: The Legend as Performance in Five Centuries. Ed. Lois Potter. Newark, DE, University of Delaware Press, 1998, pp. 45-62.
955. 1998 Michael R. Evans, ‘Robynhill, or Robin Hood’s Hills? Place-Names and the Evolution of the Robin Hood Legends.’ Journal of the English Place-Name Society 30, 1998, pp. 43-51. See, Robin Hood Place Names.
956. 1998 Dan Georgakas, ‘Robin Hood: From Roosevelt to Reagan.’ Play It Again, Sam: Retakes on Remakes. Ed. Andrew Horton, Stuart Y. McDougal, and Leo Braudy. Berkeley, CA, University of California Press, 1998, pp. 70-79.
957. 1998 Stephen Knight, “‘Quite Another Man’: The Restoration Robin Hood.” Playing Robin Hood: The Legend as Performance in Five Centuries. Ed. Lois Potter. Newark, DE, University of Delaware Press, 1998, pp. 167-81.
958. 1998 Natalie O. Kononenko, ‘Clothes Unmake the Social Bandit: Sten’ka Razin and the Golyt’ba.’ Playing Robin Hood: The Legend as Performance in Five Centuries. Ed. Lois Potter. Newark, DE, University of Delaware Press, 1998, pp. 111-135.
959. 1998 John Marshall, “‘Goon in-to Bernysdale’: The Trail of the Paston Robin Hood Play.” Leeds Studies in English 29, 1998, pp. 185-217.
960. 1998 Katherine M. Morsberger and Robert E. Morsberger, “Robin Hood on Film: Can We Ever Again ‘Make Them Like They Used To’?” Playing Robin Hood: The Legend as Performance in Five Centuries. Ed. Lois Potter. Newark, DE, University of Delaware Press, 1998, pp. 205-31.
961. 1998 Michael Shapiro, ‘Cross-Dressing in Elizabethan Robin Hood Plays.’ Playing Robin Hood: The Legend as Performance in Five Centuries. Ed. Lois Potter. Newark, DE, University of Delaware Press, 1998, pp. 77-90.
962. 1998 Jeffrey L. Singman, ‘Munday’s Unruly Earl.’ Playing Robin Hood: The Legend as Performance in Five Centuries. Ed. Lois Potter. Newark, DE, University of Delaware Press, 1998, pp. 63-76.
963. 1998 Alexandra F. Johnston, ‘The Robin Hood of the Records.’ Playing Robin Hood: The Legend as Performance in Five Centuries. Ed. Lois Potter. Newark, DE, University of Delaware Press, 1998, pp. 27-44.
964. 1998 Max Harris, ‘Sweet Moll and Malinche: Maid Marian Goes to Mexico.’ Playing Robin Hood: The Legend as Performance in Five Centuries. Ed. Lois Potter. Newark, DE, University of Delaware Press, 1998.
965. 1998 Yoshiko Ueno, ‘Robin Hood in Japan.’ Playing Robin Hood: The Legend as Performance in Five Centuries. Ed. Lois Potter. Newark, DE, University of Delaware Press, 1998.
966. 1998 Lois Potter, ‘The Apotheosis of Maid Marian: Tennyson’s The Foresters and the Nineteenth Century Theatre.’ Playing Robin Hood: The Legend as Performance in Five Centuries. Ed. Lois Potter. Newark, DE, University of Delaware Press, 1998.
967. 1998 Jeffrey L. Singman, Robin Hood: The Shaping of the Legend. Westport, CT & London, Greenwood Press, 1998. A good overview of the legend, including a comprehensive list of Robin Hood Games, supplied by the Records of Early English Drama project (REED) and others, with contributions by: Alexandra Johnston, director of REED; Sally-Beth MacLean, executive editor of REED; James Stokes; Peter Greenfield; Evelyn Newlyn and Sally L. Joyce; Rosalind C. Hays and C. E. Mc Gee. There are also some records taken from the book by Anna Jean Mill (Medieval Plays in Scotland, Edinburgh and London, W. Blackwood and Sons, 1927).
968. 1998 Richard Rutherford-Moore, The Legend of Robin Hood. Capall Bann Publishing, 1998. The first book of his Robin Hood trilogy, about the life and times of the most legendary bowman of all time.
969. 1999 Keely Fisher, ‘The Crying of ane Playe: Robin Hood and Maying in Sixteenth-Century Scotland’, Medieval and Renaissance Drama in England, Vol. 12, Associated University Presses, Inc., 1999, pp. 19-58. Examines this dramatic text in Older Scots, and an overview of Robin Hood celebrations in Scotland.
970. 1999 Stephen Knight, Robin Hood: Anthology of scholarship and criticism, D. S. Brewer, Cambridge, 1999. Contains articles by various authors, including David C. Fowler, R. B. Dobson and J. Taylor, and David Wiles.
971. 1999 Richard Barber, Myths and Legends of the British Isles. Suffolk: Boydell & Brewer, 1999. (Robin Hood, pp. 504-555).
972. 1999 Oscar De Ville, ‘The Deyvilles and the Genesis of the Robin Hood Legend.’ Nottingham Medieval Studies 43, 1999, pp. 90-109. See, Robert Hod Isle of Ely.
973. 1999 Peter H. Greenfield, ‘The Carnivalesque in the Robin Hood Games and King Ales of Southern England.’ Carnival and the Carnivalesque: The Fool, the Reformer, the Wildman, and Others in Early Modern Theatre. Ed. Konrad Eisenbichler and Wim Hüsken. Amsterdam, Rodopi, 1999, pp. 19-28.
974. 1999 Stephen Knight, ‘Robin Hood and the Printer.’ Trivium 31, 1999, pp. 155-68.
975. 1999 Stephen Knight, ‘From Print to Script: Editing the Forresters Manuscript.’ Ballads into Books: The Legacies of Francis James Child. Ed. Tom Cheesman and Sigrid Rieuwerts. Bern, Peter Lang, 1999, pp. 179-87.
976. 1999 Bernard Isaac Lumpkin, ‘The Making of a Medieval Outlaw: Code and Community in the Robin Hood Legend, 1400-1600.’ Dissertation Harvard University, 1999.
977. 1999 Scott Allen Nollen, Robin Hood: A Cinematic History of the English Outlaw and his Scottish Counterparts. Jefferson, NC & London, McFarland & Company, 1999.
978. 1999 Evelyn Mooar Perry, ‘Maid in Voyage: Maid Marian and Female Heroism in Twentieth Century Retellings of the Legend of Robin Hood.’ Dissertation University of Rhode Island, 1999.
979. 1999 Julie Sanders, ‘Jonson, The Sad Shepherd and the North Midlands.’ Ben Jonson Journal: Literary Contexts in the Age of Elizabeth, James and Charles 6, 1999, pp. 49-68.
980. 2000 Mary Lynn Dobson, The Somewhat True Tale of Robin Hood. Woodstock, IL, Dramatic Publishing, 2000.
981. 2000 Dudley Jones, ‘Reconstructing Robin Hood: Ideology, Popular Film, and Television.’ A Necessary Fantasy? The Heroic Figure in Children’s Popular Culture. Dudley Jones and Tony Watkins. New York, Garland, 2000. pp. 111-35.
982. 2000 Frank Abbott, ‘Theme Park Tales from Nottingham.’ Robin Hood in Popular Culture: Violence, Transgression, and Justice. Ed. Thomas Hahn. Cambridge, D. S. Brewer, 2000, pp. 13-20.
983. 2000 Stephanie L Barczewski, Myth and National Identity in Nineteenth-Century Britain: the Legends of King Arthur and Robin Hood. Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2000.
984. 2000 Sarah Beach, “Robin Hood and Green Arrow: Outlaw Bowmen in the Modern Urban Landscape.” Robin Hood in Popular Culture: Violence, Transgression, and Justice. Ed. Thomas Hahn. Cambridge, D. S. Brewer, 2000, pp. 21-28.
985. 2000 Laura Blunk, ‘Red Robin: The Radical Politics of Richard Carpenter’s Robin of Sherwood.’ Robin Hood in Popular Culture: Violence, Transgression, and Justice. Ed. Thomas Hahn. Cambridge, D. S. Brewer, 2000, pp. 29-39.
986. 2000 Kelly DeVries, ‘Longbow Archery and the Earliest Robin Hood Legends.’ Robin Hood in Popular Culture: Violence, Transgression, and Justice. Ed. Thomas Hahn. Cambridge, D. S. Brewer, 2000, pp. 41-59.
987. 2000 R. B. Dobson, ‘Robin Hood: the Genesis of a Popular Hero.’ Robin Hood in Popular Culture: Violence, Transgression, and Justice. Ed. Thomas Hahn. Cambridge, D. S. Brewer, 2000, pp. 61-77.
988. 2000 Geoff Doel and Fran Doel, Robin Hood: Outlaw or Greenwood Myth. Stroud, Tempus Publishing, 2000.
989. 2000 Michael Eaton, ‘A Voice from the Hood, Or Adventures in The Green Trade: A Convulsion in Seven Fits.’ Robin Hood in Popular Culture: Violence, Transgression, and Justice. Ed. Thomas Hahn. Cambridge, D. S. Brewer, 2000, pp. 79-86.
990. 2000 Thomas Hahn, ‘Playing with Transgression: Robin Hood and Popular Culture.’ Robin Hood in Popular Culture: Violence, Transgression, and Justice. Ed. Thomas Hahn. Cambridge, D. S. Brewer, 2000 pp. 1-11.
991. 2000 Thomas Hahn, Robin Hood in Popular Culture: Violence, Transgression, and Justice. Cambridge, D. S. Brewer, 2000.
992. 2000 Kevin J. Harty, ‘Robin Hood on Film: Moving Beyond a Swashbuckling Stereotype.’ Robin Hood in Popular Culture: Violence, Transgression, and Justice. Ed. Thomas Hahn. Cambridge, D. S. Brewer, 2000, pp. 87-100.
993. 2000 Stuart Kane, ‘Horseplay: Robin Hood, Guy of Gisborne, and the Neg(oti)ation of the Bestial.’ Robin Hood in Popular Culture: Violence, Transgression, and Justice. Ed. Thomas Hahn. Cambridge, D. S. Brewer, 2000, pp. 101-110.
994. 2000 Siobhan Keenan, ‘Recusant Involvement in a Robin Hood Play at Brandsby Church, Yorkshire, 1615.’ Notes and Queries 47, 2000, pp. 475-78.
995. 2000 Stephen Knight, ‘Which Way to the Forest? Directions in Robin Hood Studies.’ Robin Hood in Popular Culture: Violence, Transgression, and Justice. Ed. Thomas Hahn. Cambridge, D. S. Brewer, 2000, pp. 111-128.
996. 2000 David Lampe, ‘The Heirs/Errors of Ivanhoe: Robin Hood in Pre- and Post-Modern Fiction.’ Robin Hood in Popular Culture: Violence, Transgression, and Justice. Ed. Thomas Hahn. Cambridge, D. S. Brewer, 2000, pp. 129-139.
997. 2000 Bernard Lumpkin, ‘The Ties that Bind: Outlaw and Community in the Robin Hood Ballads and the Romance of Eustace the Monk.’ Robin Hood in Popular Culture: Violence, Transgression, and Justice. Ed. Thomas Hahn. Cambridge, D. S. Brewer, 2000, pp. 141-150.
998. 2000 Sherron Lux, “And the ‘Reel’ Maid Marian?” Robin Hood in Popular Culture: Violence, Transgression, and Justice. Ed. Thomas Hahn. Cambridge, D. S. Brewer, 2000, pp. 151-160.
999. 2000 Anne Scott MacLeod, ‘Howard Pyle’s Robin Hood: The Middle Ages for Americans.’ Children’s Literature Association Quarterly 25, 2000, pp. 44-48.
1000. 2000 John Marshall, ‘Playing the Game: Reconstructing Robin Hood and the Sheriff of Nottingham.’ Robin Hood in Popular Culture: Violence, Transgression, and Justice. Ed. Thomas Hahn. Cambridge, D. S. Brewer, 2000, pp. 161-174.
1001. 2000 Thomas H. Ohlgren, ‘Edwardus Redivivus in A Gest of Robyn Hode.’ Journal of English and Germanic Philology 99, 2000, pp. 1-28.
1002. 2000 Thomas H. Ohlgren, “The ‘Marchaunt’ of Sherwood: Mercantile Ideology in A Gest of Robyn Hode.” Robin Hood in Popular Culture: Violence, Transgression, and Justice. Ed. Thomas Hahn, Cambridge, D. S. Brewer, 2000, pp. 175-190.
1003. 2000 Evelyn M. Perry, ‘Disguising and Revealing the Female Hero’s Identity: Cross-dressing in the Ballad of Robin Hood and Maid Marian.’ Robin Hood in Popular Culture: Violence, Transgression, and Justice. Ed. Thomas Hahn. Cambridge, D. S. Brewer, 2000, pp. 191-196.
1004. 2000 Helen Phillips, ‘Forest, Town, and Road: The Significance of Places and Names in Some Robin Hood Texts.’ Robin Hood in Popular Culture: Violence, Transgression, and Justice. Ed. Thomas Hahn. Cambridge, D. S. Brewer, 2000, pp. 197-214.
1005. 2000 Lois Potter, ‘Sherwood Forest and the Byronic Robin Hood.’ Robin Hood in Popular Culture: Violence, Transgression, and Justice. Ed. Thomas Hahn. Cambridge, D. S. Brewer, 2000, pp. 215-224.
1006. 2000 Marcus A. J. Smith, and Julian Wasserman. ‘In the Sheriff’s Court: Robin Hood and American Jurisprudence, Or, Who Is This Robin Hood and Why Are All Those Lawyers Saying Such Nasty Things About Him?’ Robin Hood in Popular Culture: Violence, Transgression, and Justice. Ed. Thomas Hahn. Cambridge, D. S. Brewer, 2000, pp. 225-238.
1007. 2000 Lorraine Kochanske Stock, ‘Lords of the Wildwood: The Wild Man, the Green Man, and Robin Hood.’ Robin Hood in Popular Culture: Violence, Transgression, and Justice. Ed. Thomas Hahn. Cambridge, D. S. Brewer, 2000, pp. 239-249.
1008. 2000 Linda V. Troost, ‘Robin Hood Musicals in Eighteenth-Century London.’ Robin Hood in Popular Culture: Violence, Transgression, and Justice. Ed. Thomas Hahn. Cambridge, D. S. Brewer, 2000, pp. 251-264.
1009. 2000 Yoshiko Ueno, ‘Murayama’s Robin Hood: the Most Radical Variant in Japan.’ Robin Hood in Popular Culture: Violence, Transgression, and Justice. Ed. Thomas Hahn. Cambridge, D. S. Brewer, 2000, pp. 265-272.
1010. 2000 Gary Yershon, ‘Robin Hood in Cheltenham.’ Robin Hood in Popular Culture: Violence, Transgression, and Justice. Ed. Thomas Hahn. Cambridge, D. S. Brewer, 2000, pp. 273-278.
1011. 2000 Pierre Lurbe, ‘Le mythe de Robin des Bois.’ Cités, No. 2, Michel Foucault : de la guerre des races au biopouvoir (2000), pp. 71-81.
1012. 2000 ‘Robin Hood Plays’ (pp. 269-452). From: Robin Hood and Other Outlaw Tales, Medieval Institute Publications (2000).
1013. 2001 Ludger Kaczmarek, “‘When Men Get Merry’: Vom feiern im Wald in The Adventures of Robin Hood.” Montage/AV: Zeitschrift für Theorie und Geschichte audiovisueller Kommunikation 10. 2, 2001, pp. 37-42.
1014. 2001 Robert Leach, “As You Like It-A ‘Robin Hood’ Play.” English Studies: A Journal of English Language and Literature 82, 2001, pp. 393-400.
1015. 2001 John Marshall, “‘Comyth in Robyn Hode’: Paying and Playing the Outlaw at Croscombe.” Leeds Studies in English 32, 2001, pp. 345-68.
1016. 2001 Thomas H. Ohlgren, ‘Richard Call, the Pastons, and the Manuscript Context of Robin Hood and the Potter (Cambridge, University Library Ee.4.35.1).’ Nottingham Medieval Studies 45, 2001, pp. 210-33.
1017. 2001 A. J. Pollard, ‘Idealising Criminality: Robin Hood in the Fifteenth Century.’ In R. E. Horrox and S. Rees Jones, Eds. Pragmatic Utopias: Ideals and Communities, 1200-1630. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2001, pp. 156-73.
1018. 2001 A. J. Pollard and R. L. Almond, ‘The Yeomanry of Robin Hood and Social Terminology in Fifteenth-Century England.’ Past and Present 170, Feb. 2001, pp. 52-77.
1019. 2001 Jeffrey Richards, ‘Robin Hood on Film and Television since 1945.’ Visual Culture in Britain 2, 2001, pp. 65-80.
1020. 2001 Richard Rutherford-Moore, Robin Hood: On the Outlaw Trail. Capall Bann Publishing, 2001. The second book of his Robin Hood trilogy.
1021. 2001-2002 Richard Clouet, ‘The Robin Hood Legend and Its Cultural Adaptation for the Film Industry: Comparing Literary Sources with Filmic Representations.’ Journal of English Studies 3, 2001-2002, pp. 37-46.
1022. 2002 Christine Chism, ‘Robin Hood: Thinking Globally, Acting Locally in the Fifteenth-Century Ballads.’ The Letter of the Law: Legal Practice and Literary Production in Medieval England. Ed. Emily Steiner and Candace Barrington. Ithaca, NY, Cornell University Press, 2002, pp. 12-39.
1023. 2002 Sean Field, ‘Devotion, Discontent, and the Henrician Reformation: The Evidence of the Robin Hood Stories.’ The Journal of British Studies 41, 2002, pp. 6-22.
1024. 2002 Jeffrey Steven Theis, ‘The Wildwood and Sylvan Pastoral: Nature, History, and Genre in Early Modern England.’ Dissertation University of Wisconsin, Madison, 2002.
1025. 2002 Daniel Mersey, The Legendary Tales and Historical Truths of the Most Notorious Warriors. Conway, 2002. This book quotes ‘translations’ and ‘modernizations’ of the ‘Gest’.
1026. 2003 Stephen Knight, Robin Hood: A Mythic Biography, Cornell University Press, 2003. Knight traces the development of the Hood myth from its earliest medieval origins to the outlaw’s emergence as a Hollywood hero.
1027. 2003 Vera Nünning, “A ‘Usable Past’: Fictions of Memory and British National Identity.” Journal for the Study of British Cultures 10, 2003, pp. 27-48.
1028. 2003 Victor I. Scherb, “‘I’de Have a Shooting’: Catherine of Aragon’s Receptions of Robin Hood.” Research Opportunities in Renaissance Drama 42, 2003, pp. 123-46.
1029. 2003 Meredith Skura, ‘Anthony Munday’s : “Gentrification” of Robin Hood.’ English Literary Renaissance, Vol. 33, No. 2 (Spring 2003), pp. 155-180.
1030. 2004 A. J. Pollard, Imagining Robin Hood. See, Historical Books.
1031. 2004 Stephen Knight, ‘How Red Was Robin Hood?’ Running Wild: Essays, Fictions and Memoirs Presented to Michael Wilding. Ed. David Brooks and Brian Kiernan. New Delhi, Manohar, 2004, pp. 12-28.
1032. 2004 David Greenwood, The Origins of Robin Hood. Nottingham, 2004. This booklet contains several theories, and Greenwood suggests that the ballads of Robin Hood ‘began in Yorkshire and were created by a Yorkshireman and later settled and grew organically in Nottingham’.
1033. 2004 David Greenwood, Yorkshire Origins of the Earliest Ballads of Robin Hood. Nottingham?, 2004.
1034. 2004 J. C. Holt, ‘Hood, Robin’ in Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford University Press, 2004.
1035. 2004 Richard Firth Green, ‘Violence in the Early Robin Hood Poems’ (pp. 268-286). From: ‘A Great Effusion of Blood’?: Interpreting Medieval Violence, University of Toronto Press (2004).
1036. 2004 Richard Rutherford-Moore, Robin Hood: On the Outlaw Trail Again. Capall Bann Publishing, 2004. The final book of his Robin Hood trilogy, which takes the reader back ‘on the outlaw trail’ from Sherwood Forest to the North of England, visiting many popular sites and several less well-known spots associated with the legend.
1037. 2004 Elsa Watson, Maid Marian. Crown Publishers, 2004. An orphan and heiress to a large country estate, Marian Fitzwater is wed at the age of five, to an equally young nobleman, Lord Hugh of Sencaster. When she is seventeen her husband dies, and she is made the ward of King Richard the Lionheart. Marian’s fate lies in the hands of his mother, the formidable Queen Eleanor of Aquitaine. Determined not to be sold into another sham marriage, she seeks out the one man who can help uncover the queen’s intentions: Robin Hood, the notorious Saxon outlaw of Sherwood Forest.
1038. 2005 John Aberth, A Knight at the Movies: Medieval History on Film. NY & London, Routledge, 2005. (Especially chapter 4: ‘Splendid in Spandex: Robin Hood Films’).
1039. 2005 Glyn S. Burgess, ‘“I kan rymes of Robyn Hood, and Randolf Erl of Chestre”’, in Keith Busby, Bernard Guidot, and Logan E. Whelan (eds.), ‘De sens rassis’: Essays in Honor of Rupert T. Pickens, Amsterdam and New York, 2005, pp. 51-84.
1040. 2005 Kevin J. Harty, ‘The Mid-Life Crises of Legendary Medieval Fitures: Robin Hood From the Ballad Tradition to Richard Lester’s 1976 Film Robin and Marian.’ Jeunesse et Vieillesse: Images medievals de l’age en litterature anglaise. Ed. Leo Carruthers and Adrian Papahagi. Paris, L’Harmattan, 2005 pp. 179-191.
1041. 2005 Helen Phillips, Robin Hood: Medieval and Post-Medieval. Dublin, Four Courts Press, 2005. Contains essays on Robin Hood by various authors including: Douglas Gray, ‘Everybody’s Robin Hood.’; Derek Pearsall, ‘Little John and the ballad of Robin Hood and the Monk.’; Richard Firth Green, ‘The hermit and the outlaw: new evidence for Robin Hood’s death?’; Roy Pearcy, ‘The literary Robin Hood: character and function in Fitts 1, 2 and 4 of the Gest of Robyn Hode.’; Thomas H. Ohlgren, ‘Merchant adventure in Robin Hood and the Potter.’; Timothy S. Jones, “Oublie ai chevalerie’: Tristan, Malory, and the outlaw-knight.”; David Hepworth, ‘A grave tale.’; Liz Oakley-Brown, ‘Framing Robin Hood: temporality and textuality in Anthony Munday’s Huntington plays.’; Stephen Knight, “Meere English flocks’: Ben Jonson’s The Sad Shepherd and the Robin Hood tradition.”; Linda Troost, ‘The noble peasant.’; Helen Phillips, ‘Robin Hood, the prioress of Kirklees and Charlotte Bronte.’; Lois Potter, ‘Robin Hood and the fairies: Alfred Noyes’ Sherwood’; Michael Evans, ‘Robin Hood in the landscape.’
1042. 2005 Thomas H. Ohlgren, Medieval Outlaws: Twelve Tales in Modern English Translation (Revised and Expanded Edition). Parlor Press, 2005. Ed. Thomas H. Ohlgren. Authors include: Timothy S. Jones, ‘The Outlawry of Earl Godwin’; Michael Swanton, ‘The Deeds of Hereward’; Thomas E. Kelly, ‘Eustache the Monk’; Carter Revard, ‘The Outlaw’s Song of Trailbaston’; Thomas E. Kelly, ‘Fouke fitz Waryn’; Mica Gould, ‘Two Tales of Owain Glyndwr’; Stephen Knight, ‘The Tale of Gamelyn’; Shaun F. D. Hughes, ‘The Saga of An Bow-bender’; Alexander L. Kaufman, ‘The Hermit and the Outlaw’; Thomas H. Ohlgren, ‘A Gest of Robyn Hode’; Thomas Hahn, ‘Adam Bell, Clim of the Clough, and William of Cloudesley’; Walter Scheps, ‘From The Acts and Deeds of Sir William Wallace’.
1043. 2005 Dean A. Hoffman, “I Wyll Be Thy True Servaunte / And Trewely Serve Thee”: Guildhall Minstrelsy in the “Gest of Robyn Hode.” TDR (1988-), Vol. 49, No. 2 (Summer, 2005), pp. 119-134.
1044. 2006 Stephen Knight, ‘Robin Hood and the Crusades: When and Why Did the Longbowman of the People Mount Up Like a Lord?’ Florilegium, Vol. 23:1, 2006, pp. 201-22.
1045. 2006 Mark Ormrod, R. Evans, H. Fulton and D. Matthews, ‘Robin Hood and public record: the authority of writing in the medieval outlaw tradition.’ Medieval Cultural Studies: Essays in Honour of Stephen Knight. Cardiff, University of Wales Press, 2006, pp. 57-74.
1046. 2006 John Marshall, ‘Gathering in the Name of the Outlaw: REED and Robin Hood.’ (pp. 65-84). From: REED in Review: Essays in Celebration of the First Twenty-Five Years, University of Toronto Press (2006).
1047. 2007? Tony Cobb and Karrol Cobb, ‘Robin Hood, The Musical.’ See, Operas, Musicals, and Pantomime 2.
1048. 2007 Frank Schwemmer, ‘Robin Hood.’ An opera. See, Operas, Musicals, and Pantomime 2.
1049. 2007 Thomas H. Ohlgren, Lister M. Matheson, Robin Hood, the Early Poems, 1465-1560, Texts, Contexts, and Ideology. See, Historical Books.
1050. 2007 David Greenwood, Robin of St. Ann’s Well Road. Nottingham, 2007.
1051. 2007 David Greenwood, Robin Hood in Barnsdale Stood. Nottingham?, 2007.
1052. 2007 John Marshall, ‘Riding with Robin Hood: English Pageantry and the Making of a Legend’ (pp. 93-117). From: The Making of the Middle Ages, Liverpool University Press (2007).
1053. 2008 Lois Potter and Joshua Calhoun, Images of Robin Hood: Medieval to Modern, Newark: University of Delaware Press, 2008. Essay collection by various authors: Part 1: Medieval: Origins and Others. Stephen Knight ‘Robin Hood: The Earliest Contexts’; Stuart Kane ‘The Outlaw’s Song of Trailbaston, the Green Man and the Facial Machine’; Stephen D. Winick, ‘Reynardine and Robin Hood: Echoes of an Outlaw Legend in Folk Balladry’; John Marshall, ‘Picturing Robin Hood in Early Print and Performance: 1500-1590’; Image and Society. Helen Phillips, ‘“Merry” and “Greenwood”: A History of Some Meanings’; Kimberley A. Thompson, ‘The Late Medieval Robin Hood: Good Yeomanry and Bad Performances’; Michael Wheare, ‘“From the Castle Hill they came with violence”. The Edinburgh Robin Hood Riots of 1561’; Part II: Postmedieval: Image and Word. Henry Griffy, ‘The Work of Robin Hood Art in an Age of Mechanical Reproduction’; Jill May, ‘Robin Hood’s Home Away from Home: Howard Pyle and His Art Students’; Word and Image. Alan T. Gaylord, ‘“There was something about him that spoke of other things than rags and tatters”: Howard Pyle and the Language of Robin Hood’; Patricia Lee Yongue, ‘The Play’s the Thing: Tom Sawyer Re-enacts Robin Hood’; Michael R. Evans, ‘“A Song of Freedom”: Geoffrey Trease’s Bows Against the Barons’; Sherron Lux, ‘Picturing Marian: Illustrations of Maid Marian in Juvenile Fiction’; Image and Performance. Yoshiko Ueno, ‘Male Cross-Dressing in Kabuki: Benten the Thief’; Jianguo Chen, ‘Figures of “Robin Hood” in the Chinese Cultural Imaginary’; Judy B. McInnis, ‘The Images of Robin Hood and Don Juan in George Bernard Shaw’s Man and Superman’; Orly Leah Krasner, ‘To Steal from the Rich and Give to the Poor: Reginald de Koven’s Robin Hood’; Lorraine Kochanske Stock, ‘Recovering Reginald de Koven’s and Harry Bache Smith’s “Lost” Operetta Maid Marian’.
1054. 2008 A. J. Pollard, ‘Robin Hood, Sherwood Forest and the Sheriff of Nottingham.’ Nottingham Medieval Studies 52, 2008, pp. 113-130.
1055. 2008 Helen Phillips, Bandit Territories: British Outlaws and Their Traditions. University of Wales Press, 2008. Includes articles by various authors: Helen Phillips, ‘Bandit Territories and Good Outlaws’; Thomas Hahn and Stephen Knight, “Exempt me, Sire, for I am afeard of women’: Gendering Robin Hood”; David Blamires, ‘Maid Marian in Twentieth-century Children’s Books’; Adrian Price, ‘Welsh Bandits’; Glyn Burgess, ‘Fouke Fitz Waryn III and King John: Good Outlaw and Bad King’; Stephen Knight, ‘Rabbie Hood: The Development of the English Outlaw Myth in Scotland’; Helen Phillips, ‘Scott and the Outlaws’; Marcus A. J. Smith and Julian N. Wasserman, ‘Sketches by a Green Crayon: Washington Irving, Robin Hood and the Emerging American Frontier’; Jeffrey Richards, ‘Robin Hood, King Arthur and Cold War Chivalry’; Laura Blunk, ‘And for best supporting hero . . . Little John’; Allan W. Wright, “Begone, knave! Robbery is out of fashion hereabouts!’ Robin Hood and the Comics Code”; John Beynon, ‘Robin Hood is Alive and Well in Cityton Prison’.
1056. 2008 Thomas Leitch, ‘Adaptations without Sources: The Adventures of Robin Hood.’ Literature/Film Quarterly, Vol. 36, No. 1 (2008), pp. 21-30.
1057. 2008 Jack R. Baker, ‘Christ’s Crucifixion and “Robin Hood and the Monk”: A Latin Charm Against Thieves in Cambridge University Library, MS Ff.5.48. Transactions of the Cambridge Bibliographical Society, Vol. 14, No. 1 (2008), pp. 71-85.
1058. 2009 Angus Donald, Outlaw. New York, St. Martin’s Press, 2009. This novel tells the story through the words of young Alan Dale, but this is a darker, more complex Robin Hood.
1059. 2009 A. J. Pollard, ‘Political Ideology in the Early Stories of Robin Hood.’ In John Appleby and Paul Dalton, Eds. Outlaws in Medieval and Early Modern England: Crime, Government and Society, c. 1066-1600. Farnham, GBR, Ashgate, 2009, pp. 111-128.
1060. 2009 Graham Seal, ‘The Robin Hood Principle: Folklore, History, and the Social Bandit.’ Journal of Folklore Research, Vol. 46, No. 1 (Jan. – Apr., 2009), pp. 67-89.
1061. 2009 Erika T. Lin, ‘Popular Festivity and the Early Modern Stage: The Case of George a Greene.’ Theatre Journal, Vol. 61, No. 2 (May 2009), pp. 271-297.
1062. 2009/2010 ‘The Pantomime of Robin Hood’. Norwich Theatre Royal, 2009/2010. See, Operas, Musicals, and Pantomime 2.
1063. 2009/2010 Ellie King, ‘Robin Hood.’ The Royal Canadian Theatre Company, 2009/2010. See, Operas, Musicals, and Pantomime 2.
1064. 2010? Andy Brown & Steve Williamson, ‘Hood The Musical.’ See, Operas, Musicals, and Pantomime 2.
1065. 2010 Nigel Cawthorne, Robin Hood the True History Behind the Legend. See, Historical Books.
1066. 2010 David Baldwin, Robin Hood the English Outlaw Unmasked. See, Historical Books.
1067. 2010 John Spence, A Lost Manuscript of the ‘Rymes of […] Randolf Erl of Chestre’. Electronic British Library Journal, 2010, Article 6, pp. 1-8.
1068. 2010 Kathryn Lasky, Hawksmaid: The Untold Story of Robin Hood and Maid Marian. HarperCollins, 2010. Before she was Maid Marian, she was Matty. As the daughter of Nottingham’s most famous falconer, she finds a new destiny in the hawks her father keeps. The sheriff of Nottingham is rising to power, and a true king has been kidnapped. Determined to fight, Matty’s friend Fynn becomes Robin Hood. As Maid Marian, Matty joins Fynn and his Merry Men, famously robbing from the rich to give to the poor.
1069. 2010, 2012 Jim Bradbury, Robin Hood. Amberley Publishing, Gloucestershire, 2010, 2012. ‘This book roughly follows my trek back through time to try and see how the Robin Hood legend has developed over the ages and try to work out the historical origin of the hero as far as possible’.
1070. 2011 Stephen Knight, Robin Hood in Greenwood Stood: Alterity and Context in the English Outlaw Tradition. Brepols Publishers n.v., Turnhout, Belgium, 2011. Contains essays by several authors including: Stephen Knight, ‘Alterity, Parody, Habitus: The Formation of the Early Literary Tradition of Robin Hood’; Alexander L. Kaufman, ‘Nietzsche’s Herd and the Individual: The Construction of Alterity in A Lytell Geste of Robyn Hode’; Lesley Coote, ‘Journeys to the Edge: Self-Identity, Salvation, and Outlaw(ed) Space’; John Block Friedman, ‘Robin Hood and the Social Context of Late Medieval Archery’; Helen Phillips, ‘Reformist Polemics, Reading Publics, and Unpopular Robin Hood’; Carrie Griffin, ‘The Forresters Manuscript: A Book on the Margins?’; Rob Gossedge, ‘Thomas Love Peacock, Robin Hood, and the Enclosure of Windsor Forest’; Brian J. Levy and Lesley Coote, ‘Mouvance, Greenwood, and Gender in The Adventures of Robin Hood and Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves’; John Chandler, ‘Batman and Robin Hood: Hobsbawm’s Outlaw Heroes Past and Present’; Valerie B. Johnson, “Agamben’s homo sacer, the ‘State of Exception’, and the Modern Robin Hood”.
1071. 2011 Ben Dodds, ‘Jaime el Barbudo and Robin Hood: bandit narratives in comparative perspective.’ Social History, Vol. 36, No. 4 (November 2011), pp. 464-481.
1072. 2011 Alexis Butzner, “‘Sette on foote with gode Wyll’: Towards a Reconstruction of “Robin Hood and the Sheriff of Nottingham.” Early Theatre, Vol. 14, No. 1 (2011), pp. 61-77.
1073. 2011 Graham Seal, ‘The Robin Hood Principle’ (pp. 165-174). From: Outlaw Heroes in Myth and History, Anthem Press (2011).
1074. 2011 Graham Seal, ‘Before Robin Hood’ (pp. 15-24). From: Outlaw Heroes in Myth and History, Anthem Press (2011).
1075. 2011 Graham Seal, ‘Medieval Marauders’ (pp. 35-48). From: Outlaw Heroes in Myth and History, Anthem Press (2011).
1076. 2011 Graham Seal, ‘Consuming Outlaws’ (pp. 137-150). From: Outlaw Heroes in Myth and History, Anthem Press (2011).
1077. 2012 Angus Donald, King’s Man: A Novel of Robin Hood. New York, St. Martin’s Press, 2012. Entrusted by a betrayed and imprisoned Richard the Lionheart to save England, Robin Hood, a renegade earl and former outlaw, embarks on a deadly mission at the side of loyal lieutenant Alan Dale in a heroic bid to restore the king to the throne.
1078. 2012 Angus Donald, Warlord. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 2012. King Richard I, the Lionheart, is engaged in a bloody war to drive the French out of Normandy. Using the brutal tactics of medieval warfare—siege, savagery and scorched earth—the Lionheart gradually pushes back the forces of King Philip of France. By his side in this epic struggle are the erstwhile outlaw Robin Hood, and Sir Alan Dale, his loyal friend.
1079. 2013 Katherine Echols, ‘Radio Adaptations of Robin Hood’s Legend During the Golden Age of Radio.’ Journal of Radio and Audio Media 20.1, 2013, pp. 151-64.
1080. 2013 Joseph Taylor, “‘Me longeth sore to Bernysdale’: Centralization, Resistance and the Bare Life of the Greenwood in A Gest of Robyn Hode.” Modern Philology 110. 3, 2013, pp. 313-339.
1081. 2013 Robert B. Waltz, The Gest of Robyn Hode: A Critical and Textual Commentary. Published by Robert B. Waltz, 2013. A good overview of the legend, and a detailed analysis of the Gest and other tales.
1082. 2013 Andrew James Johnston, ‘Die Robin-Hood-Balladen’ (pp. 24-61). From: Robin Hood: Geschichte einer Legende, Verlag, C. H. Beck (2013).
1083. 2013 Andrew James Johnston, ‘Robins erste Verkörperung: die Robin-Hood-Spiele’ (pp. 19-23). From: Robin Hood: Geschichte einer Legende, Verlag, C. H. Beck (2013).
1084. 2013 Andrew James Johnston, ‘Robin auf der Leinwand’ (pp. 96-119). From: Robin Hood: Geschichte einer Legende, Verlag C. H. Beck (2013).
1085. 2013 Toby Venables, Hunter of Sherwood: Knight of Shadows: A Guy of Gisburne Novel #1. Abaddon, 2013. England, 1191: Richard Lionheart has left the realm bankrupt and leaderless in his quest for glory. Only Prince John seems willing to fight back the tide of chaos threatening England – embodied by the traitorous ‘Hood.’
1086. 2013 David Pilling, Robin Hood: The First Arrow. Robin Hood: Book One. Independently Published. Robert Hode, a yeoman farmer, is forced to flee into the forests of Yorkshire. His only crime is to defend his home and family against Sir Gui de Gisburne, a brutal and charismatic Yorkshire knight and the sheriff’s chief enforcer.
1087. 2013 David Pilling, Robin Hood: The Wrath of God. Robin Hood: Book Two. Independently Published. Robin Hood is now an outlaw in Sherwood. Tales of his exploits quickly spread. All over northern England, common people sing of the Hooded Man.
1088. 2014 David Pilling, Robin Hood: The Hooded Man. Robin Hood: Book Three. Independently Published. King Henry of England is at war with his rival, the King of France. The armies are poised to do battle at Taillebourg. Robin Hood is now serving in the English army as a captain of archers. Forced to leave England, he has spent fourteen years as a mercenary in France.
1089. 2014 David Pilling, Robin Hood: Thief of Barnsdale. Independently Published. ‘Robin Hood in Barnsdale stood…’ England, 1224 AD: The north of the country is wild and lawless, plagued by bands of outlaws and robbers and broken men. This is the setting for the story of Robert Hood, a yeoman farmer and petty thief, forced to flee into the forests of Yorkshire after defending his home and family against the malice of Sir Gui de Gisburne.
1090. 2014 Toby Venables, Hunter of Sherwood: The Red Hand: A Guy of Gisburne Novel #2. Abaddon, 2014. Returning to England after foiling a plot to destroy Jerusalem, Guy of Gisburne is arrested and hauled to the Tower of London; John, England’s regent in the absence of its monstrous King, needs his knight once more. Someone is killing John’s men, and the obvious culprit—the most dangerous man in the Kingdom, Hood himself—has an alibi even Guy can’t deny.
1091. 2014 Charles Robert Kos, ‘Remembering the Outlaw in Medieval England: The emergence of the Robin Hood legend’. Thesis submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy, in the School of Philosophical, Historical and International Studies, Faculty of Arts, Monash University, Australia. July 2014.
1092. 2014 Chris Wood, Robin Hood. Uploaded by independent researcher Chris Wood on 10th December 2014. This article looks at the historical development and modern portrayals of the archetypal Noble Outlaw legend, Robin Hood. In particular it examines the twentieth-century Pagan interpretations of the myth.
1093. 2014 Kenneth Goldsmith, ‘Robin Hood of the Avant-Garde’ (pp. 251-260). From: Dynamic Fair Dealing: Creating Canadian Culture Online, University of Toronto Press (2014).
1094. 2015 David Pilling, Robin Hood: The King’s Pardon. Robin Hood: Book Four. Independently Published. The rebellion is over. Robin Hood and his followers have escaped to Sherwood, but not for long. King Henry is determined to end the Hooded Man once and for all.
1095. 2015 Mark Olly, The Life & Times of the Real Robyn Hoode (A Journey of Discovery), UK, USA, 2015. A modern examination and adaptation of primarily original Late Medieval source material, ect.
1096. 2015 Macklin Cowart, ‘Robin Hood as Sheriff in Medieval Estates Model Literature.’ Dissertation, Georgia State University, 2015.
1097. 2015 Jean E. Howard, ‘The Political Fortunes of Robin Hood on the Early Modern Stage’ (pp. 272-288). From: Forms of Association: Making Publics in Early Modern Europe. University of Massachusetts Press (2015).
1098. 2015 Alexander L. Kaufman, ‘A Desire for Origins: The Marginal Robin Hood of the Later Ballads’ (pp. 51-62). From: Studies in Medievalism XXIV: Medievalism on the Margins, D. S. Brewer (2015).
1099. 2016 Christopher Cannon, From Literacy to Literature: England, 1300-1400. Oxford University Press. Contains another version of a fragmentary poem of the early fifteenth century in Lincoln Cathedral Library MS. 132. ‘Robert Hood . . . hooded and hatted as a reaper, in hoes and shoes, holding twenty-four arrows in his hand’. See, 745 above.
1100. 2016 Michael Reuel, Robin Hood Existed. Rule Hard Publishing, 2016. Ruel suggests that Robin Hood may have lived in the time of Edward III.
1101. 2016 John Matthews, Robin Hood (Foreword by Richard Carpenter, Preface by Mark Ryan). Amberley Publishing, Gloucestershire, 2016. A good examination of subjects relating to the legend.
1102. 2016 Jeppe von Platz, ‘Robin Hood Justice: Why Robin Hood Took From the Rich And Gave to the Poor (And We Should Too).’ Public Affairs Quarterly, Vol. 30, No. 2 (April 2016), pp. 149-169.
1103. 2016 Kevin J. Harty, “The grasping, rasping Norman race”: Victorian Nationalism and Sir George Alexander Macfarren’s 1860 Opera, Robin Hood’ (pp. 253-264). From: Telling Tales and Crafting Books: Essays in Honor of Thomas H. Ohlgren, Medieval Institute Publications (2016).
1104. 2016 Christine Chism, ‘The romance of the road in Athelston and two late medieval Robin Hood ballads’ (pp. 220-248). From: Roadworks: Medieval Britain, medieval roads, Manchester University Press (2016).
1105. 2016 Felix Herzog, ‘Robin Hood – Betrachtungen über soziale Gerechtigkeit’ (pp. 593-600). From: Rechtsstaatlicher Strafprozess und Bürgerrechte.: Gedächtnisschrift für Edda Weßlau., Duncker & Humblot GmbH (2016).
1106. 2016 John Marshall, ‘Show or Tell?: Priority and Interplay in the Early Robin Hood Play/Games and Poems’ (pp. 177-202). From: Telling Tales and Crafting Books: Essays in Honor of Thomas H. Ohlgren. Medieval Institute Publications (2016).
1107. 2016 Alexander L. Kaufman, ‘“Two Ancient Ballads: “Robin Hood’s Courtship with Jack Cade’s Daughter”and “The Freiris Tragedie”: An Edition (pp. 215-252). From: Telling Tales and Crafting Books: Essays in Honor of Thomas H. Ohlgren. Medieval Institute Publications (2016).
1108. 2016 Stephen Knight, ‘Feasts in the Forest’ (pp. 161-176). From: Telling Tales and Crafting Books: Essays in Honor of Thomas H. Ohlgren, Medieval Institute Publications (2016).
1109. 2017 Lesley Coote and Valerie B. Johnson, Robin Hood in Outlaw/ed Spaces: Media, performance, and other new directions, Routledge, 2017. This book presents some of the latest research undertaken by members of the International Association for Robin Hood Studies and associated scholars, with essays by various authors: Valerie B. Johnson, ‘A forest of her own: Greenwood-space and the forgotten female characters of the Robin Hood tradition’; Christine Chism, ‘Mortal friends in Robin and Gandelyn and the medieval Robin Hood ballads’; Carrie Griffin, ‘The play’s the thing: Establishing boundaries in Anthony Munday’s The Downfall of Robert, Earle of Huntington’; Alexander L. Kaufman, ‘Strange genealogies: Robin Hood’s Courtship with Jack Cade’s Daughter and the creation of a fraudulent text’; Kristin Noone, ‘Highwaymen, robbers, and rogues in the twentieth century: A new outlaw fantasy’; Spencer Gavin Smith, ‘Property not prophecy: Welsh “outlaws” Owain Lawgoch and Owain Glyn Dwr as high-status landowners’; John Marshall, ‘Revisiting and revising Robin Hood in sixteenth-century London’; Kristi J. Castleberry, ‘Sailing the Little John: John Ward and legitimizing outlaw space’; Dana Symons ‘Relishing the kill, becoming a man: Robin Hood’s rivalry with Guy of Gisborne’; Gillian B. Anderson, ‘Douglas Fairbanks in Robin Hood and its music’; Thomas Rowland ‘“And Now Begins Our Game”: Revitalizing the ludic Robin Hood’; Stephen Knight, Epilogue: ‘Parody and archery: Re-generating the Robin Hood tradition’.
1110. 2017 Murray Dahm, ‘Robin Hood on film: Take From the Rich; Give to the Poor.’ Medieval Warfare, Vol. 7, No. 2, (May / Jun 2017), pp. 54-55.
1111. 2017 Toby Venables, Hunter of Sherwood: Hood: A Guy of Gisburne Novel #3. Abaddon, 2017. It’s Guy of Gisburne’s final stand against a killer and fraud: Robin Hood.
1112. 2017 Melissa Sartore, “‘Robin Hood Goes to Neptune: The Collective Social Bandit in “Veronica Mars.” Studies in Popular Culture, Vol. 40, No. 1 (Fall 2017), pp. 53-77.
1113. 2017 Renée Ward, “Thou shalt have the better cloathe’: Reading Second Skins in Robin Hood and Guy of Gisborne” (pp. 349-365). From: Flaying in the Pre-Modern World: Practice and Representation, D. S. Brewer (2017).
1114. 2018 Sean McGlynn, Robin Hood: A True Legend. Sharpe Books, 2018. This book ‘reveals a true-life hero and legend who has previously been lost to history, a soldier who resolves the hero-outlaw paradox and who fits perfectly into the timing of the legend’s origins’.
1115. 2018 K C Murdarasi, Why Everything You Know about Robin Hood Is Wrong: Featuring a pirate monk, a French maid, and a surprising number of morris dancers. Hephaestion Press, 2018. A humorous look at the facts surrounding the legend.
1116. 2018 David Atkinson, ‘Survival and Revival: The Medieval Ballad and Ballad Medievalism’ (pp. 31-66). From: The Ballad and its Pasts: Literary Histories and the Play of Memory, D. S. Brewer (2018).
1117. 2018 Olivia Longueville and J. C. Plummer, Robin Hood’s Dawn. Book One of the Robin Hood Trilogy. Angevin World Publishing, 2018. Falsely convicted of a shocking crime, Robin Fitzooth, the Earl of Huntingdon, finds refuge in Sherwood Forest and becomes Robin Hood.
1118. 2019 Stephen Basdeo, Robin Hood: The Life & Legend of an Outlaw, Yorkshire – Philadelphia, 2019. Examines Robin Hood in British popular culture, from medieval poems through to the twenty-first century. Also by Basdeo, a PhD entitled ‘The Changing Faces of Robin Hood, c. 1700-c. 1900’.
1119. 2019 Lesley Coote and Alexander L. Kaufman, Robin Hood and the Outlaw/ed Literary Canon. Routledge, New York and Abingdon, Oxon, 2019. Contains essays by various authors including: Lesley Coote and Alexander L. Kaufman, ‘Introduction: The Medieval Outlaw/ed Literary Canon: Literary and Ideological Thresholds and Boundaries’; Henry Griffy, ‘Robin Hood and the Margins of Romance: Insights on Canon Formation and Maintenance’; Alice Blackwood, ‘By Words and By Deeds: The Role of Performance in Shaping the “Canon” of Robin Hood’; Mark Truesdale, ‘Robin Hood and the King and Commoner Tradition: “The best archer of ilkon,/I durst mete hym with a stone”; Liz Oakley-Brown, ‘Robin Hood’s Passions: Emotion and Embodiment in Anthony Munday’s The Downfall and The Death of Robert, Earle of Huntington (c. 1598)’; Lorraine Kochanske Stock, ‘Canonicity and “Robin Hood”: The Morris Dance and the Meaning of “Lighter than Robin Hood” in the Prologue to Fletcher and Shakespeare’s The Two Noble Kinsmen’; Robert C. Evans, ‘Ben Jonson’s The Sad Shepherd, the Theme of Compassion, and the Robin Hood Canon’; Perry Neil Harrison, ‘“Gone, the Song of Gamelyn”: John Keats and the Medieval Robin Hood’; Anna Czarnowus, ‘The Legend of Janosik and the Polish Novel About Robin Hood as Continuations of the Medieval Outlaw Tradition’; Valerie B. Johnson, ‘What A Canon Wants: Robin Hood, Romance Novels, and Carrie Lofty’s What A Scoundrel Wants’; Ian Wojcik-Andrews, ‘Children’s Literature Canon, Robin Hood, Children’s Literature Criticism’; Leigh Smith, ‘Doing Yeoman Work: Uses of the Robin Hood Tales in the Undergraduate Survey’.
1120. 2019 John Marshall, “A ‘Gladnes’ of Robin Hood’s Men: Henry VIII Entertains Queen Katherine” (pp. 98-121). From: Medieval English Theatre 40, D. S. Brewer (2019).
1121. 2020 David Crook, Robin Hood: Legend and Reality, Boydell Press, 2020. David Crook, senior research fellow at the University of Nottingham and the National Archives, claims that the original Robin Hood was Robert of Wetherby, the Yorkshire fugitive Robert Hod, first recorded in the pipe rolls of 1226. See, Hobbehod; William Robehod; The Many Robin Hoods 11.
1122. 2020 Thor Ewing, The Original Robin Hood: Traditional ballads and plays including all medieval sources translated into modern English, Welkin Books Ltd, 2020. Ewing argues that, as the eldest grandson of Prince David of Scotland (1152-1219) Robin Hood was heir to the Earldom of Huntingdon, which was left vacant when his maternal uncle John of Scotland died in 1237, but he was disinherited because his father was a commoner (see, 378 above).
1123. 2020 Usha Vishnuvajjala, ‘“ Objectivity, Impossibility, and Laughter in Doctor Who’s “Robot of Sherwood” (pp. 201-216). From: Studies in Medievalism XXIX: Politics and Medievalism (Studies), D. S. Brewer (2020).
1124. 2020 Stephen Basdeo, ‘Youthful consumption and conservative visions: Robin Hood and Wat Tyler in late Victorian penny periodicals’ (pp. 125-141). From: Pasts at play: Childhood encounters with history in British culture, 1750???1914, Manchester University Press (2020).
1125. 2020 Olivia Longueville and J. C. Plummer, Robin Hood’s Widow. Book Two of the Robin Hood Trilogy. Angevin World Publishing, 2020. Robin’s duty to his king sends him on an odyssey that will unfold from the streets of Paris to the banks of the Danube. From incredible triumphs on the battlefields of the Crusade, to harrowing sea voyages, to a desperate dash across the frozen landscape of Central Europe, Robin Hood must ensure that King Richard safely returns to England.
1126. 2020 Robert Muchamore, Hacking, Heists & Flaming Arrows (Robin Hood, #1). Hot Key Books, 2020. The first in a series of young adult books by Robert Muchamore.
1127. 2021 Robert Muchamore, Piracy, Paintballs & Zebras (Robin Hood, #2). Hot Key Books, 2021. The second in a series of young adult books by Robert Muchamore.
1128. 2021 Robert Muchamore, Jet Skis, Swamps & Smugglers (Robin Hood #3). Hot Key Books, 2021. The third in a series of young adult books by Robert Muchamore.
1129. 2021 Stephen Basdeo, Discovering Robin Hood: The Life of Joseph Ritson – Gentleman, Scholar and Revolutionary. Pen and Sword History, Yorkshire and Philadelphia, 2021. Basdeo examines the life of Joseph Ritson, a pioneer in the ballads and information concerning Robin Hood. See, 594 above.
1130. 2021 Elizabeth Allen, ‘Robin Hood and the Limits of Sanctuary’ (pp. 172-195). From: Uncertain Refuge: Sanctuary in the Literature of Medieval England, University of Pennsylvania Press (2021).
1131. 2021 Stephen Knight, ‘Chartism and Medievalism: Retrospective Radicalism in the English Nineteenth Century’ (pp. 77-90). From: Subaltern Medievalisms: Medievalism ‘from below’ in Nineteenth-Century Britain, D. S. Brewer (2021).
1132. 2021 Stephen Knight, Medieval Literature and Social Politics: Studies of Cultures and Their Contexts. Routledge, 2021. This book brings together seventeen articles that primarily focus on the social and political meaning of medieval literature, in the past and the present. The concluding chapters examine the Anglo-nationalist `Arctic Arthur’, and the ways in which Arthur, Merlin and Robin Hood can be treated in terms of modern studies of the history of emotions and the environment.
1133. 2021 Olivia Longueville and J. C. Plummer, Robin Hood’s Return. Book Three of the Robin Hood Trilogy. Angevin World Publishing, 2021. The Legend of Robin Hood is born when he is outlawed after returning from the Holy Land. Finally reunited, Robin and Marian, along with their band of men, must face both an army led by the mysterious Sheriff of Nottingham and the wrath of a ruthless Queen Eleanor.
1134. 2022 Robert Muchamore, Drones, Dams and Destruction (Robin Hood #4). Hot Key Books, 2022. The fourth in a series of young adult books by Robert Muchamore.