Bluegrass Messengers

No. 117: A Gest of Robyn Hode

[A Gest of Robyn Hode or "A Tale of Robin Hood" is really a 456 stanza "romantic poem" that was intended to be recited. The "Gest" dates back to the late 1400s/ early 1500s. The Traditional Ballad Index gives a date of c 1505. It is one of the earliest Robin Hood poems.

There are no known traditional US or Canadian versions of this ballad.

R. Matteson 2012]

CONTENTS:

1. Child's Narrative
2. Footnotes 
3. Brief (Kittredge)
4. Child's Ballad Texts A a-g (Texts a-g found in endnotes. Text a is a compilation of texts a-g)
5. Endnotes [not completely proofed]
6. Additions and Corrections
 
ATTACHED PAGES (see left hand column):

1. Recordings & Info: 117. A Gest of Robyn Hode 
     A. Roud No. 70: A Gest of Robyn Hode (5 Listings)   
   
2. Sheet Music:  (Bronson's traditional music versions and other versions)

3. English and Other Versions (Including Child versions Aa.-Ag. with additional notes)]
 

Child's Narrative: The Gest of Robyn Hode

A. a. 'A Gest of Robyn Hode,' without printer's name, date, or place; the eleventh and last piece in a volume in the Advocates' Library, Edinburgh. Reprinted by David Laing, 1827, with nine pieces from the press of Walter Chepman and Androw Myllar, Edinburgh, 1508, and one other, by a printer unknown, under the title of The Knightly Tale of Golagrus and Gawane, and other Ancient Poems.
   b. 'A Lytell Geste of Robyn Hode,' etc., London, Wynken de Worde, n.d.: Library of the University of Cambridge.
   c. Douce Fragment, No 16: Bodleian Library.
   d. Douce Fragment, No 17: Bodleian Library.
   e. Douce Fragment, No 16: Bodleian Library.^[1]
   f. 'A Mery Geste of Robyn Hoode,' etc., London, Wyllyam Copland, n.d.: British Museum, C. 21. c.
   g. 'A Merry Iest of Robin Hood,' etc., London, printed for Edward White, n.d.: Bodleian Library, Z. 3. Art. Seld., and Mr. Henry Huth's library.

The best qualified judges are not agreed as to the typographical origin of a: see Dickson, Introduction of the Art of Printing into Scotland, Aberdeen, 1885, pp 51 ff, 82 ff, 86 f. Mr. Laing had become convinced before his death that he had been wrong in assigning this piece to the press of Chepman and Myllar. The date of b may be anywhere from 1492 to 1534, the year of W. de Worde's death. Of c Ritson says, in his corrected preface to the Gest, 1832, I, 2: By the favor of the Reverend Dr. Farmer, the editor had in his hands, and gave to Mr. Douce, a few leaves of an old 4to. black letter impression by the above Wynken de Worde, probably in 1489, and totally unknown to Ames and Herbert. No reason is given for this date.^[2] I am not aware that any opinion has been expressed as to the printer or the date of d, e. W. Copland's edition, f, if his dates are fully ascertained, is not earlier than 1548. Ritson says that g is entered to Edward White in the Stationers' books, 13 May, 1594. "A pastorall plesant commedie of Robin Hood & Little John, &c," is entered to White on the 14th of May of that year, Arber, II, 649: this is more likely to have been a play of Robin Hood.

a, b, f, g, are deficient at 71, 339¹, and misprinted at 49, 50, repeating, it may be, the faults of a prior impression, a appears, by internal evidence, to be an older text than b.^[3] Some obsolete words of the earlier copies have been modernized in f, g, ^[4] and deficient lines have been supplied. A considerable number of Middle-English forms remain^[5] after those successive renovations of reciters and printers which are presumable in such cases. The Gest may have been compiled at a time when such forms had gone out of use, and these may be relics of the ballads from which this little epic was made up; or the whole poem may have been put together as early as 1400, or before. There are no firm grounds on which to base an opinion.

No notice of Robin Hood has been down to this time recovered earlier than that which was long ago pointed out by Percy as occurring in Piers Plowman, and this, according to Professor Skeat, cannot be older than about 1377.^[6] Sloth, in that poem, says in his shrift that he knows "rymes of Robyn Hood and Randolf, erle of Chestre,"^[7] though but imperfectly acquainted with his paternoster: B, passus v, 401 f, Skeat, ed. 1886, I, 166. References to Robin Hood, or to his story, are not infrequent in the following century.

In Wyntoun's Chronicle of Scotland, put at about 1420, there is this passage, standing quite by itself, under the year 1283:

  Lytill Ihon and Robyne Hude
Waythmen ware commendyd gude;
In Yngilwode and Barnysdale
Thai oysyd all this tyme thare trawale.
            Laing, II, 263.

Disorderly persons undertook, it seems, to imitate Robin Hood and his men. In the year 1417, says Stowe, one, by his counterfeit name called Fryer Tucke, with many other malefactors, committed many robberies in the counties of Surrey and Sussex, whereupon the king sent out his writs for their apprehension: Annals, p. 352 b, ed. 1631.^[8] A petition to Parliament, in the year 1439, represents that one Piers Venables, of Derbyshire, rescued a prisoner, "and after that tyme, the same Piers Venables, havynge no liflode ne sufficeante of goodes, gadered and assembled unto him many misdoers, beynge of his clothinge, ... and, in manere of insurrection, wente into the wodes in that contré, like as it hadde be Robyn-hode and his meyné:" Rotuli Parliamentorum, V, 16.^[9]

Bower, writing 1441-47, describes the lower orders of his time as entertaining themselves with ballads both merry and serious, about Robin Hood, Little John, and their mates, and preferring them to all others;^[10] and Major, or Mair, who was born not long after 1450, says in his book, printed in 1521, that Robin Hood ballads were in vogue over all Britain.^[11]

Sir John Paston, in 1473, writes of a servant whom he had kept to play Robin Hood and the Sheriff of Nottingham, and who was gone into Bernysdale: Fenn, Original Letters, etc., II, 134, cited by Ritson.

Gutch cites this allusion to Robin Hood ballads "from Manuscript Porkington, No 10, f. 152, written in the reign of Edward IV:"

  Ther were tynkerris in tarlottus, the met was fulle goode,
The "sowe sat one him benche" (sic), and harppyd Robyn Hoode.

And again, the name simply, from "a song on Woman, from Manuscript Lambeth, 306, fol. 135, of the fifteenth century":

  He that made this songe full good
Came of the northe and of the sothern blode,
And somewhat kyne to Robyn Hode.
            Gutch, Robin Hood, I, 55 f.

These passages show the popularity of Robin Hood ballads for a century or more before the time when the Gest was printed, a popularity which was fully established at the beginning of this period, and unquestionably extended back to a much earlier day. Of these ballads, there have come down to us in a comparatively ancient form the following: those from which the Gest (printed, perhaps, before 1500) was composed, being at least four, Robin Hood, the Knight and the Monk, Robin Hood, Little John and the Sheriff, Robin Hood and the King, and Robin Hood's Death (a fragment); 'Robin Hood and the Monk,' No 118, more properly Robin Hood rescued by Little John, Manuscript of about 1450, but not for that older than the ballads of the Gest; 'Robin Hood and Guy of Gisborn,' No 119, Percy Manuscript c. 1650; 'Robin Hood's Death,' No 120, Percy Manuscript and late garlands; 'Robin Hood and the Potter,' No 121, Manuscript of about 1500, later, perhaps, than any other of the group.^[12] Besides these there are thirty-two ballads, Nos 122-153. For twenty-two of these we have the texts of broadsides and garlands of the seventeenth century,^[13] four of the same being also found in the Percy Manuscript; eight occur in garlands, etc., of the last century, one of these same in the Percy Manuscript, and another in an eighteenth-century Manuscript; one is derived from a suspicious nineteenth-century Manuscript, and one from nineteenth-century tradition. About half a dozen of these thirty-two have in them something of the old popular quality; as many more not the least smatch of it. Fully a dozen are variations, sometimes wearisome, sometimes sickening, upon the theme 'Robin Hood met with his match.' A considerable part of the Robin Hood poetry looks like char-work done for the petty press, and should be judged as such. The earliest of these ballads, on the other hand, are among the best of all ballads, and perhaps none in English please so many and please so long.

That a considerable number of fine ballads of this cycle have been lost will appear all but certain when we remember that three of the very best are found each in only one manuscript.^[14]

Robin Hood is absolutely a creation of the ballad-muse. The earliest mention we have of him is as the subject of ballads. The only two early historians who speak of him as a ballad-hero, pretend to have no information about him except what they derive from ballads, and show that they have none other by the description they give of him; this description being in entire conformity with ballads in our possession, one of which is found in a Manuscript as old as the older of these two writers.

Robin Hood is a yeoman, outlawed for reasons not given but easily surmised, "courteous and free," religious in sentiment, and above all reverent of the Virgin, for the love of whom he is respectful to all women. He lives by the king's deer (though he loves no man in the world so much as his king) and by levies on the superfluity of the higher orders, secular and spiritual, bishops and archbishops, abbots, bold barons, and knights,^[15] but harms no husbandman or yeoman, and is friendly to poor men generally, imparting to them of what he takes from the rich. Courtesy, good temper, liberality, and manliness are his chief marks; for courtesy and good temper he is a popular Gawain. Yeoman as he is, he has a kind of royal dignity, a princely grace, and a gentleman-like refinement of humor. This is the Robin Hood of the Gest especially; the late ballads debase this primary conception in various ways and degrees.

This is what Robin Hood is, and it is equally important to observe what he is not. He has no sort of political character, in the Gest or any other ballad. This takes the ground from under the feet of those who seek to assign him a place in history. Wyntoun, who gives four lines to Robin Hood, is quite precise. He is likely to have known of the adventure of King Edward and the outlaw, and he puts Robin under Edward I, at the arbitrary date of 1283, a hundred and forty years before his own time. Bower, without any kind of ceremony, avouches our hero to have been one of the proscribed followers of Simon de Montfort, and this assertion of Bower is adopted and maintained by a writer in the London and Westminster Review, 1840, XXXIII, 424. ^[16] Major, who probably knew some ballad of Richard I and Robin Hood, offers a simple conjecture that Robin flourished about Richard's time, "circa hæc tempora, ut auguror," and this is the representation in Matthew Parker's 'True Tale,' which many have repeated, not always with ut auguror; as Scott, with whom no one can quarrel, in the inexpressibly delightful Ivanhoe, and Thierry in his Conquête de l'Angleterre, Book xi, IV, 81 ff, ed. 1830, both of whom depict Robin Hood as the chief of a troop of Saxon bandits, Thierry making him an imitator of Hereward. Hunter, again, The Ballad-Hero, Robin Hood, p. 48, interprets the King Edward of the Gest as Edward II, and makes Robin Hood an adherent of the Earl of Lancaster in the fatal insurrection of 1322. No one of these theories has anything besides ballads for a basis except Hunter's. Hunter has an account-book in which the name Robin Hood occurs; as to which see further on, under stanzas 414-450 of the Gest. Hereward the Saxon, Fulk Fitz Warine, Eustace the Monk, Wallace, all outlaws of one kind or another, are celebrated in romantic tales or poems, largely fabulous, which resemble in a general way, and sometimes in particulars, the traditional ballads about Robin Hood; ^[17] but these outlaws are recognized by contemporary history.

The chief comrades of Robin Hood are: Robin Hood and the Monk, Little John, Scathlok (Scarlok. Scarlet), and Much; to these the Gest adds Gilbert of the White Hand and Reynold, 292 f. A friar is not a member of his company in the older ballads. A curtal, or cutted friar, called Friar Tuck in the title, but not in the ballad, has a fight with Robin Hood in No 123, and is perhaps to be regarded as having accepted Robin's invitation to join his company; this, however, is not said. Friar Tuck is simply named as one of Robin's troop in two broadsides, No 145, No 147, but plays no part in them. These two broadsides also name Maid Marian, who appears elsewhere only in a late and entirely insignificant ballad, No 150.^[18]

Friar Tuck is a character in each of two Robin Hood plays, both of which we have, unluckily, only in a fragmentary state. One of these plays, dating as far back as 1475, presents scenes from Robin Hood and Guy of Gisborn, followed, without any link, by others from some ballad of a rescue of Robin Hood from the sheriff; to which extracts from still other ballads may have been annexed. In this play the friar has no special mark; he simply makes good use of his bow. The other play, printed by Copland with the Gest, not much before 1550, treats more at length the story of Robin Hood and the Curtal Friar, and then that of Robin Hood and the Potter, again, and naturally, without connection. The conclusion is wanting, and the play may have embraced still other ballads. The Friar in this is a loose and jovial fellow, and gave the hint for Scott's Clerk of Copmanhurst.^[19]

The second of the Robin Hood plays is described in the title as "very proper to be played in May-games." These games were in the sixteenth century, and, it would seem, before, often a medley of many things. They were not limited to the first day of May, or even to the month of May; they might occur in June as well. They were not uniform, and might include any kind of performance or spectacle which suited the popular taste. "I find," says Stow, "that in the moneth of May, the citizens of London, of all estates, lightlie in every parish, or sometimes two or three parishes joyning together, had their several Mayinges, and did fetch in Maypoles, with divers warlike shewes, with good archers, morrice-dancers, and other devices for pastime all the day long; and towards the evening they had stage-playes and bonefires in the streetes."^[20] In the Diary of Henry Machyn we read that on the twenty-sixth of May, 1555, there was a goodly May-game at St. Martins in the Field, with giant and hobby-horses, morris-dance and other minstrels; and on the third day of June following, a goodly May-game at Westminster, with giants and devils, and three morris-dancers, and many disguised, and the Lord and Lady of the May rode gorgeously, with divers minstrels playing. On the thirtieth of May, 1557, there was a goodly May-game in Fenchurch Street, in which the Nine Worthies rode, and they had speeches, and the morris-dance, and the Sowdan, and the Lord and Lady of the May, and more besides. And again, on the twenty-fourth of June, 1559, there was a May-game, with a giant, the Nine Worthies, with speeches, a goodly pageant with a queen, St. George and the Dragon, the morris-dance, and afterwards Robin Hood and Little John, and Maid Marian and Friar Tuck, and they had speeches round about London. (Pp 89, 137, 201.)^[21]

In the rural districts the May-game was naturally a much simpler affair. The accounts of the chamberlains and churchwardens of Kingston upon Thames for Mayday, 23 Henry VII-28 Henry VIII, 1507-36, contain charges for the morris, the Lady, Little John, Robin Hood, and, Maid Marian; the accounts for 21 Henry VII-1 Henry VIII relate to expenses for the Kyngham, and a king and queen are mentioned, presumably king and queen of May; under 24 Henry VII the "cost of the Kyngham and Robyn Hode are entered together."^[22]

"A simple northern man" is made to say in Albion's England, 1586:

  At Paske began our Morris, and ere Penticost our May;
Tho Robin Hood, Liell John, Frier Tucke and Marian deftly play,
And Lard and Ladie gang till kirk, with lads and lasses gay.^[23]

Tollet's painted window (which is assigned by Douce to about 1460-70, and, if rightly dated, furnishes the oldest known representation of a May-game with the morris) has, besides a fool, a piper and six dancers, a May-pole, a hobby-horse, a friar, and a lady, and the lady, being crowned, is to be taken as Queen of May.

What concerns us is the part borne by Robin Hood, John, and the Friar in these games, and Robin's relation to Maid Marian. In Ellis's edition of Brand's Antiquities, I, 214, note h, we are told that Robin Hood is styled King of May in The Book of the Universal Kirk of Scotland. This is a mistake, and an important mistake. In April, 1577, the General Assembly requested the king to "discharge [prohibit] playes of Robin Hood, King of May, and sick others, on the Sabboth day." In April, 1578, the fourth session, the king and council were supplicated to discharge "all kynd of insolent play is, as King of May, Robin Hood, and sick others, in the moneth of May, played either be bairnes at the schools, or others"; and the subject was returned to in the eighth session. We know from various sources that plays, founded on the ballads, were sometimes performed in the course of the games. We know that archers sometimes personated Robin Hood and his men in the May-game.^[24] The relation of Robin Hood, John, and the Friar to the May-game morris is obscure. "It plainly appears," says Ritson, "that Robin Hood, Little John, the Friar, and Maid Marian were fitted out at the same time with the morris-dancers, and consequently, it would seem, united with them in one and the same exhibition," meaning the morris. But he adds, with entire truth, in a note: "it must be confessed that no other direct authority has been met with for constituting Robin Hood and Little John integral characters of the morris-dance."^[25] And further, with less truth so far as the Friar is concerned: "that Maid Marian and the Friar were almost constantly such is proved beyond the possibility of a doubt." The Friar is found in Tollet's window, which Douce speaks of, cautiously, as a representation of an English May-game and morris-dance. The only "direct authority," so far as I am aware, for the Friar's being a party in the morris-dance (unconnected with the May-game) is the late authority of Ben Jonson's Masque of the Metamorphosed Gipsies, 1621, cited by Tollet in his Memoir; where it is said that the absence of a Maid Marian and a friar is a surer mark than the lack of a hobby-horse that a certain company cannot be morris-dancers.^[26] The lady is an essential personage in the morris.^[27] How and when she came to receive the appellation of Maid Marian in the English morris is unknown. The earliest occurrence of the name seems to be in Barclay's fourth Eclogue,^[28] "subjoined to the last edition of The Ship of Foles, but originally printed soon after 1500:" Ritson, I, lxxxvii, ed. 1832. Warton suggested a derivation from the French Marion, and the idea is extremely plausible. Robin and Marion were the subject of innumerable motets and pastourelles of the thirteenth century, and the hero and heroine of a very pretty and lively play, more properly comic opera, composed by Adam de la Halle not far from 1280. We know from a document of 1392 that this play was annually performed at Angers, at Whitsuntide, and we cannot doubt that it was a stock-piece in many places, as from its merits it deserved to be. There are as many proverbs about Robin and Marion as there are about Robin Hood, and the first verse of the play, derived from an earlier song, is still (or was fifty years ago) in the mouths of the peasant girls of Hainault.^[29] In the May-game of June, 1559, described by Machyn, after many other things, they had "Robin Hood and Little John," and "Maid Marian and Friar Tuck," some dramatic scene, pantomime, or pageant, probably two; but there is nothing of Maid Marian in the two (fragmentary) Robin Hood plays which are preserved, both of which, so far as they go, are based on ballads. Anthony Munday, towards the end of the sixteenth century, made a play, full of his own inventions, in which Robert, Earl of Huntington, being out-lawed, takes refuge in Sherwood, with his chaste love Matilda, daughter of Lord Fitzwaters, and changes his name to Robin Hood, hers to Maid Marian. ^[30] One S. G., a good deal later, wrote a very bad ballad about the Earl of Huntington and his lass, the only ballad in which Maid Marian is more than a name. Neglecting these perversions, Maid Marian is a personage in the May-game and morris who is not infrequently paired with a friar, and sometimes with Robin Hood, under what relation, in either case, we cannot precisely say. Percy had no occasion to speak of her as Robin's concubine, and Douce none to call her Robin's paramour.

That ballads about Robin Hood were familiar throughout England and Scotland we know from early testimony. Additional evidence of his celebrity is afforded by the connection of his name with a variety of natural objects and archaic remains over a wide extent of country.

"Cairns on Blackdown in Somersetshire, and barrows near to Whitby in Yorkshire and Ludlow in Shropshire, are termed Robin Hood's pricks or butts; lofty natural eminences in Gloucestershire and Derbyshire are Robin Hood's hills; a huge rock near Matlock is Robin Hood's Tor; an ancient boundary stone in Lincolnshire is Robin Hood's cross; a presumed loggan, or rocking-stone, in Yorkshire is Robin Hood's penny-stone; a fountain near Nottingham, another between Doncaster and Wakefield, and one in Lancashire are Robin Hood's wells; a cave in Nottinghamshire is his stable; a rude natural rock in Hope Dale is his chair; a chasm at Chatsworth is his leap; Blackstone Edge, in Lancashire, is his bed; ancient oaks, in various parts of the country, are his trees."^[31] All sorts of traditions are fitted to the localities where they are known. It would be an exception to ordinary rules if we did not find Robin Hood trees and Robin Hood wells and Robin Hood hills. But, says Wright, in his essay on the Robin Hood ballads (p. 208), the connection of Robin Hood's name with mounds and stones is perhaps one of the strongest proofs of his mythic character, as if Robin Hood were conceived of as a giant. The fact in question is rather a proof that those names were conferred at a time when the real character of Robin Hood was dimly remembered. In the oldest ballads Robin Hood is simply a stout yeoman, one of the best that ever bare bow; in the later ballads he is repeatedly foiled in contests with shepherds and beggars. Is it supposable that those who knew of him even at his best estate, could give him a loggan for a penny-stone? No one has as yet undertaken to prove that the ballads are later than the names.^[32] Mounds and stones bear his name for the same idle reason that "so many others have that of King Arthur, King John, and, for want of a better, that of the devil."^[33]

Kuhn, starting with the assumption that the mythical character of Robin Hood is fully established (by traditions posterior to the ballads and contradictory to their tenor), has sought to show that our courteous outlaw is in particular one of the manifestations of Woden. The hobby-horse, which, be it borne in mind, though now and then found in the May-game or morris-dance, was never intimately associated, perhaps we may say never at all associated, with Robin Hood, represents, it is maintained, Woden. The fundamental grounds are these. In a Christmas, New Year, or Twelfth Day sport at Paget's Bromley, Staffordshire, the rider of the hobby-horse held a bow and arrow in his hands, with which he made a snapping noise. In a modern Christmas festivity in Kent, the young people would affix the head of a horse to a pole about four feet in length, and tie a cloth round the head to conceal one of the party, who, by pulling a string attached to the horse's lower jaw, produced a snapping noise as he moved along. This ceremony, according to the reporter, was called a hoodening, and the figure of the horse a hooden, "a wooden horse."^[34] The word hooden, according to Kuhn, we may unhesitatingly expound as Woden; Hood is a corruption of "Hooden," and this Hooden again conducts us to Woden.

  Glosyng is a ful glorious thing certayn.

The sport referred to is explained in Pegge's Alphabet of Kenticisms (collected 1735-36), under the name hooding, as a country masquerade at Christmas time, which in Derbyshire they call guising, and in other places mumming; and to the same effect in the Rev. W.D. Parish's Dictionary of the Kentish Dialect (soon to be published) under hoodening, which word is an obvious corruption, or secondary form, of hooding. The word hooding, applied to the sport, means just what it does in the old English hooding-cloth, a curtain; that is, a covering, and so a disguise by covering. It is true that wooden is pronounced hooden,^[35] or ooden, in Kent, and that the hobby-horse had a wooden head, but it is quite inconceivable that the sport should receive its name from a circumstance so subordinate as the material of which the horse was made. Such an interpretation would hardly be thought of had not hooding in its proper sense long been obsolete. That this is the case is plain from two facts: the hooding used to be accompanied with carol-singing, and the Rev. Mr. Parish informs us that carol-singing on Christmas Eve is still called hoodening at Monckton, in East Kent. The form Hooden, from which Robin's name is asserted by Kuhn to be corrupted, is invented for the occasion. I suppose that no one will think that the hobby-horse-rider's carrying a bow and arrows, in the single instance of the Staffordshire sport, conduces at all to the identifying of Robin Hood with the hobby-horse. Whether the Hobby-Horse represents Woden is not material here. It is enough that the Hobby-Horse cannot be shown to represent Robin Hood.^[36]

I cannot admit that even the shadow of a case has been made out by those who would attach a mythical character either to Robin Hood or to the outlaws of Inglewood, Adam Bell, Clim of the Clough, and William of Cloudesly.^[37]

Ballads of other nations, relating to classes of men living in revolt against authority and society, may be expected to show some kind of likeness to the English outlaw-ballads, and such resemblances will be pointed out upon occasion. Spanish broadside ballads dating from the end of the sixteenth century commemorate the valientes and guapos of cities, robbers and murderers of the most flaunting and flagitious description: Duran, Romancero, Nos 1331-36, 1339-43, II, 367 ff.^[38] These display towards corregidores, alcaldes, custom-house officers, and all the ministers of government an hostility corresponding to that of Robin Hood against the sheriff; they empty the jails and deliver culprits from the gallows; reminding us very faintly of the Robin Hood broadsides, as of the rescues in Nos 140, 141, the Progress to Nottingham, No 139, in which Robin Hood, at the age of fifteen, kills fifteen foresters, or of Young Gamwell, in No 128, who begins his career by killing his father's steward,^[39] But Robin Hood and his men, in the most degraded of the broadsides, are tame innocents and law-abiding citizens beside the guapos. The Klephts, whose songs are preserved in considerable numbers, mostly from the last century and the present, have the respectability of being engaged, at least in part, in a war against the Turks, and the romance of wild mountaineers. They, like Robin Hood, had a marked animosity against monks, and they put beys to ransom as he would an abbot or a sheriff. There are Magyar robber-ballads in great number;^[40] some of these celebrate Shobri (a man of this century), who spares the poor, relieves beggars, pillages priests (but never burns or kills), and fears God: Erdélyi's collection, I, 194-98, Nos 237-39; Arany-Gyulai, II, 56, No 49; Kertbeny, Ausgewählte Ungarische Volkslieder, pp 246-251, Nos 136-38; Aigner, pp 198-201. Russian robber-songs are given by Sakharof, under the title Udaluiya, Skazaniya, 1841, I, iii, 224-32; Ralston, Songs of the Russian People, pp 44-50. There are a few Sicilian robber-ballads in Pitré, Canti pop. Siciliani, Nos 913-16, II, 125-37.

The Gest is a popular epic, composed from several ballads by a poet of a thoroughly congenial spirit. No one of the ballads from which it was made up is extant in a separate shape, and some portions of the story may have been of the compiler's own invention. The decoying of the sheriff into the wood, stanzas 181-204, is of the same derivation as the last part of Robin Hood and the Potter, No 121, Little John and Robin Hood exchanging parts; the conclusion, 451-56, is of the same source as Robin Hood's Death, No 120. Though the tale, as to all important considerations, is eminently original, absolutely so as to the conception of Robin Hood, some traits and incidents, as might be expected, are taken from what we may call the general stock of mediaeval fiction.

The story is a three-ply web of the adventures of Robin Hood with a knight, with the sheriff of Nottingham, and with the king (the concluding stanzas, 451-56, being a mere epilogue), and may be decomposed accordingly. I. How Robin Hood relieved a knight, who had fallen into poverty, by lending him money on the security of Our Lady, the first fit, 1-81; how the knight recovered his lands, which had been pledged to Saint Mary Abbey, and set forth to repay the loan, the second fit, 82-143; how Robin Hood, having taken twice the sum lent from a monk of this abbey, declared that Our Lady had discharged the debt, and would receive nothing more from the knight, the fourth fit, 205-280. II. How Little John insidiously took service with Robin Hood's standing enemy, the sheriff of Nottingham, and put the sheriff into Robin Hood's hands, the third fit, 144-204; how the sheriff, who had sworn an oath to help and not to harm Robin Hood and his men, treacherously set upon the outlaws at a shooting-match, and they were fain to take refuge in the knight's castle; how, missing of Robin Hood, the sheriff made prisoner of the knight; and how Robin Hood slew the sheriff and rescued the knight, the fifth and sixth fit, 281-353. III. How the king, coming in person to apprehend Robin Hood and the knight, disguised himself as an abbot, was stopped by Robin Hood, feasted on his own deer, and entertained with an exhibition of archery, in the course of which he was recognized by Robin Hood, who asked his grace and received a promise thereof, on condition that he and his men should enter into the king's service; and how the king, for a jest, disguised himself and his company in the green of the outlaws, and going back to Nottingham caused a general flight of the people, which he stopped by making himself known; how he pardoned the knight; and how Robin Hood, after fifteen months in the king's court, heart-sick and deserted by all his men but John and Scathlock, obtained a week's leave of the king to go on a pilgrimage to Saint Mary Magdalen of Barnsdale, and would never come back in two-and-twenty years, the seventh and eighth fit, 354-450. A particular analysis may be spared, seeing that many of the details will come out incidentally in what follows.

Barnsdale, Robin Hood's haunt in the Gest, 3, 21, 82, 134, 213, 262, 440, 442, is a woodland region in the West Riding of Yorkshire, a little to the south of Pontefract and somewhat further to the north of Doncaster. The river Went is its northern boundary. "The traveller enters upon it [from the south] a little beyond a well-known place called Robin Hood's Well [some ten miles north of Doncaster, near Skelbrook], and he leaves it when he has descended to Wentbridge." (For Wentbridge, see No 121, st. 6; the Gest, 135 1.) A little to the west is Wakefield, and beyond Wakefield, between that town and Halifax, was the priory of Kyrkesly or Kirklees. The Sayles, 18, was a very small tenancy of the manor of Pontefract. The great North Road, formerly so called, and here, 18, denominated Watling Street (as Roman roads often are), crosses Barnsdale between Doncaster and Ferrybridge.^[41] Saint Mary Abbey, "here besyde," 54, was at York, and must have been a good twenty miles from Barnsdale. The knight, 1264, is said to be "at home in Verysdale." Wyresdale (now Over and Nether Wyersdale) was an extensive tract of wild country, part of the old forest of Lancashire, a few miles to the southeast of Lancaster. The knight's son had slain a knight and a squire of Lancaster, a, Lancashire, b, f, g, 53. It is very likely, therefore, that the knight's castle, in the original ballad, was in Lancashire. However this may be, it is put in the Gest, 309 f, on the way between Nottingham and Robin Hood's retreat, which must be assumed to be Barnsdale. From it, again, Barnsdale is easily accessible to the knight's wife, 334 f.^[42] Wherever it lay or lies, the distance from Nottingham or from Barnsdale, as also the distance from Nottingham to Barnsdale (actually some fifty miles), is made nothing of in the Gest.^[43] The sheriff goes a-hunting; John, who is left behind, does not start from Nottingham till more than an hour after noon, takes the sheriff's silver to Barnsdale,^[44] runs five miles in the forest, and finds the sheriff still at his sport: 155 f, 168, 176-82. We must not be nice. Robin Hood has made a vow to go from London to Barnsdale barefoot. The distance thither and back would not be much short of three hundred and fifty miles. King Edward allows him a seven-night, and no longer, 442 f. The compiler of the Gest did not concern himself to adjust these matters. There was evidently at one time a Barnsdale cycle and a Sherwood cycle of Robin Hood ballads. The sheriff of Nottingham would belong to the Sherwood series (to which Robin Hood and the Monk appertains). He is now a capital character in all the old Robin Hood ballads. If he was adopted from the Sherwood into the Barnsdale set, this was done without a rearrangement of the topography.

5-7. Robin Hood will not dine until he has some guest that can pay handsomely for his entertainment, 18, 19, 206, 209; dinner, accordingly, is sometimes delayed a long time, 25, 30, 143, 220; to Little John's impatience, 5, 16, 206, 211. This habit of Robin's seems to be a humorous imitation of King Arthur, who in numerous romances will not dine till some adventure presents itself; a custom which, at least on one occasion, proves vexatious to his court. Cf. I, 257 f.^[45]

8-10. Robin's general piety and his special devotion to the Virgin are again to be remarked in No 118. There is a tale of a knight who had a castle near a public road, and robbed everybody that went by, but said his Ave every day, and never allowed anything to interfere with his so doing, in Legenda Aurea, c. 51, Grasse, p. 221; Hagen, Gesammtabenteuer, III, 563, No 86; Morlini Novellæ, Paris, 1855, p. 269, No 17, etc.

13-15. Robin's practice corresponds closely with Gamelyn's:

  Whil Gamelyn was outlawed hadde he no cors;
There was no man that for him ferde the wors
But abbotes and priours, monk and chanoun;
On hem left he no-thing, whan he mighte hem noin.
            vv 779-82, ed. Skeat.

Fulk Fitz Warine, nor any of his, during the time of his outlawry would ever do hurt to any one except the king and his knights: Wright, p. 77 f.

45. "Distraint of knighthood," or the practice of requiring military tenants who held 20 l. per annum to receive knighthood, or pay a composition, began under Henry III, as early as 1224, and was continued by Edward I. This was regarded as a very serious oppression under James I and Charles I, and was abolished in 1642. Stubbs, Constitutional History, II, 281 f; Hallam, Constitutional History, ed. 1854, I, 338, note x, II, 9, 99.

62-66. The knight has no security to offer for a loan "but God that dyed on a tree," and such security, or that of the saints, is peremptorily rejected by Robin; but when the knight says that he can offer no other, unless it be Our Lady, the Virgin is instantly accepted as entirely satisfactory. In a well-known miracle of Mary, found in most of the larger collections, a Christian, who resorts to a Jew to borrow money, tenders Jesus as security, and the Jew, who regards Jesus as a just man and a prophet, though not divine, is willing to lend on the terms proposed. The Christian, not being able, as he says, to produce Jesus Christ in person, takes the Jew to a church, and, standing before an image of the Virgin and Child, causes him to take the hand of the Child, saying, Lord Jesus Christ, whose image I have given as pledge for this money, and whom I have offered this Jew as my surety, I beg and entreat that, if I shall by any chance be prevented from returning the money to this man upon the day fixed, but shall give it to thee, thou wilt return it to him in such manner and form as may please thee. In the sequel this miraculous interposition becomes necessary, and the money is punctually restored, the act of grace being implicitly or distinctly attributed to Mary rather than her Son; distinctly in an English form of the legend, where the Christian, especially devoted to the Virgin, offers Saint Mary for his borrow: Horstmann, Die altenglischen Marienlegenden des Manuscript Vernon, in Archiv für das Studium der neueren Sprachen, LVI, 232, No 6.^[46]

107. The abbot had retained the chief justice "by robe and fee," to counsel and aid him in the spoliation of the knight, 93. Taking and giving of robes and fees for such purposes is defined as conspiracy in a statute of Edward I, 1305-06; and by another statute, 20 Edward III, c. vi, 1346, justices are required to swear that they will take robes and fees from no man but the king: et que vos ne prendrez fee, tant come vos serez justicz, ne robes, de nul homme, graunt ne petit, sinoun du roi meismes. Statutes of the Realm, I, 145, 305: cited by J. Lewelyn Curtis, in Notes and Queries, S.I, VI, 479 f. All the English judges, including the chief justice, were convicted of bribery and were removed, under Edward I, 1289.

121. The knight would have given something for the use of the four hundred pound had the abbot been civil, though under no obligation to pay interest. In 270 the knight proffers Robin twenty mark (3 per cent) for his courtesy, which seemingly small sum was to be accompanied with the valuable gift of a hundred bows and a hundred sheaf of peacock-feathered, silver-nocked arrows. But though the abbot had not lent for usury, still less had he lent for charity. The knight's lands were to be forfeited if the loan should not be punctually returned, 86 f, 94, 106; and of this the knight was entirely aware, 85. "As for mortgaging or pawning," says Bacon, Of Usury, "either men will not take pawns without use, or, if they do, they will look precisely for the forfeiture. I remember a cruel moneyed man in the country that would say. The devil take this usury; it keeps us from forfeitures of mortgages and bonds." But troubles, legal or other, might ensue upon this hard-dealing unless the knight would give a quittance, 117 f.

135-37. A ram was the prize for an ordinary wrestling-match; but this is an occasion which brings together all the best yeomen of the West Country, and the victor is to have a bull, a horse saddled and bridled, a pair of gloves, a ring, and a pipe of wine. In Gamely n "there was set up a ram and a ring," v. 172.

181-204. The sheriff is decoyed into the wood by Robin Hood in No 121, 56-69, No 122, A, 18-25, B, 20-27, as here by Little John. Fulk Fitz Warine gets his enemy, King John, into his power by a like stratagem. Fulk, disguised as a collier, is asked by King John if he has seen a stag or doe pass. He has seen a horned beast; it had long horns. He offers to take the king to the place where he saw it, and begs the king to wait while he goes into the thicket to drive the beast that way. Fulk's men are in the forest: he tells them that he has brought the king with only three knights; they rush out and seize the king. Fulk says he will have John's life, but the king promises to restore Fulk's heritage and all that had been taken from him and his men, and to be his friend forever after. A pledge of faith is exacted and given, and very happy is the king so to escape. But the king keeps the forced oath no better than the sheriff. Wright, p. 145 ff. There is a passage which has the same source, though differing in details, in Eustace the Monk, Michel, pp. 36-39, vv 995-1070. The story is incomparably better here than elsewhere.

213-33. The black monks are Benedictines. There are two according to 213 f, 218, 225⁴, but the high cellarer only (who in 91-93 is exultant over the knight's forfeiture) is of consequence, and the other is made no account of. Seven score of wight young men, 2293, is the right number for a band of outlaws; so Gamelyn, v. 628. The sheriff has his seven score in Guy of Gisborn, 13.

243-47. "What is in your coffers?" So Eustace the monk to the merchant, v. 938, p. 34, Michel: "Di-moi combien tu as d'argent." The merchant tells the exact truth, and Eustace, having verified the answer by counting, returns all the money, saying, If you had lied in the least, you would not have carried off a penny. When Eustace asks the same question of the abbot, v. 1765, p. 64, the abbot answers, after the fashion of our cellarer, Four silver marks. Eustace finds thirty marks, and returns to the abbot the four which he had confessed.

213-272. Nothing was ever more felicitously told, even in the best dit or fabliau, than the "process" of Our Lady's repaying the money which had been lent on her security. Robin's slyly significant welcome to the monk upon learning that he is of Saint Mary Abbey, his professed anxiety that Our Lady is wroth with him because she has not sent him his pay, John's comfortable suggestion that perhaps the monk has brought it, Robin's incidental explanation of the little business in which the Virgin was a party, and request to see the silver in case the monk has come upon her affair, are beautiful touches of humor, and so delicate that it is all but brutal to point them out. The story, however, is an old one, and was known, perhaps, wherever monks were known. A complete parallel is afforded by Pauli's Schimpf und Ernst, No 59 (c. 1515). A nobleman took a burgess's son prisoner in war, carried him home to his castle, and shut him up in a tower. After lying there a considerable time, the prisoner asked and obtained an interview with his captor, and said: Dear lord, I am doing no good here to you or myself, since my friends will not send my ransom. If you would let me go home, I would come back in eight weeks and bring you the money. Whom will you give for surety? asked the nobleman. I have no one to offer, replied the prisoner, but the Lord God, and will swear you an oath by him to keep my word. The nobleman was satisfied, made his captive swear the oath, and let him go. The hero sold all that he owned, and raised the money, but was three weeks longer in so doing than the time agreed upon. The nobleman, one day, when he was riding out with a couple of servants, fell in with an abbot or friar who had two fine horses and a man. See here, my good fellows, said the young lord; that monk is travelling with two horses, as fine as any knight, when he ought to be riding on an ass. Look out now, we will play him a turn. So saying, he rode up to the monk, seized the bridle of his horse, and asked, Sir, who are you? Who is your lord? The monk answered, I am a servant of God, and he is my lord. You come in good time, said the nobleman. I had a prisoner, and set him free upon his leaving your lord with me as a surety. But I can get nothing from this lord of yours; he is above my power; so I will lay hands on his servant; and accordingly made the monk go with him afoot to the castle, where he took from him all that he had. Shortly after, his prisoner appeared, fell at his feet, and wished to pay the ransom, begging that he would not be angry, for the money could not be got sooner. But the nobleman said, Stand up, my good man. Keep your money, and go whither you will, for your surety has paid your ransom. Ed. Oesterley, p. 49. The gist of the story is in Jacques de Vitry, Sermones Vulgares, fol. 62, Manuscript 17, 509, Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris; Scala Celi (1480), 159 b, "De Restitucione," and elsewhere: see Oesterly's note, p. 480. A very amusing variety is the fabliau Du povre Mercier, Barbazan et Méon, III, 17; Montaiglon et Raynaud, II, 114; Legrand, III, 93, ed. 1829.^[47]

2933. Reynolde. Possibly Little John borrows this Reynolde's name in 149, but there is no apparent reason why he should. In the following very strange, and to me utterly unintelligible, piece in Ravenscroft's Deuteromelia, which may have been meant to have only enough sense to sing, Renold, a miller's son, mickle of might (was he rechristened Much?), becomes one of Robin Hood's men. (Deuteromelia, p. 4: London, for Tho. Adams, 1609.)

1   By Lands-dale hey ho,
By mery Lands-dale hey ho,
There dwelt a jolly miller,
And a very good old man was he, hey ho.

2   He had, he had and a sonne a,
Men called him Renold,
And mickle of his might
Was he, was he, hey ho.

3   And from his father a wode a,
His fortune for to seeke,
From mery Lands-dale
Wode he, wode he, hey ho.

4   His father would him seeke a,
And found him fast a sleepe;
Among the leaves greene
Was he, was he, hey ho.

5   He tooke, he tooke him up a,
All by the lilly-white hand,
And set him on his feet,
And bad him stand, hey ho.

6   He gave to him a benbow,
Made all of a trusty tree,
And arrowes in his hand,
And bad him let them flee.

7   And shoote was that that a did a,
Some say he shot a mile,
But halfe a mile and more
Was it, was it, hey ho.

8   And at the halfe miles end,
There stood An armed man;
The childe he shot him through,
And through and through, hey ho.^[48]

9   His beard was all on a white a,
As white as whale is bone,
His eyes they were as cleare
As christall stone, hey ho.

10   And there of him they made
Good yeoman, Robin Rood,
Scarlet, and Little John,
And Little John, hey ho.

302-05. The Klepht Giphtakis, wounded in knee and hand, exclaims: Where are you, my brother, my friend? Come back and take me off, or take off my head, lest the Turk should do so, and carry it to that dog of an Ali Pacha. (1790. Fauriel, 1, 20; Zambelios, p. 621, No 32; Passow, p. 52, No 61.)

357-59. The king traverses the whole length of Lancashire and proceeds to Plumpton Park, missing many of his deer. Camden, Britannia, II, 175, ed. 1772, places Plumpton Park on the bank of the Petterel, in Cumberland, east of Inglewood. (Hunter, p. 30, citing no authority, says it was part of the forest of Knaresborough, in Yorkshire.) Since this survey makes the king wroth with Robin Hood, we must give a corresponding extent to Robin's operations. And we remember that Wyntouu says that he exercised his profession in Inglewood and Barnsdale.

371 ff. The story of the seventh fit has a general similitude to the extensive class of tales, mostly jocular, represented by 'The King and the Miller;' as to which, see further on.

403-09. The sport of "pluck-buffet" (424³) is a feature in the romance of Richard Coeur de Lion, 762-98, Weber, II, 33 f. Richard is betrayed to the king of Almayne by a minstrel to whom he had given a cold reception, and is put in prison. The king's son, held the strongest man of the land, visits the prisoner, and proposes to him an exchange of this sort. The prince gives Richard a clout which makes fire spring from his eyes, and goes off laughing, ordering Richard to be well fed, so that he may have no excuse for returning a feeble blow when he takes his turn. The next day, when the prince comes for his payment, Richard, who has waxed his hand by way of preparation, delivers a blow which breaks the young champion's cheek-bone and fells him dead. There is another instance in 'The Turke and Gowin,' Percy Manuscript, Hales and Furnivall, I, 91 ff.

414-450. Robin Hood is pardoned by King Edward on condition of his leaving the green-wood with all his company, and taking service at court. In the course of a twelvemonth,^[49] keeping up his old profusion, Robin has spent not only all his own money, but all his men's, in treating knights and squires, and at the end of the year all his band have deserted him save John and Scathlock. About this time, chancing to see young men shooting, the recollection of his life in the woods comes over him so powerfully that he feels that he shall die if he stays longer with the king. He therefore affects to have made a vow to go to Barnsdale "barefoot and woolward." Upon this plea he obtains from the king leave of absence for a week, and, once more in the forest, never reports for duty in two and twenty years.

Hunter, who could have identified Pigrogromitus and Quinapalus, if he had given his mind to it, sees in this passage, and in what precedes it of King Edward's trip to Nottingham, a plausible semblance of historical reality.^[50] Edward II, as may be shown from Rymer's Fœdera, made a progress in the counties of York, Lancaster, and Nottingham, in the latter part of the year 1323. He was in Yorkshire in August and September, in Lancashire in October, at Nottingham November 923, spending altogether five or six weeks in that neighborhood, and leaving it a little before Christmas. "Now it will scarcely be believed, but it is, nevertheless, the plain and simple truth, that in documents preserved in the Exchequer, containing accounts of expenses in the king's household, we find the name of Robyn Hode, not once, but several times occurring, receiving, with about eight and twenty others, the pay of 3d. a day, as one of the 'vadlets, porteurs de la chambre' of the king;" these entries running from March 24, 1324, to November 22 of the same year. There are entries of payments to vadlets during the year preceding, but unluckily the accountant has put down the sums in gross, without specifying the names of persons who received regular wages. This, as Hunter remarks, does not quite prove that Robyn Hode had not been among these persons before Christmas, 1323, but, on the other hand, account-book evidence is lacking to show that he had been. Hunter's interpretation of the data is that Robyn Hode entered the king's service at Nottingham a little before Christmas, 1323. If this was so, his career as porter was not only brief, but pitiably checkered. His pay is docked for five days' absence in May, again for eight days in August, then for fifteen days in October. "He was growing weary of his new mode of life." Seven days, once more, are deducted in November, and under the 22d of that month we find this entry: Robyn Hode, jadys un des porteurs, poar cas qil ne poait pluis travailler, de donn par comandement, v.s. After this his name no longer appears.

A simple way of reading the Exchequer documents is that one Robert Hood, some time (and, for aught we know, a long time) porter in the king's household, after repeatedly losing time, was finally discharged, with a present of five shillings, because he could not do his work. To detect "a remarkable coincidence between the ballad and the record" requires not only a theoretical prepossession, but an uncommon insensibility to the ludicrous.^[51] But taking things with entire seriousness, there is no correspondence between the ballad and the record other than this: that Robin Hood, who is in the king's service, leaves it; in the one instance deserting, and in the other being displaced. Hunter himself does not, as in the case of Adam Bell, insist that the name Robin Hood is "peculiar." He cites, p. 10, a Robert Hood, citizen of London, who supplied the king's household with beer, 28 Edward I, and a Robert Hood of Wakefield, twice mentioned, 9, 10 Edward H.^[52] Another Robert Hood at Throckelawe, North umbria, is thrice mentioned in the Exchequer Rolls, Edward I, 19, 20, 30: Rot. Orig. in Cur. Scac. Abbrev., I, 69, 73, 124. A Robert Hood is manucaptor for a burgess returned from Lostwithiel, Cornwall, 7 Edward II, Parliamentary Writs, II, 1019, and another, of Howden, York, 10 Edward III, is noted in the Calendar of Patent Rolls, p. 125, No 31, cited by Ritson. In all these we have six Robin Hoods between 30 Edward I and 10 Edward III, a period of less than forty years.

433, 435-50 are translated by A. Grün, p. 166
 
 Footnotes:

1. a preserves stanzas 1-83⁴, 118⁴-208³, 314²-349³; with defects at 22³, 71, 123⁴-127³, 133-136³. It has therefore about 200 stanzas out of 456.

c preserves 264-603; d, 280-350, very much mutilated; e, 435⁴-450¹, very much mutilated, e, inserted among the Douce fragments, was presented by Mr. Halliwell-Phillips.

2. Dr. Farmer considered these leaves to be of Rastell's printing, and older by some years than b; which is not quite intelligible, since Rastell's work is put at 1517-38. c is cited under Rastell's name in Ritson's second edition as well as his first.

3. 94, a, allther moste: b, all other moste. (f, g, of all other; b, 283³, all ther best; 284¹, all theyre best; f, g, al of the best.) 61⁴, a, Muche in fere: b, Much also. 68⁴, a, By xxviii (eight and twenty) score: b (f, g), By eyghtene score, which gives no meaning. 138³, a. frembde bested: b (f, g), frend. 173⁴, a, same nyght: b, same day. 176⁴, a, wode hore: b (f, g), wode tre. 333², a, on rode: b (f, g), on a tre. 343², a, The sherif: b (f, g), The knyght.

4. 133, a, b, husbonde: f, g, husbandeman. 256¹, b, in yonder other corser: f, on the other courser: g, in the other coffer. 274⁴, 286², 387⁴, 412², b, trystell-tre: f, g, trusty tre. 385¹, b, "tarpe": f, g, scale. 371⁴, b, blyve: f, g, blythe, etc.

5. 1112, That all this worlde wrought; 163², The while that he wolde; 316⁴, To metë can they gone; 72⁴, But his bowë tree; 291, They brought hym to the lodgë dore.

255⁴, To seke a monkës male; 360³, He shall haue the knyghtës londys; 369¹, And I wyll be your ledës man; 376¹, Robyn toke the kyngës hors; 366³, 367², 368⁴, etc. 336³, For our derë lady loue.

6. Ritson had seen, among Peck's collections for the history of Premonstratensian monasteries, a Latin poem with the title Prioris Alnwicensis de bello Scotico apud Dunbar, tempore regis Edwardi I, dictamen, sive rithmus Latinus, quo de Willielmo Wallace, Scotico illo Robin Whood, plura sed invidiose canit, and in the margin the date 22 Julii, 1304; whence he concluded that Robin Hood was both mentioned, and compared with Wallace, in 1304. The date refers to matters in the poem. The Manuscript (Sloane, 4934, pars II, ff 103-106) is of the eighteenth century, Hardy, Descriptive Catalogue, etc., III, 279, No 503. The title was supplied by Peck, one of whose marks is the spelling Whood.

7. Either Randle the second, earl from 1128 to 1153, or Randle the third, earl from 1181 and for fifty years, would be likely to be the subject of ballads, but especially the latter. He figures in the story of Fulk Fitz Warine: Wright, p. 149.

8. Cited by Ritson. I have not found the writs.

9. Cited in the Edinburgh Review, 1847, LXXXVI, 134, note; and by Hunter, 1852, The Ballad-Hero, Robin Hood, p. 58 (where the year is wrongly given as 1432). It appears from many cases that the name was very often pronounced Róbinhode.

10. "Robertus Hode et Litill-Johanne, cum eorum complicibus, de quibus stolidum vulgus hianter in comœdiis et in tragœdiis prurienter festum faciunt, et præ ceteris romanciis mimos et bardanos cantitare delectantur."

"Of whom the foolish vulgar in comedies and tragedies make lewd entertainment, and are delighted to hear the jesters and minstrels sing them above all other ballads:" Ritson, whose translation may pass. Ritson rightly observes that comedies and tragedies here are not to be understood as plays. Then follows this abstract of one of the 'tragedies.'

"De quo etiam quagdam commendabilia recitantur, sicut patuit in hoc, quod cum ipse quondam in Barnisdale, iram regis et fremitum principis declinans, missam, ut solitus erat, devotissime audiret, nec aliqua necessitate volebat interrumpere officium, quadam die, cum audiret missam, a quodam vicecomite et ministris regis, eum sæpius perprius infestantibus, in illo secretissimo loco nemorali ubi missæ interfuit exploratus, venientes ad eum qui hoc de suis perceperunt ut omni annisu fugeret suggesserunt. Quod, ob reverentiam sacramenti, quod tunc devotissime venerabatur, omnino facere recusavit. Sed, ceteris suis ob metum mortis trepidantibus, Robertus, in tantum confisus in eum quem coluit, inveritus, cum paucis qui tunc forte ei affuerunt inimicos congressus eos de facili devicit, et, de eorum spoliis ac redemptione ditatus, ministros ecclesiae et missas in majore veneratione semper et de post habere præelegit, attendens quod vulgariter dictum est:

  Hunc deus exaudit qui missam saepius audit."
            Scotichronicon, ed. Goodall, II, 104.

11. Major was in extreme old age in 1524: see Moir's Wallace, I, iv. "Robertus Hudus Anglus et Paruus loannes, latrones famatissimi in nemoribus latuerunt, solum opulentorum virornm bona diripientes. Nullum nisi eos inuadentem, vel resistentem pro suarum rerum tuitione, occiderunt Centum sagittarios ad pugnam aptissimos Robertus latrociniis aluit, quos 400 viri fortissimi inuadere non audebant. Rebus huius Roberti gestis tola Britannia incantibus utitur. Fœminam nullam opprimi permisit, nee pauperum bona surripuit, verum eos ex abbatum bonis ablatis opipare pauit." Historia Maioris Britanniæ, fol. 55 b.

It will be observed that Wyntoun, Bower, and Mair are Scots.

12. Because comic and not heroic, and because Robin is put at a disadvantage. In the other ballads Robin Hood is "evermore the best." Though there is humor in the Gest, it is kept well under, and never lowers Robin's dignity.

13. The only one of these ballads entered in the Stationers' Registers, or known to have been printed, at a date earlier than the seventeenth century is No 124, 'Of Wakefylde and a Grene,' 1557-58.

The earliest known copy of Robin Hood's Garland is one in the Bodleian Library, Wood, 79, printed for W. Gilbertson, 1663. This contains seventeen ballads. An edition of 1670, in the same library, Douce, H. 80, for Coles, Vere and Wright, omits the first of these, a version of Robin Hood and Queen Katherine which is found nowhere else. There is an edition, printed by J.M. for J. Clarke, W. Thackeray, and T. Passinger, among Pepys's Penny Merriments, vol. iii, and Gutch had a copy, printed for the same, to which he gives the date 1686. Garlands of the eighteenth century increase the number of ballads to twenty-seven.

14. In the Stationers' Registers, 1562-63, Arber, I, 204, 'a ballett of Robyn Hod' is licensed to John Alde. The best one would expect of this would be a better copy of some later broadside. 'Robyn Hode in Barnysdale stode' is the first line of a mock-song introduced into the Morality of the Four Elements (which alludes to the discovery of America "within this xx. yere"): Halliwell, Percy Society, vol. xxii, p. 51. It is mentioned ("As R.H.," etc.) in Udall's translation of Erasmi Apothegmata, 1542: Hazlitt, Handbook, pp 513 f. This line, Ritson observes, has been repeatedly cited, singularly enough, in law-cases (and always misquoted: in Barnwood stood, in Barnwell stood, upon Greendale stood): Ritson's Robin Hood, 1832, 1, lxxxix ff. We find "Robyn stode in Bernesdale," Gest, 31; also, "As Robin Hood in the forest stood," No 138, 21; " When Robin Hood in the greenwood stood," No 141, 11, both texts very much later than the interlude. It is not strictly necessary to assume, as Ritson does, that the line belongs to a lost ballad; it may be from some older text of one that we have.

15. Knights and squires are exempted in the Gest, 14, inconsistently with 7, and, as to knights, with the tenor of what follows.

16. Bower, as above. The writer in the L. & W. Review does not distinguish Fordun and Bower.

17. Lieut.-Col. Prideaux states the resemblances between the story of Fulk Fitz Warine and that of Robin Hood, in an interesting article in Notes and Queries, 7th series, II, 421 ff, and suggests that the latter has borrowed from the former. Undoubtedly this might be, but both may have borrowed from the common stock of tradition.

18. The Finder of Wakefield became, according to hia ballad, one of Robin Hood's men, but is not heard of in any other. Will Stutly is also one in No 141; Clifton, No 145; David of Doncaster, No 152. Robin Hood assumes the name Locksley in No 145, and by a blunder Locksley is made one of his men in 147 and 153. Scarlet aad Scathlock are made two in the Earl of Huntington plays. Grafton says that the name of William of Goldesborough was graven, among others, with that of Robin Hood on Robin's tombstone: Chronicle, I, 222, ed. 1809. Ritson says that Munday makes Right-hitting Brand one of the band: I have not observed this.

19. Robin Hood presents the friar with a "lady free," not named, who may be meant for a degraded Maid Marian, such as Falstaff refers to in 1 Henry IV, III, iii, 129.

20. Stow, Survay of London, 1598, p. 72, in Ritson's excellent note EE, Robin Hood, I, cix ff, ed. 1832, which contains almost all the important information relative to the subject. Stow adds that in consequence of a riot on May-day, 1517, the great Mayings and May-games were not after that time "so freely used as afore."

21. These are the people's sports. Hall, fol. lvi, b, cited by Ritson, gives an account of a Maying devised by the guards for the entertainment of Henry VIII and his queen, in 1516. The king and queen, while riding with a great company, come upon a troop of two hundred yeomen in green. One of these, calling himself Robin Hood, invites the king to see his men shoot, and then to an outlaws-break-fast of venison. The royal party, on their return home, were met by a chariot drawn by five horses, in which sat "the Lady May accompanied with Lady Flora," who saluted the king with divers songs.

22. Lysons, The Environs of London, I, 225-32

23. The last two lines are to be understood, I apprehend, exclusively of the May, and the lord and lady mean Lord and Lady of the May. The Lord of Misrule, "with his hobby-horses, dragons, and other antiques," used to go to church: Stubbes, Anatomy of Abuses, ed. Furnivall, p. 147.

24. Myselfe remembreth of a childe, in contreye native mine,
A May game was of Robyn Hood, and of his traine, that time,
To traine up young men, stripplings, and eche other younger childe,
In shooting; yearely this with solempne feast was by the guylde
Or brotherhood of townsmen don, etc.
            Richard Robinson, 1553, in Ritson, p. cxii f, ed. 1832.

25. A Christmas game of very modern date is described in The Mirror, XXVI, 42, in which there was a troop of morris-dancers with Robin Hood and Maid Marian; and also Beelzebub and his wife. Cited by Kuhn, Haupt's Zeitschrift, V, 481.

26. The entries in the Kingston accounts for 28 and 29 Henry VIII, if they refer to the morris-dance only, would show the morris to be constituted as follows:

(28 Henry VIII.) Four dancers, fool, Maid Marian, friar, and piper. A minstrel is also mentioned.

(29 Henry VIII.) Friar, Maid Marian, Morian (Moor?), four dancers, fool. This entry refers to the costume of the characters, which may account for the omission of the piper. Lysons, Environs of London, I, 228 f.

27. It need hardly be remarked that the morris was neither an exclusively English dance nor exclusively a May-game dance. A Flemish morris, delineated in an engraving dated 1460-70, has for personages a lady, fool, piper, and six dancers: Douce, p. 446 f. In Robert Laneham's description of a bride-ale at Kenilworth, 1575, there is a morris-dance, "according to the ancient manner," in the which the parties are Maid Marian, the fool, and six dancers: Furnivall, Captain Cox, p. 22 f. A painting of about 1625 has a morris-dance of seven figures, a Maid Marian, fool, piper, hobby-horse, and three dancers. A tract, of Elizabeth's time, speaks of "a quintessence, beside the fool and the Maid Marian, of all the picked youth, footing the morris about a Maypole," to the pipe and tabor, and other music; and a poem of 1614 describes a country morris-dance of a fool, Maid Marian, hobby-horse, and piper: Ellis's Brand, p. 206 f.

28. The well-to-do Codrus says to the starving Menalcas, who has been venting his spleen against "rascokle" rivals,

  'Yet would I gladly heare some mery fit
Of Maide Marian, or els of Robin Hood.'

Codrus is here only suggesting themes which would be agreeable to him. We are not to deduce from his words that there were ballads about Maid Marian. But if there had been, they would have been distinct from ballads about Robin Hood.

29. See Monmerqué et Michel, Théatre Français au Moyen Age, 1 842, Notice sur Adam de la Halle, pp 27 ff, the songs, pp 31 ff, the play, pp 102 ff; Ducange, Robinetus. Henryson's Robin and Ma'kyne was undoubtedly suggested by the French pastorals.

30. I must invoke the spirit of Ritson to pardon the taking of no very serious notice of Robin Hood's noble extraction. The first mention of this seems to be in Grafton's Chronicle, 1569. Grafton says: In an olde and auncient pamphlet I finde this written of the sayd Robert Hood. This man, sayth he, discended of a noble parentage; or rather, beyng of a base stocke and linage, was for his manhoode and chiualry aduaunced to the noble dignitie of an erle... But afterwardes he so prodigally exceeded in charges and expences that he fell into great debt, by reason whereof so many actions and sutes were commenced against him, wherevnto he aunswered not, that by order of lawe he was outlawed, etc.: I, 221, ed. 1809. (Some such account furnished a starting-point for Munday.) Leland also, Ritson adds, has expressly termed him "nobilis" (Ro: Hood, nobilis ille exlex), Collectanea, I, 54, ed. 1770, and Warner, in Albion's England (1586), p. 132, ed. 1612, calls him a "county":

  Those dales begot some mal-contents, the principal! of whom
A countie was, that with a troop of yeomandry did roam.

Ritson also cites the Sloane Manuscript, 715, "written, as it seems, toward the end of the sixteenth century;" and Harleian Manuscript, 1233, which he does not date, but which is of the middle of the seventeenth century. Against the sixteenth-century testimony, so to call it, we put in that of the early ballads, all of which describe Robin as a yeoman, the Gest emphasizing the point.

31. The Edinburgh Review, LXXXVI, 123 (with a slight correction in one instance), mostly from Ritson, I, cix, cxxvi ff, 1832, and from Wright's Essays, etc., II, 209 f, 1846. Of course the list might be extended: there are some additions in The Academy, XXIV, 231, 1883, and four Robin Hood's wells in Yorkshire alone are there noted.

32. A Robin Hood's Stone, near Barnsdale, of what description we are not told, is mentioned in an account of a progress made by Henry VII, and Robin Hood's Well, in the same region, in an account of a tour made in 1634: Hunter's Robin Hood, p. 61. The well is also mentioned by Drunken Barnaby. A Robin Hood's Hill is referred to in Vicars' account of the siege of Gloucester in 1 643: The Academy, XXIV, 231.

33. Gough, in the Gentleman's Magazine, March 8, 1793, cited by Gutch. Wright has, somewhat naively, furnished his own refutation: "A large tumulus we know well in our own county, near Ludlow in Shropshire, which is also called Robin Hood's But, and which affords us a curious instance how new stories were often invented to account for a name whose original import was forgotten. The circumstances, too, in this case, prove that the story was of late invention. The barrow, as regarded superstitiously, had borne the name of Robin Hood. On the roof of one of the chancels of the church of Ludlow, which is called Fletchers' chancel, as having been, when 'the strength of England stood upon archery,' the place where the fletchers held their meetings, and which is distant from the aforesaid barrow two miles, or two miles and a half, there stands an iron arrow, as the sign of their craft. The imagination of the people of the place, after archery and fletchers had been forgotten, and when Robin Hood was known only as an outlaw and a bowman, made a connection between the barrow (from its name) and the chancel (from the arrow on its roof), and a tale was invented how the outlaw once stood upon the former and took aim at the weathercock on the church-steeple; but the distance being a little too great, the arrow fell short of its mark, and remained up to the present day on the roof of the chancel." (Essays, I, 209 f.)

A correspondent of The Academy, XXIV, 181, remarks that one of the Anglo-Saxon charters in Kemble's Codex Diplomaticus mentions a "place" in Worcestershire called Hódes ác (now Hodsoak), that there is a village in Nottinghamshire called Hodsock, that it is improbable that two men living in districts so widely apart should each have given his name to an oak-tree, and that therefore we may safely conclude Hód to be a mythical personage. Somebody's tree is given as a boundary mark more than thirty times in these charters, somebody's thorn at least ten times, somebody's oak at least five times. How often such a mark might occur in connection with any particular name would depend upon the frequency of the name. Hód or Hóde is cited thirteen times by Kemble, and few names occur oftener. The name, we may infer, was relatively as common then as it is in our century, which has seen three Admiral Hoods (who, by virtue of being three, may be adjudged as mythical by and by) and one poet Hood alive together. Why may not three retired wícings and one scóp, of the name, have been living in Berks, Hants, Wilts, and Worcestershire in the tenth century?

34. Plot's History of Staffordshire, p. 434, cited in Ellis's Brand, 1, 383; The Mirror, XX, 419, cited by Kuhn, Haupt's Zeitschrift, V, 474 f. The Kentish sport is also described in the Rev. W.D. Parish's Dictionary of the Kentish Dialect, p. 77, under Hoodening

35. In West Worcestershire h is put for w, "by an emphatic speaker," in such words as wood, wool: Mrs. Chamberlain's Glossary. Hood for wood occurs in East Sussex; also in Somerset, according to Halliwell's Dictionary. The derivation of Hood from wood has often been suggested: as by Peele, in his Edward I, "Robin of the Wood, alias Robin Hood," Works, Dyce, I, 162. The inventive Peck was pleased always to write Robin Whood.

36. The Hobby-Horse, Schimmel, Fastnachtspferd, Herbstpferd, Adventspferd, Chevalet, Cheval Mallet, is maintained by Mannhardt to be figurative of the Corn-Sprite, Korndamon; nichts anderes als das Kornross, Vegetationsross, nicht aber eine Darstellung Wodans, wie man nach Kuhns Vorgang jetzt allgemein annimmt: Mannhardt, Mythologische Forschungen, in Quellen u. Forschungen, LI, p. 165. "Man sieht den Ungrund der bei deutschen Mythologen so beliebten Identifizierung von Robin Hood und Wodan:" Mannhardt, Wald- u. Feldkulte, I, 546, note 3.

37. The reasoning, in the instance of Robin Hood, has been signally loose and incautious; still, the general conclusion finds ready acceptance with mythologists, on one ground or another, and deductions are made with the steadiness of a geometer. Robin Hood, being one of the "solar heroes," "has his faint reflection in Little John, who stands to him in the same relation as Patroclus to Achilles," etc. "Maid Marian will therefore be the dawn-maiden, to be identified with Briseis," etc. "Friar Tuck is one of the triumvirate who appear also in the Cloudesly and Tell legends," etc. And again, by an interpreter of somewhat different views: "though a considerable portion of this story is ultimately derived from the great Aryan sun-myth, there is the strongest reason for believing that the Anglian Hód was not originally a solar personage, but a degraded form of the God of the Wind, Hermes-Woden. The thievish character of this divinity explains at once why his name should have been chosen as the popular appellation of an outlaw chief." (The Academy, XXIV, 250, 384.)

The Potter in the later Play of Robin Hood (not in the corresponding ballad) wears a rose garland on his head. So does a messenger in the history of Fulk Fitz Warine, Wright, p. 78, not to mention other cases referred to by Ritson, Robin Hood, II, 200, ed. 1832. Fricke, Die Robin-Hood Balladen, p. 55, surmises that the rose garland worn by the Potter may be a relic of the strife between Summer and Winter; and this view, he suggests, would tend to confirm "the otherwise well-grounded hypothesis" that Robin Hood is a mythological personage.

38. "Desde la última década del siglo xvi hasta pocos anos hace, no eran ya los heroes del pueblo ni los Bernardos, ni los Cides, ni los Pulgares, ni los Garcilasos, ni los Céspedes, ni los Paredes, porque su pueblo estaba muerto ó trasformado en vulgo, y este habia sustituido á aquellos los guapos Francisco Estéban, los Correas, los Merinos, los Salinas, los Pedrajas, los Montijos." (Duran, p. 389, note.)

39. Bernardo del Montijo, Duran, No 1342, kills an alcalde at the age of eighteen, "con bastante causa:" upon which phrase Duran observes, "para el vulgo era bastante causa, sin duda, el ser alcalde." Beginning with so much promise of spirit, he afterwards, in carrying off his mistress, who was about to be wedded against her will, kills six constables, a corregidor, the bridegroom, and a captain of the guard. For differences, compare the English broadside R.H. and Allen-a-Dale, No 138.

40. "Doch sind sie meist ohne grossen poetischen Werth, nur als Zeugniss für die Denkweise des Volkes über die 'armen Bursche,' die es lange nicht für so grosse Verbrecher hält als der Staat, und die es, ihre Vorurtheile theilend, im Gegentheile oft als kühne Freiheitshelden betrachtet, die gegen grössere oder kleinere Tyrannen sich zu erheben und denselben zu trotzen wagen, und als ungerecht verfolgte Söhne seines Stammes in Schutz nimmt gegen die fremden Gesetzvollstrecker." (Aigner, Ungarische Volksdichtungen, p. xxvi f.)

41. J. Hunter (Critical and Historical Tracts, No IV), whom I follow here, shows that Barnsdale was peculiarly unsafe for travellers in Edward the First's time. Three ecclesiastics, conveyed from Scotland to Winchester, had a guard, sometimes of eight archers, sometimes of twelve, or, further south, none at all; but when they passed from Pontefract to Tickhill, the number was increased to twenty, propter Barnsdale: p. 14.

42. Hunter suspects that the Nottinghamshire knight, Sir Richard at the Lee, in the latter half of the Gest, was originally a different person from the knight in the former half, "the knight of the Barnsdale ballads," p. 25. Fricke makes the same suggestion, Die Robin-Hood Balladen, p. 19. This may be, but the reasons offered are not quite conclusive.

43. And so, as to Nottingham and Barnsdale, in No 118; and perhaps No 121, for the reference to Wentbridge, st. 6, would imply that Robin Hood is in Barnsdale rather than Sherwood.

44. I say Barnsdale, though the place is not specified, and though Sherwood would remove or reduce the difficulty as to distance. We have nothing to do with Sherwood in the Gest: a rational topography is out of the question. In the seventh fit the king starts from Nottingham, 365, walks "down by yon abbey," 368, and ere he comes to Nottingham, 370, falls in with Robin, 375.

45. This was a custom of Arthur's only upon certain holidays, according to the earlier representation, but in later accounts is made general. For romances, besides these mentioned at I, 257, in which this way of Arthur's is noted (Rigomer, Jaufré, etc.), see Gaston Paris, Les Romans en vers du Cycle de la Table Ronde (from Histoire Litt. de la France, XXX), p. 49.

46. Pothouis Liber de Miraculis S.D.G. Marias, c. 33, p. 377; Vincentius B., Speculum Hist., vii. c. 82. Mussafia, Sitzungsberichte der Wiener Akad., Phil.-Hist. Classe, CXIII, 960-91, notes nine Latin copies, besides that attributed to Potho, in Manuscripts mostly of the 13th century. Gautier de Coincy, ed. Poqnet, cols. 543-52; Adgar's Marienlegenden, Neuhaus, p. 176, No 29; Miracles de Nostre Dame par Personnages, G. Paris et U. Robert, VI, 171-223, No 35; Romania, VIII, 16, No 3 (Provençal). Berceo, in Sanchez, II, 367, No 23. Unger, Maria Saga, No 15, pp. 87-92, 1064-67. Mone's Anzeiger, VIII, col. 355, No 8, as a broadside ballad. Afanasief, Skazki, vii, No 49, as a popular tale, the Jew changed to a Tartar, and the Cross taken as surety, Ralston, Russian Folk-Tales, p. 27. "God-borg" in Alfred's Laws, c. 33, Schmid, Gesetze der Angelsachsen, p. 88 f., was perhaps only an asseveration with an invocation of the Deity, like the Welsh "briduw." And so "Ich wil dir got ze bürgen geben," "Got den wil ich ze bürgen han," in the Ritter v. Staufenberg, vv 403, 405, Janicke, Altdeutsche Studien.

47. Le Doctrinal de Sapience, fol. 67 b, cited by Legrand, is not to the purpose. Scala Celi refers to a Speculum Exemplorum.

In Peele's Edward I, the friar, having lost five nobles at dice to St. Francis, pays them to St. Francis' receiver; but presently wins a hundred marks of the saint, and makes the receiver pay. (The story has in one point a touch of the French fabliau.) Peele's Works, ed. Dyce, I, 157-61.

48. hey hoy.

49. 435. The three in 433, as in 416, is for rhyme, and need not be taken strictly.

50. Critical and Historical Tracts, No IV, Kobin Hood, p. 28 ff.

51. Think of Robin as light porter, Robin who had been giving and taking buffets that might fell an ox. Think of him as worn oat with the work in eleven months, and dropped for disability. Think of his being put on three-pence a day, after paying his yeomen at thrice the rate, 171, not to speak of such casual gratuities as we hear of in 382. "There is in all this, perhaps, as much correspondency as we can reasonably expect between the record and the ballad," says Hunter, p. 38.

52. Hunter asks if it is not possible to find in this Robert Hood of Wakefield, near Barnsdale, "the identical person whose name has been so strangely perpetuated." This Robert Hood would be a person of some consideration, and he would thus be qualified "for his station among the vadlets of the crown," three-penny vadlets, Great Hob, Little Coll, Robert Trash, and their fellows. The Wakefield Robert's wife was named Matilda, "and the ballad testimony is not the Little Gest, but other ballads of uncertain antiquity, that the outlaw's wife was named Matilda, which name she exchanged for Marian when she joined him in the green-wood." (Pp 46-48.) Hunter has made a trivial mistake about Matilda: she belongs to Munday's play, and not to the ballads (ballad) he has in mind.

 Brief Description by George Lyman Kittredge

The best qualified judges are not agreed as to the typographical origin of a. The date of b may be anywhere from 1492 to 1534. Copland's edition was not earlier than 1548. The dates of the other texts are uncertain, a, b, f, g, are deficient at 71, 3391, and misprinted at 49, 50, repeating, it may be, the faults of a prior impression, a appears, by internal evidence, to be an older text than b. Some obsolete words of the earlier copies have been modernized in f, g, and deficient lines have been supplied. A considerable number of Middle-English forms remain after those successive renovations of reciters and printers which are presumable in such cases. The Gest may have been compiled at a time when such forms had gone out of use, and these may be relics of the ballads from which this little epic was made up; or the whole poem may have been put together as early as 1400, or before. There are no firm grounds on which to base an opinion.

No notice of Robin Hood has been recovered earlier than that which was long ago pointed out by Percy as occurring in Piers Plowman, and this, according to Professor Skeat, cannot be older than about 1377. Sloth, in that poem, says in his shrift that he knows "rymes of Robyn Hood and Randolf, erle of Chestre," though but imperfectly acquainted with his paternoster. Thomas Robinhood is one of six witnesses to a grant in 1380 or 11381 (Historical Manuscripts. Commission, Fifth Report, Appendix, p. 511). References to Robin Hood are not infrequent in the following century.

Thus it is evident that Robin Hood ballads were popular for a century or more before the time when the Gest was printed. Their popularity was fully established at the beginning of this period, and unquestionably extended back to a much earlier day. Of these ballads, there have come down to us in a comparatively ancient form the following: those from which the Gest (printed, perhaps, before 1500) was composed, being at least four, Robin Hood, the Knight and the Monk, Robin Hood, Little John and the Sheriff, Robin Hood and the King, and Robin Hood's death (a fragment); Robin Hood and the Monk (No. 119), more properly Robin Hood rescued by Little John, Manuscript of about 1450, but not for that older than the ballads of the Gest; Robin Hood and Guy of Gisborne (No. 118), Percv Manuscript ca. 1650; Robin Hood's Death (No. 120), Percy Manuscript and late garlands; Robin Hood and the Potter No. 121), Manuscript of about 1500, later perhaps than any of the group. Besides these there are thirtytwo ballads (Nos. 122-153). About half a dozen of these thirty-two have in them something of the old popular quality; as many more not the least trace of it. Fully a dozen are variations, sometimes wearisome, sometimes sickening, upon the theme 'Robin Hood met with his match.' A considerable part of the Robin Hood poetry looks like char-work done for the petty press, and should be judged as such. The earliest of these ballads, on the other hand, are among the best of all ballads, and perhaps none in English please so many and please so long.

Robin Hood is absolutely a croation of the ballad-muse. The earliest mention we have of him is as the subject of ballads. The only two early historians who speak of him as a ballad hero (Bower, writing 1441-47, and Major, born ca. 1450) pretend to have no information about him except what they derive from ballads, and show that they have none other by the description they give of him; this description being in entire conformity with ballads in our possession, one of which is found in a Manuscript as old as the older of these two writers.

Robin Hood is a yeoman, outlawed for reasons not given, but easily surmised, "courteous and free," religious in sentiment, and above all reverent of the Virgin, for the love of whom he is respectful to all women. He lives by the king's deer (though he loves no man in the world so much as his king) and by levies on the superfluity of the higher orders, secular and spiritual, bishops and archbishops, abbots, bold barons, and knights, but harms no husbandman or yeoman, and is friendly to poor men generally, imparting to them of what he takes from the rich. Courtesy, good temper, liberality, and manliness are his chief marks; for courtesy and good temper he is a popular Gawain. Yeoman as he is, he has a kind of royal dignity, a princely grace, and a gentleman-like refinement of humor. This is the Robin Hood of the Gest especially; the late ballads debase this primary conception in various ways and degrees.

This is what Robin Hood is, and it is equally important to observe what he is not. He has no sort of political character, in the Gest or any other ballad. This takes the ground from under the feet of those who seek to assign him a place in history. Nor has even a shadow of a case been made out by those who would equate Robin Hood with Odin or account for him in accordance with the supposed principles of comparative mythology.

The chief comrades of Robin Hood are in 'Robin Hood and the Monk,' Little John, Scathlok (Scarlok, Scarlet), and Much; to these the Gest adds Gilbert of the White Hand and Reynold (292 f.). A friar is not a member of his company in the older ballads. Maid Marian is unknown to the genuine Robin Hood tradition.

The Gest is a popular epic, composed from several ballads by a poet of a thoroughly congenial spirit. No one of the ballads from which it was made up is extant in a separate shape, and some portions of the story may have been of the compiler's own invention. The decoying of the sheriff into the wood, stanzas 181-204, is of the same derivation as the last part of Robin Hood and the Potter (No. 121), Little John and Robin Hood exchanging parts; the conclusion, 451-456, is of the same source as Robin Hood's Death (No. 120). Though the tale, as to all important considerations, is eminently original, absolutely so as to the conception of Robin Hood, some traits and incidents, as might be expected, are taken from what we may call the general stock of mediaeval fiction.

The story is a three-ply web of the adventures of Robin Hood with a knight, with the sheriff of Nottingham, and with the king (the concluding stanzas, 451-456, being a mere epilogue), and may be decomposed accordingly. I. How Robin Hood relieved a knight, who had fallen into poverty, by lending him money on the security of Our Lady, the first fit, 1-81; how the knight recovered his lands, which had been pledged to Saint Mary Abbey, and set forth to repay the loan, the second fit, 82-143; how Robin Hood, having taken twice the sum lent from a monk of this abbey, declared that Our Lady had discharged the debt, and would receive nothing more from the knight, the fourth fit, 205-280. II. How Little John insidiously took service with Robin Hood's standing enemy, the sheriff of Nottingham, and put the sheriff into Robin Hood's hands, the third fit, 144-204; how the sheriff, who had sworn an oath to help and not to harm Robin Hood and his men, treacherously set upon the outlaws at a shooting-match, and they were fain to take refuge in the knight's castle; how, missing of Robin Hood, the sheriff made prisoner of the knight; and how Robin Hood slew the sheriff and rescued the knight, the fifth and sixth fit, 281-353. III. How the king, coming in person to apprehend Robin Hood and the knight, disguised himself as an abbot, was stopped by Robin Hood, feasted on his own deer, and entertained with an exhibition of archery, in the course of which he was recognized by Robin Hood, who asked his grace and received a promise thereof, on condition that he and his men should enter into the king's service; and how the king, for a jest, disguised himself and his company in the green of the outlaws, and going back to Nottingham caused a general flight of the people, which he stopped by making himself known; how he pardoned the knight; and how Robin Hood, after fifteen months in the king's court, heart-sick and deserted by all his men but John and Scathlock, obtained a week's leave of the king to go on a pilgrimage to Saint Mary Magdalen of Barnsdale, and would never come back in two-andtwenty years, the seventh and eighth fit, 354-450.

Child's Ballad Texts A a.

'A Gest of Robyn Hode'- Version A; Child 117 The Gest of Robyn Hode
  a. 'A Gest of Robyn Hode,' without printer's name, date, or place; the eleventh and last piece in a volume in the Advocates' Library, Edinburgh. Reprinted by David Laing, 1827, with nine pieces from the press of Walter Chepman and Androw Myllar, Edinburgh, 1508, and one other, by a printer unknown, under the title of The Knightly Tale of Golagrus and Gawane, and other Ancient Poems.
  b. 'A Lytell Geste of Robyn Hode,' etc., London, Wynken de Worde, n.d.: Library of the University of Cambridge.
  c. Douce Fragment, No 16: Bodleian Library.
  d. Douce Fragment, No 17: Bodleian Library.
  e. Douce Fragment, No 16: Bodleian Library. 
  f. 'A Mery Geste of Robyn Hoode,' etc., London, Wyllyam Copland, n.d.: British Museum, C. 21. c.
  g. 'A Merry Iest of Robin Hood,' etc., London, printed for Edward White, n.d.: Bodleian Library, Z. 3. Art. Seld., and Mr. Henry Huth's library.

1    Lythe and listin, gentilmen,
That be of frebore blode;
I shall you tel of a gode yeman,
His name was Robyn Hode.

2    Robyn was a prude outlaw,
[Whyles he walked on grounde;
So curteyse an outlawe] as he was one
Was never non founde.

3    Robyn stode in Bernesdale,
And lenyd hym to a tre;
And bi hym stode Litell Johnn,
A gode yeman was he.

4    And alsoo dyd gode Scarlok,
And Much, the miller's son;
There was none ynch of his bodi
But it was worth a grome.

5    Than bespake Lytell Johnn
All vntoo Robyn Hode:
Maister, and ye wolde dyne betyme
It wolde doo you moche gode.

6    Than bespake hym gode Robyn:
To dyne haue I noo lust,
Till that I haue som bolde baron,
Or som vnkouth gest.

7    . . . . . . .
That may pay for the best,
Or som knyght or [som] squyer,
That dwelleth here bi west.

8    A gode maner than had Robyn;
In londe where that he were,
Euery day or he wold dyne
Thre messis wolde he here.

9    The one in the worship of the Fader,
And another of the Holy Gost,
The thirde of Our der Lady,
That he loued allther moste.

10    Robyn loued Oure der Lady;
For dout of dydly synne,
Wolde he neuer do compani harme
That any woman was in.

11    'Maistar,' than sayde Lytil Johnn,
'And we our borde shal sprede,
Tell vs wheder that we shal go,
And what life that we shall lede.

12    'Where we shall take, where we shall leue,
Where we shall abide behynde;
Where we shall robbe, where we shal reue,
Where we shal bete and bynde.'

13    'Therof no force,' than sayde Robyn;
'We shall do well inowe;
But loke ye do no husbonde harme,
That tilleth with his ploughe.

14    'No more ye shall no gode yeman
That walketh by gren -wode shawe;
Ne no knyght ne no squyer
That wol be a gode felawe.

15    'These bisshoppes and these archebishoppes,
Ye shall them bete and bynde;
The hy sherif of Notyingham,
Hym holde ye in your mynde.'

16    'This worde shalbe holde,' sayde Lytell Johnn,
'And this lesson we shall lere;
It is fer dayes ; God sende vs a gest,
That we were at oure dynere!'

17    'Take thy gode bowe in thy honde,' sayde Rob[yn];
'Late Much wende with the;
And so shal Willyam Scarlo[k],
And no man abyde with me.

18    'And walke vp to the Saylis,
And so to Watlingr Stret[e],
And wayte after some vnkuth gest,
Vp chaunce ye may them mete.

19    'Be he erle, or ani baron,
Abbot, or ani knyght,
Bringhe hym to lodge to me;
His dyner shall be dight.'

20    They wente vp to the Saylis,
These yeman all thre;
They loked est, they loke[d] weest;
They myght no man see.

21    But as they loked in to Bernysdale,
Bi a dern strete,
Than came a knyght ridinghe;
Full sone they gan hym mete.

22    All dreri was his semblaunce,
And lytell was his pryde;
His one fote in the styrop stode,
That othere wauyd beside.

23    His hode hanged in his iyn two;
He rode in symple aray;
A soriar man than he was one
Rode neuer in somer day.

24    Litell Johnn was full curteyes,
And sette hym on his kne:
'Welcom be ye, gentyll knyght,
Welcom ar ye to me.

25    'Welcom be thou to gren wode,
Hend knyght and fre;
My maister hath abiden you fastinge,
Syr, al these our s thre.'

26    'Who is thy maister?' sayde the knyght;
Johnn sayde, Robyn Hode;
'He is [a] gode yoman,' sayde the knyght,
'Of hym haue I herde moche gode.

27    'I graunte,' he sayde, 'with you to wende,
My bretherne, all in fere;
My purpos was to haue dyned to day
At Blith or Dancastere.'

28    Furth than went this gentyl knight,
With a carefull chere;
The teris oute of his iyen ran,
And fell downe by his lere.

29    They brought hym to the lodg -dore;
Whan Robyn hym gan see,
Full curtesly dyd of his hode
And sette hym on his knee.

30    'Welcome, sir knight,' than sayde Robyn,
'Welcome art thou to me;
I haue abyden you fastinge, sir,
All these ouris thre.'

31    Than answered the gentyll knight,
With word s fayre and fre;
God the saue, goode Robyn,
And all thy fayre meyn.

32    They wasshed togeder and wyped bothe,
And sette to theyr dynere;
Brede and wyne they had right ynoughe,
And noumbles of the dere.

33    Swannes and fessauntes they had full gode,
And foules of the ryuere;
There fayled none so litell a birde
That euer was bred on bryre.

34    'Do gladly, sir knight,' sayde Robyn;
'Gramarcy, sir,' sayde he;
'Suche a dinere had I nat
Of all these wekys thre.

35    'If I come ageyne, Robyn,
Here by thys contr ,
As gode a dyner I shall the make
As that thou haest made to me.'

36    'Gramarcy, knyght,' sayde Robyn;
'My dyner whan that I it haue,
I was neuer so gredy, bi dere worthy God,
My dyner for to craue.

37    'But pay or ye wende,' sayde Robyn;
'Me thynketh it is gode ryght;
It was neuer the maner, by dere worthi God,
A yoman to pay for a knyhht.'

38    'I haue nought in my coffers,' saide the knyght,
'That I may profer for shame:'
'Litell Johnn, go loke,' sayde Robyn,
'Ne let nat for no blame.

39    'Tel me truth,' than saide Robyn,
'So God haue parte of the:'
'I haue no more but ten shelynges,' sayde the knyght,
'So God haue parte of me.'

40    If thou hast no more,' sayde Robyn,
'I woll nat one peny;
And yf thou haue nede of any more,
More shall I lend the.

41    'Go nowe furth, Littell Johnn,
The truth tell thou me;
If there be no more but ten shelinges,
No peny that I se.'

42    Lyttell Johnn sprede downe hys mantell
Full fayre vpon the grounde,
And there he fonde in the knyght s cofer
But euen halfe [a] pounde.

43    Littell Johnn let it lye full styll,
And went to hys maysteer [full] lowe;
'What tidyng s, Johnn?' sayde Robyn;
'Sir, the knyght is true inowe.'

44    'Fyll of the best wine,' sayde Robyn,
'The knyght shall begynne;
Moche wonder thinketh me
Thy clot[h]ynge is so thin[n]e.

45    'Tell me [one] worde,' sayde Robyn,
'And counsel shal it be;
I trowe thou warte made a knyght of force,
Or ellys of yemanry.

46    'Or ellys thou hast bene a sori husbande,
And lyued in stroke and stryfe;
An okerer, or ellis a lechoure,' sayde Robyn,
'Wyth wronge hast led thy lyfe.'

47    'I am none of those,' sayde the knyght,
'By God that mad me;
An hundred wynter here before
Myn auncetres knyghtes haue be.

48    'But oft it hath befal, Robyn,
A man hath be disgrate;
But God that sitteth in heuen aboue
May amende his state.

49    'Withyn this two yere, Robyne,' he sayde,
'My neghbours well it knowe,
Foure hundred pounde of gode money
Ful well than myght I spende.

50    'Nowe haue I no gode,' saide the knyght,
'God hath shaped such an ende,
But my chyldren and my wyfe,
Tyll God yt may amende.'

51    'In what maner,' than sayde Robyn,
'Hast thou lorne thy rychesse?'
'For my great foly,' he sayde,
'And for my kynd[ ]nesse.

52    'I hade a sone, forsoth, Robyn,
That shulde hau[e] ben myn ayre,
Whanne he was twenty wynter olde,
In felde wolde iust full fayre.

53    'He slewe a knyght of Lancaster,
And a squyer bolde;
For to saue hym in his ryght
My godes both sette and solde.

54    'My londes both sette to wedde, Robyn,
Vntyll a certayn day,
To a ryche abbot here besyde
Of Seynt Mari Abbey.'

55    'What is the som?' sayde Robyn;
'Trouth than tell thou me;'
'Sir,' he sayde, 'Foure hundred pounde;
The abbot told it to me.'

56    'Nowe and thou lese thy lond,' sayde Robyn,
'What woll fall of the?'
'Hastely I wol me buske,' sayd the knyght,
'Ouer the salt see,

57    'And se w[h]ere Criste was quyke and dede,
On the mount of Caluer ;
Fare wel, frende, and haue gode day;
It may no better be.'

58    Teris fell out of hys iyen two;
He wolde haue gone hys way:
'Farewel, frende, and haue gode day;
I ne haue no more to pay.'

59    'Where be thy frends?' sayde Robyn:
'Syr, neuer one wol me knowe;
While I was ryche ynowe at home
Great boste than wolde they blowe.

60    'And nowe they renne away fro me,
As bestis on a rowe;
They take no more hede of me
Thanne they had me neuer sawe.'

61    For ruthe thanne wept Litell Johnn,
Scarlok and Muche in fere;
'Fyl of the best wyne,' sayde Robyn,
'For here is a symple chere.

62    'Hast thou any frende,' sayde Robyn,
'Thy borowe that wold be?'
'I haue none,' than sayde the knyght,
'But God that dyed on tree.'

63    'Do away thy iapis,' than sayde Robyn,
'Thereof wol I right none;
Wenest thou I wolde haue God to borowe,
Peter, Poule, or Johnn?

64    'Nay, by hym that me made,
And shope both sonne and mone,
Fynde me a better borowe,' sayde Robyn,
'Or money getest thou none.'

65    'I haue none other,' sayde the knyght,
'The sothe for to say,
But yf yt be Our der Lady;
She fayled me neuer or thys day.'

66    'By dere worthy God,' sayde Robyn,
'To seche all Englonde thorowe,
Yet fonde I neuer to my pay
A moche better borowe.

67    'Come nowe furth, Litell Johnn,
And go to my tresour ,
And bringe me foure hundered pound,
And loke well tolde it be.'

68    Furth than went Litell Johnn,
And Scarlok went before;
He tolde oute foure hundred pounde
By eight and twenty score.

69    'Is thys well tolde?' sayde [litell] Much;
Johnn sayde, 'What gre[ue]th the?
It is almus to helpe a gentyll knyght,
That is fal in pouert.

70    'Master,' than sayde Lityll John,
'His clothinge is full thynne;
Ye must gyue the knight a lyueray,
To lappe his body therin.

71    'For ye haue scarlet and grene, mayster,
And man[y] a riche aray;
Ther is no marchaunt in mery Englond
So ryche, I dare well say.'

72    'Take hym thre yerdes of euery colour,
And loke well mete that it be;'
Lytell Johnn toke none other mesure
But his bow-tree.

73    And at euery handfull that he met
He lep d foot s three;
'What deuyll s drapar,' sayid litell Muche,
'Thynkest thou for to be?'

74    Scarlok stode full stil and loughe,
And sayd, By God Almyght,
Johnn may gyue hym gode mesure,
For it costeth hym but lyght.

75    'Mayster,' than said Litell Johnn
To gentill Robyn Hode,
'Ye must giue the knig[h]t a hors,
To lede home this gode.'

76    'Take hym a gray coursar,' sayde Robyn,
'And a saydle newe;
He is Oure Ladye's messangere;
God graunt that he be true.'

77    'And a gode palfray,' sayde lytell Much,
'To mayntene hym in his right;'
'And a peyre of bot s,' sayde Scarlock,
'For he is a gentyll knight.'

78    'What shalt thou gyue hym, Litell John?' said Robyn;
'Sir, a peyre of gilt sporis clene,
To pray for all this company;
God bringe hym out of tene.'

79    'Whan shal mi day be,' said the knight,
'Sir, and your wyll be?'
'This day twelue moneth,' saide Robyn,
'Vnder this gren-wode tre.

80    'It were greate sham ,' sayde Robyn,
'A knight alone to ryde,
Without squyre, yoman, or page,
To walk by his syde.

81    'I shall the lende Litell John, my man,
For he shalbe thy knaue;
In a yema[n]'s stede he may the stande,
If thou greate ned haue.'

The seconde fytte

82    Now is the knight gone on his way;
This game hym thought full gode;
Whanne he loked on Bernesdale
He blessyd Robyn Hode.

83    And whanne he thought on Bernysdale,
On Scarlok, Much, and Johnn,
He blyssyd them for the best company
That euer he in come.

84    Then spake that gentyll knyght,
To Lytel Johan gan he saye,
To-morrowe I must to Yorke toune,
To Saynt Mary abbay.

85    And to the abbot of that place
Foure hondred pounde I must pay;
And but I be there vpon this nyght
My londe is lost for ay.

86    The abbot sayd to his couent,
There he stode on grounde,
This day twelfe moneth came there a knyght
And borowed foure hondred pounde.

87    [He borowed foure hondred pounde,]
Upon all his lond fre;
But he come this ylk day
Dysheryte shall he be.

88    'It is full erely,' sayd the pryoure,
'The day is not yet ferre gone;
I had leuer to pay an hondred pounde,
And lay downe anone.

89    'The knyght is ferre beyonde the see,
In Englonde is his ryght,
And suffreth honger and colde,
And many a sory nyght.

90    'It were grete pyt ,' said the pryoure,
'So to haue his londe;
And ye be so lyght of your consyence,
Ye do to hym moch wronge.'

91    'Thou arte euer in my berde,' sayd the abbot,
'By God and Saynt Rycharde;'
With that cam in a fat-heded monke,
The heygh selerer.

92    'He is dede or hanged,' sayd the monke,
'By God that bought me dere,
And we shall haue to spende in this place
Foure hondred pounde by yere.'

93    The abbot and the hy selerer
Stert forthe full bolde,
The [hye] iustyce of Englonde
The abbot there dyde holde.

94    The hy iustyce and many mo
Had take in to they[r] honde
Holy all the knyght s det,
To put that knyght to wronge.

95    They demed the knyght wonder sore,
The abbot and his meyn :
'But he come this ylk day
Dysheryte shall he be.'

96    'He wyll not come yet,' sayd the iustyce,
'Idare well vndertake;'
But in sorowe tym for them all
The knyght came to the gate.

97    Than bespake that gentyll knyght
Untyll his meyn:
Now put on your symple wedes
That ye brought fro the see.

98    [They put on their symple wedes,]
They came to the gates anone;
The porter was redy hymselfe,
And welcomed them euerychone.

99    'Welcome, syr knyght,' sayd the porter;
'My lorde to mete is he,
And so is many a gentyll man,
For the loue of the.'

100    The porter swore a full grete othe,
'By God that mad me,
Here be the best coresed hors
That euer yet sawe I me.

101    'Lede them in to the stable,' he sayd,
'That eased myght they be;'
'They shall not come therin,' sayd the knyght,
'By God that dyed on a tre.'

102    Lord s were to mete isette
In that abbotes hall;
The knyght went forth and kneled downe,
And salued them grete and small.

103    'Do gladly, syr abbot,' sayd the knyght,
'I am come to holde my day:'
The fyrst word the abbot spake,
'Hast thou brought my pay?'

104    'Not one peny,' sayd the knyght,
'By God that maked me;'
'Thou art a shrewed dettour,' sayd the abbot;
'Syr iustyce, drynke to me.

105    'What doost thou here,' sayd the abbot,
'But thou haddest brought thy pay?'
'For God,' than sayd the knyght,
'To pray of a lenger daye.'

106    'Thy daye is broke,' sayd the iustyce,
'Londe getest thou none:'
'Now, good syr iustyce, be my frende,
And fende me of my fone!'

107    'I am holde with the abbot,' sayd the iustyce,
'Both with cloth and fee:'
'Now, good syr sheryf, be my frende!'
'Nay, for God,' sayd he.

108    'Now, good syr abbot, be my frende,
For thy curteys ,
And holde my lond s in thy honde
Tyll I haue made the gree!

109    'And I wyll be thy true seruaunte,
And trewely seru the,
Tyl ye haue foure hondred pounde
Of money good and free.'

110    The abbot sware a full grete othe,
'By God that dyed on a tree,
Get the londe where thou may,
For thou getest none of me.'

111    'By dere worthy God,' then sayd the knyght,
'That all this world wrought,
But I haue my londe agayne,
Full dere it shall be bought.

112    'God, that was of a mayden borne,
Leue vs well to spede!
For it is good to assay a frende
Or that a man haue nede.'

113    The abbot lothely on hym gan loke,
And vylaynesly hym gan call;
'Out,' he sayd, 'Thou fals knyght,
Spede the out of my hall!'

114    'Thou lyest,' then sayd the gentyll knyght,
'Abbot, in thy hal;
False knyght was I neuer,
By God that made vs all.'

115    Vp then stode that gentyll knyght,
To the abbot sayd he,
To suffre a knyght to knele so longe,
Thou canst no curteysye.

116    In iousts and in tournement
Full ferre than haue I be,
And put my selfe as ferre in prees
As ony that euer I se.

117    'What wyll ye gyue more,' sayd the iustice,
'And the knyght shall make a releyse?
And elles dare I safly swere
Ye holde neuer your londe in pees.'

118    'An hondred pounde,' sayd the abbot;
The justice sayd, Gyue hym two;
'Nay, be God,' sayd the knyght,
'Yit gete ye it not so.

119    'Though ye wolde gyue a thousand more,
Yet were ye neuer the nere;
Shall there neuer be myn heyre
Abbot, iustice, ne frere.'

120    He stert hym to a borde anone,
Tyll a table rounde,
And there he shoke oute of a bagge
Euen four hundred pound.

121    'Haue here thi golde, sir abbot,' saide the knight,
'Which that thou lentest me;
Had thou ben curtes at my comynge,
Rewarded shuldest thou haue be.'

122    The abbot sat styll, and ete no more,
For all his ryall fare;
He cast his hede on his shulder,
And fast began to stare.

123    'Take me my golde agayne,' saide the abbot,
'Sir iustice, that I toke the:'
'Not a peni,' said the iustice,
'Bi Go[d, that dy]ed on tree.'

124    'Sir [abbot, and ye me]n of lawe,
Now haue I holde my daye;
Now shall I haue my londe agayne,
For ought that you can saye.'

125    The knyght stert out of the dore,
Awaye was all his care,
And on he put his good clothynge,
The other he lefte there.

126    He wente hym forth full mery syngynge,
As men haue tolde in tale;
His lady met hym at the gate,
At home in Verysdale.

127    'Welcome, my lorde,' sayd his lady;
'Syr, lost is all your good?'
'Be mery, dame,' sayd the knyght,
'And pray for Robyn Hode,

128    'That euer his soul be in blysse:
He holpe me out of tene;
Ne had be his kynd nesse,
Beggers had we bene.

129    'The abbot and I accorded ben,
He is serued of his pay;
The god yoman lent it me,
As I cam by the way.'

130    This knight than dwelled fayre at home,
The sothe for to saye,
Tyll he had gete four hundred pound,
Al redy for to pay.

131    He purueyed him an hundred bowes,
The stryng s well ydyght,
An hundred shefe of arow s gode,
The hedys burneshed full bryght;

132    And euery arowe an ell longe,
With pecok wel idyght,
Inocked all with whyte siluer;
It was a semely syght.

133    He purueyed hym an [hondreth men],
Well harness[ed in that stede],
And hym selfe in that same sete,
And clothed in whyte and rede.

134    He bare a launsgay in his honde,
And a man ledde his male,
And reden with a lyght songe
Vnto Bernysdale.

135    But as he went at a brydge ther was a wrastelyng,
And there taryed was he,
And there was all the best yemen
Of all the west countree.

136    A full fayre game there was vp set,
A whyte bulle vp i-pyght,
A grete courser, with sadle and brydil,
With golde burnyssht full bryght.

137    A payre of gloues, a rede golde rynge,
A pype of wyne, in fay;
What man that bereth hym best i-wys
The pryce shall bere away.

138    There was a yoman in that place,
And best worthy was he,
And for he was ferre and frembde bested,
Slayne he shulde haue be.

139    The knight had ruthe of this yoman,
In plac where he stode;
He sayde that yoman shulde haue no harme,
For loue of Robyn Hode.

140    The knyght presed in to the place,
An hundreth folowed hym [free],
With bow s bent and arow s sharpe,
For to shende that companye.

141    They shulderd all and made hym rome,
To wete what he wolde say;
He toke the yeman bi the hande,
And gaue hym al the play.

142    He gaue hym fyue marke for his wyne,
There it lay on the molde,
And bad it shulde be set a broche,
Drynk who so wolde.

143    Thus longe taried this gentyll knyght,
Tyll that play was done;
So longe abode Robyn fastinge,
Thre hour s after the none.

The thirde fytte

144    Lyth and lystyn, gentilmen,
All that nowe be here;
Of Litell Johnn, that was the knightes man,
Goode myrth ye shall here.

145    It was vpon a mery day
That yonge men wolde go shete;
Lytell Johnn fet his bowe anone,
And sayde he wolde them mete.

146    Thre tymes Litell Johnn shet aboute,
And alway he slet the wande;
The proud sherif of Notingham
By the mark s can stande.

147    The sherif swore a full greate othe:
'By hym that dyede on a tre,
This man is the best arsch re
That euer yet sawe I [me.]

148    'Say me nowe, wight yonge man,
What is nowe thy name?
In what countre were thou borne,
And where is thy wonynge wane?'

149    'In Holdernes, sir, I was borne,
I-wys al of my dame;
Men cal me Reynolde Gren lef
Whan I am at home.'

150    'Sey me, Reyno[l]de Gren lefe,
Wolde thou dwell with me?
And euery yere I woll the gyue
Twenty marke to thy fee.'

151    'I haue a maister,' sayde Litell Johnn,
'A curteys knight is he;
May ye leu gete of hym,
The better may it be.'

152    The sherif gate Litell John
Twelue moneth s of the knight;
Therfore he gaue him right anone
A gode hors and a wight.

153    Nowe is Litell John the sherif s man,
God lende vs well to spede!
But alwey thought Lytell John
To quyte hym wele his mede.

154    'Nowe so God me help ,' sayde Litell John,
'And by my true leutye,
I shall be the worst seruaunt to hym
That euer yet had he.'

155   It fell vpon a Wednesday
The sherif on huntynge was gone,
And Litel Iohn lay in his bed,
And was foriete at home.

156    Therfore he was fastinge
Til it was past the none;
'Gode sir stuarde, I pray to the,
Gyue me my dynere,' saide Litell John.

157    'It is longe for Gren lefe
Fastinge thus for to be;
Therfor I pray the, sir stuarde,
Mi dyner gif me.'

158    'Shalt thou neuer ete ne drynke,' saide the stuarde,
'Tyll my lorde be come to towne:'
'I make myn auowe to God,' saide Litell John,
'I had leuer to crake thy crowne.'

159    The boteler was full vncurteys,
There he stode on flore;
He start to the botery
And shet fast the dore.

160    Lytell Johnn gaue the boteler suche a tap
His backe went nere in two;
Though he liued an hundred ier,
The wors shuld he go.

161    He sporned the dore with his fote;
It went open wel and fyne;
And there he made large lyueray,
Bothe of ale and of wyne.

162    'Sith ye wol nat dyne,' sayde Litell John,
'I shall gyue you to drinke;
And though ye lyue an hundred wynter,
On Lytel Johnn ye shall thinke.'

163    Litell John ete, and Litel John drank,
The whil that he wolde;
The sherife had in his kechyn a coke,
A stoute man and a bolde.

164    'I make myn auowe to God,' saide the coke,
'Thou arte a shrewde hynde
In ani hous for to dwel,
For to ask thus to dyne.'

165    And there he lent Litell John
God[ ] strokis thre;
'I make myn auowe to God,' sayde Lytell John,
'These strokis lyked well me.

166    'Thou arte a bolde man and hardy,
And so thinketh me;
And or I pas fro this place
Assayed better shalt thou be.'

167    Lytell Johnn drew a ful gode sworde,
The coke toke another in hande;
They thought no thynge for to fle,
But stifly for to stande.

168    There they faught sore togedere
Two myl way and well more;
Myght neyther other harme done,
The mountnaunce of an owre.

169    'I make myn auowe to God,' sayde Litell Johnn,
And by my true lewt ,
Thou art one of the best sworde-men
That euer yit sawe I [me.]

170    'Cowdest thou shote as well in a bowe,
To gren wode thou shuldest with me,
And two times in the yere thy clothinge
Chaunged shuld be;

171    'And euery yere of Robyn Hode
Twenty merke to thy fe:'
'Put vp thy swerde,' saide the coke,
'And felow s woll we be.'

172    Thanne he fet to Lytell Johnn
The nowmbles of a do,
Gode brede, and full gode wyne;
They ete and drank theretoo.

173    And when they had dronkyn well,
Theyre trouth s togeder they plight
That they wo[l]de be with Robyn
That ylk sam nyght.

174    They dyd them to the tresoure-hows,
As fast as they myght gone;
The lokk s, that were of full gode stele,
They brake them euerichone.

175    They toke away the siluer vessell,
And all that they mig[h]t get;
Pecis, masars, ne sponis,
Wolde thei not forget.

176    Also [they] toke the god pens,
Thre hundred pounde and more,
And did them st[r]eyte to Robyn Hode,
Under the gren wode hore.

177    'God the saue, my der mayster,
And Criste the saue and se!'
And thanne sayde Robyn to Litell Johnn,
Welcome myght thou be.

178    'Also be that fayre yeman
Thou bryngest there with the;
What tydyng s fro Noty[n]gham?
Lytill Johnn, tell thou me.'

179    'Well the gretith the proud sheryf,
And sende[th] the here by me
His coke and his siluer vessell,
And thre hundred pounde and thre.'

180    'I make myne avowe to God,' sayde Robyn,
'And to the Trenyt ,
It was neuer by his gode wyll
This gode is come to me.'

181    Lytyll Johnn there hym bethought
On a shrewde wyle;
Fyue myle in the forest he ran,
Hym happed all his wyll.

182    Than he met the proud sheref,
Huntynge with houndes and horne;
Lytell Johnn coude of curtesye,
And knelyd hym beforne.

183    'God the saue, my der mayster,
And Criste the saue and se!'
'Reynolde Gren lefe,' sayde the shryef,
'Where hast thou nowe be?'

184    'I haue be in this forest;
A fayre syght can I se;
It was one of the fayrest syghtes
That euer yet sawe I me.

185    'Yonder I sawe a ryght fayre harte,
His coloure is of grene;
Seuen score of dere vpon a herde
Be with hym all bydene.

186    'Their tynd s are so sharpe, maister,
Of sexty, and well mo,
That I durst not shote for drede,
Lest they wolde me slo.'

187    'I make myn auowe to God,' sayde the shyref,
'That syght wolde I fayne se:'
'Buske you thyderwarde, mi der mayster,
Anone, and wende with me.'

188    The sherif rode, and Litell Johnn
Of fote he was smerte,
And whane they came before Robyn,
'Lo, sir, here is the mayster-herte.'

189    Still stode the proud sherief,
A sory man was he;
'Wo the worthe, Raynolde Gren lefe,
Thou hast betrayed nowe me.'

190    'I make myn auowe to God,' sayde Litell Johnn,
'Mayster, ye be to blame;
I was mysserued of my dynere
Whan I was with you at home.'

191    Sone he was to souper sette,
And serued well with siluer white,
And whan the sherif sawe his vessell,
For sorowe he myght nat ete.

192    'Make glad chere,' sayde Robyn Hode,
'Sherif, for charit ,
And for the loue of Litill Johnn
Thy lufe I graunt to the.'

193    Whan they had souped well,
The day was al gone;
Robyn commaunde[d] Litell Johnn
To drawe of his hosen and his shone;

194    His kirtell, and his cote of pie,
That was fured well and fine,
And to[ke] hym a grene mantel,
To lap his body therin.

195    Robyn commaundyd his wight yonge men,
Vnder the gren -wode tree,
They shulde lye in that same sute,
That the sherif myght them see.

196    All nyght lay the proud sherif
In his breche and in his [s]chert;
No wonder it was, in gren wode,
Though his syd s gan to smerte.

197    'Make glade chere,' sayde Robyn Hode,
'Sheref, for charit ;
For this is our ordre i-wys,
Vnder the gren -wode tree.'

198    'This is harder order,' sayde the sherief,
'Than any ankir or frere;
For all the golde in mery Englonde
I wolde nat longe dwell her.'

199    'All this twelue monthes,' sayde Robin,
'Thou shalt dwell with me;
I shall the tech , proud sherif,
An outlaw for to be.'

200    'Or I be here another nyght,' sayde the sherif,
'Robyn, nowe pray I the,
Smyte of mijn hede rather to-morowe,
And I forgyue it the.

201    'Lat me go,' than sayde the sherif,
'For saynt charit ,
And I woll be the best[ ] frende
That euer yet had ye.'

202    'Thou shalt swere me an othe,' sayde Robyn,
'On my bright bronde;
Shalt thou neuer awayte me scathe,
By water ne by lande.

203    'And if thou fynde any of my men,
By nyght or [by] day,
Vpon thyn oth thou shalt swere
To helpe them tha[t] thou may.'
204    Nowe hathe the sherif sworne his othe,
And home he began to gone;
He was as full of gren wode
As euer was hepe of stone.
The fourth fytte
205    The sherif dwelled in Notingham;
He was fayne he was agone;
And Robyn and his mery men
Went to wode anone.
206    'Go we to dyner,' sayde Littell Johnn;
Robyn Hode sayde, Nay;
For I drede Our Lady be wroth with me,
Foe she sent me nat my pay.
207    'Haue no doute, maister,' sayde Litell Johnn;
'Yet is nat the sonne at rest;
For I dare say, and sauely swere,
The knight is true and truste.'
208    'Take thy bowe in thy hande,' sayde Robyn,
'Late Much wende with the,
And so shal Wyllyam Scarlok,
And no man abyde with me.
209    'And walke vp vnder the Sayles,
And to Watlynge-strete,
And wayte after some vnketh gest;
Vp-chaunce ye may them mete.
210    'Whether he be messengere,
Or a man that myrth s can,
Of my good he shall haue some,
Yf he be a por man.'
211    Forth then stert Lytel Johan,
Half in tray and tene,
And gyrde hym with a full good swerde,
Under a mantel of grene.
212    They went vp to the Sayles,
These yemen all thre;
They loked est, they loked west,
They myght no man se.
213    But as [t]he[y] loked in Bernysdale,
By the hy waye,
Than were they ware of two blacke monkes,
Eche on a good palferay.
214    Then bespake Lytell Johan,
To Much he gan say,
I dare lay my lyfe to wedde,
That [these] monkes haue brought our pay.
215    'Make glad chere,' sayd Lytell Johan,
'And frese your bowes of ewe,
And loke your hert s be seker and sad,
Your stryng s trusty and trewe.
216    'The monke hath two and fifty [men,]
And seuen somers full stronge;
There rydeth no bysshop in this londe
So ryally, I vnderstond.
217    'Brethern,' sayd Lytell Johan,
'Here are no more but we thre;
But we bryng them to dyner,
Our mayster dare we not se.
218    'Bende your bowes,' sayd Lytell Johan,
'Make all yon prese to stonde;
The formost monke, his lyfe and his deth
Is closed in my honde.
219    'Abyde, chorle monke,' sayd Lytell Johan,
'No ferther that thou gone;
Yf thou doost, by dere worthy God,
Thy deth is in my honde.
220    'And euyll thryfte on thy hede,' sayd Lytell Johan,
'Ryght vnder thy hatt s bonde;
For thou hast made our mayster wroth,
He is fastynge so longe.'
221    'Who is your mayster?' sayd the monke;
Lytell Johan sayd, Robyn Hode;
'He is a stronge thefe,' sayd the monke,
'Of hym herd I neuer good.'
222    'Thou lyest,' than sayd Lytell Johan,
'And that shall rew the;
He is a yeman of the forest,
To dyne he hath bod the.'
223    Much was redy with a bolte,
Redly and anone,
He set the monke to-fore the brest,
To the grounde that he can gone.
224    Of two and fyfty wyght yonge yemen
There abode not one,
Saf a lytell page and a grome,
To lede the somers with Lytel Johan.
225    They brought the monke to the lodg -dore,
Whether he were loth or lefe,
For to speke with Robyn Hode,
Maugre in theyr tethe.
226    Robyn dyde adowne his hode,
The monke whan that he se;
The monke was not so curt yse,
His hode then let he be.
227    'He is a chorle, mayster, by dere worthy God,'
Than sayd Lytell Johan:
'Thereof no force,' sayd Robyn,
'For curteysy can he none.
228    'How many men,' sayd Robyn,
'Had this monke, Johan?'
'Fyfty and two whan that we met,
But many of them be gone.'
229    'Let blowe a horne,' sayd Robyn,
'That felaushyp may vs knowe;'
Seuen score of wyght yemen
Came pryckynge on a rowe.
230    And euerych of them a good mantell
Of scarlet and of raye;
All they came to good Robyn,
To wyte what he wolde say.
231    They made the monke to wasshe and wype,
And syt at his denere,
Robyn Hode and Lytell Johan
They serued him both in-fere.
232    'Do gladly, monke,' sayd Robyn.
'Gramercy, syr,' sayd he.
'Where is your abbay, whan ye are at home,
And who is your avow ?'
233    'Saynt Mary abbay,' sayd the monke,
'Though I be symple here.'
'In what offyce?' sayd Robyn:
'Syr, the hy selerer.'
234    'Ye be the more welcome,' sayd Robyn,
'So euer mote I the;
Fyll of the best wyne,' sayd Robyn,
'This monke shall drynke to me.
235    'But I haue grete meruayle,' sayd Robyn,
'Of all this long day;
I drede Our Lady be wroth with me,
She sent me not my pay.'
236    'Haue no doute, mayster,' sayd Lytell Johan,
'Ye haue no nede, I saye;
This monke it hath brought, I dare well swere,
For he is of her abbay.'
237    'And she was a borowe,' sayd Robyn,
'Betwene a knyght and me,
Of a lytell money that I hym lent,
Under the g'Rene-wode tree.
238    'And yf thou hast that syluer ibrought,
I pray the let me se;
And I shall help the eftsones,
Yf thou haue nede to me.'
239    The monke swore a full grete othe,
With a sory chere,
'Of the borowehode thou spekest to me,
Herde I neuer ere.'
240    'I make myn avowe to God,' sayd Robyn,
'Monke, thou art to blame;
For God is holde a ryghtwys man,
And so is his dame.
241    'Thou toldest with thyn own tonge,
Thou may not say nay,
How thou arte her seruaunt,
And seruest her euery day.
242    'And thou art made her messengere,
My money for to pay;
Therfore I cun the mor thanke
Thou arte come at thy day.
243    'What is in your cofers?' sayd Robyn,
'Trewe than tell thou me:'
'Syr,' he sayd, 'Twenty marke,
Al so mote I the.'
244    'Yf there be no more,' sayd Robyn,
'I wyll not one peny;
Yf thou hast myster of ony more,
Syr, more I shall lende to the.
245    'And yf I fynd [more,' sayd] Robyn,
'I-wys thou shalte it for gone;
For of thy spendynge-syluer, monke,
Thereof wyll I ryght none.
246    'Go nowe forthe, Lytell Johan,
And the trouth tell thou me;
If there be no more but twenty marke,
No peny that I se.'
247    Lytell Johan spred his mantell downe,
As he had done before,
And he tolde out of the monk s male
Eyght [hondred] pounde and more.
248    Lytell Johan let it lye full styll,
And went to his mayster in hast;
'Syr,' he sayd, 'The monke is trewe ynowe,
Our Lady hath doubled your cast.'
249    'I make myn avowe to God,' sayd Robyn —
'Monke, what tolde I the? —
Our Lady is the trewest woman
That euer yet founde I me.
250    'By dere worthy God,' sayd Robyn,
'To seche all Englond thorowe,
Yet founde I neuer to my pay
A moche better borowe.
251    'Fyll of the best wyne, and do hym drynke,' sayd Robyn,
'And grete well thy lady hende,
And yf she haue nede to Robyn Hode,
A frende she shall hym fynde.
252    'And yf she nedeth ony more syluer,
Come thou agayne to me,
And, by this token she hath me sent,
She shall haue such thre.'
253    The monke was goynge to London ward,
There to holde grete mote,
The knyght that rode so hye on hors,
To brynge hym vnder fote.
254    'Whether be ye away?' sayd Robyn:
'Syr, to maners in this londe,
Too reken with our reues,
That haue done moch wronge.'
255    'Come now forth, Lytell Johan,
And harken to my tale;
A better yemen I knowe none,
To seke a monk s male.'
256    'How moch is in yonder other corser?' sayd Robyn,
'The soth must we see:'
'By Our Lady,' than sayd the monke,
'That were no curteysye,
257    'To bydde a man to dyner,
And syth hym bete and bynde.'
'It is our old maner,' sayd Robyn,
'To leue but lytell behynde.'
258    The monke toke the hors with spore,
No lenger wolde he abyde:
'Ask to drynk ,' than sayd Robyn,
'Or that ye forther ryde.'
259    'Nay, for God,' than sayd the monke,
'Me reweth I cam so nere;
For better chepe I myght haue dyned
In Blythe or in Dankestere.'
260    'Grete well your abbot,' sayd Robyn,
'And your pryour, I you pray,
And byd hym send me such a monke
To dyner euery day.'
261    Now lete we that monke be styll,
And speke we of that knyght:
Yet he came to holde his day,
Whyle that it was lyght.
262    He dyde him streyt to Bernysdale,
Under the gren -wode tre,
And he founde there Robyn Hode,
And all his mery meyn .
263    The knyght lyght doune of his good palfray;
Robyn whan he gan see,
So curteysly he dyde adoune his hode,
And set hym on his knee.
264    'God the sau , Robyn Hode,
And all this company:'
'Welcome be thou, gentyll knyght,
And ryght welcome to me.'
265    Than bespake hym Robyn Hode,
To that knyght so fre:
What ned dryueth the to gren wode?
I praye the, syr knyght, tell me.
266    'And welcome be thou, ge[n]tyll knyght,
Why hast thou be so longe?'
'For the abbot and the hy iustyce
Wolde haue had my londe.'
267    'Hast thou thy londe [a]gayne?' sayd Robyn;
'Treuth than tell thou me:'
'Ye, for God,' sayd the knyght,
'And that thanke I God and the.
268    'But take not a grefe,' sayd the knyght, 'That I haue be so longe;
I came by a wrastelynge,
And there I holpe a por yeman,
With wronge was put behynde.'
269    'Nay, for God,' sayd Robyn,
'Syr knyght, that thanke I the;
What man that helpeth a good yeman,
His frende than wyll I be.'
270    'Haue here foure hondred pounde,' than sayd the knyght,
'The whiche ye lent to me;
And here is also twenty marke
For your curteysy.'
271    'Nay, for God,' than sayd Robyn,
'Thou broke it well for ay;
For Our Lady, by her [hy ] selerer,
Hath sent to me my pay.
272    'And yf I toke it i-twyse,
A shame it were to me;
But trewely, gentyll knyght,
Welcom arte thou to me.'
273    Whan Robyn had tolde his tale,
He leugh and had good chere:
'By my trouthe,' then sayd the knyght,
'Your money is redy here.'
274    'Broke it well,' sayd Robyn,
'Thou gentyll knyght so fre;
And welcome be thou, ge[n]tyll knyght,
Under my trystell-tre.
275    'But what shall these bow s do?' sayd Robyn,
'And these arow s ifedred fre?'
'By God,' than sayd the knyght,
'A por present to the.'
276    'Come now forth, Lytell Johan,
And go to my treasur ,
And brynge me there foure hondred pounde;
The monke ouer-tolde it me.
277    'Haue here foure hondred pounde,
Thou gentyll knyght and trewe,
And bye hors and harnes good,
And gylte thy spores all newe.
278    'And yf thou fayle ony spendynge,
Com to Robyn Hode,
And by my trouth thou shalt none fayle,
The whyles I haue any good.
279    'And broke well thy foure hondred pound,
Whiche I lent to the,
And make thy selfe no more so bare,
By the counsell of me.'
280    Thus than holpe hym good Robyn,
The knyght all of his care:
God, that syt in heuen hye,
Graunte vs well to fare!
The fifth fytte
281    Now hath the knyght his leue i-take,
And wente hym on his way;
Robyn Hode and his mery men
Dwelled styll full many a day.
282    Lyth and lysten, gentil men,
And herken what I shall say,
How the proud[ ] sheryfe of Notyngham
Dyde crye a full fayre play;
283    That all the best archers of the north
Sholde come vpon a day,
And [he] that shoteth allther best
The game shall bere a way.
284    He that shoteth allther best,
Furthest fayre and lowe,
At a payre of fynly buttes,
Under the gren -wode shawe,
285    A ryght good arowe he shall haue,
The shaft of syluer whyte,
The hede and the feders of ryche red golde,
In Englond is none lyke.
286    This than herde good Robyn,
Under his trystell-tre:
'Make you redy, ye wyght yonge men;
That shotynge wyll I se.
287    'Buske you, my mery yonge men,
Ye shall go with me;
And I wyll wete the shryu s fayth,
Trewe and yf he be.'
288    Whan they had theyr bowes i-bent,
Theyr takles fedred fre,
Seuen score of wyght yonge men
Stode by Robyns kne.
289    Whan they cam to Notyngham,
The buttes were fayre and longe;
Many was the bolde archere
That shoted with bow s stronge.
290    'There shall but syx shote with me;
The other shal kepe my he[ue]de,
And stand with good bow s bent,
That I be not desceyued.'
291    The fourth outlawe his bowe gan bende,
And that was Robyn Hode,
And that behelde the proud[ ] sheryfe,
All by the but [as] he stode.
292    Thry s Robyn shot about,
And alway he slist the wand,
And so dyde good Gylberte
Wyth the whyt hande.
293    Lytell Johan and good Scatheloke
Were archers good and fre;
Lytell Much and good Reynolde,
The worste wolde they not be.
294    Whan they had shot aboute,
These archours fayre and good,
Euermore was the best,
For soth, Robyn Hode.
295    Hym was delyuered the good arowe,
For best worthy was he;
He toke the yeft so curteysly,
To gren wode wolde he.
296    They cryed out on Robyn Hode,
And grete horn s gan they blowe:
'Wo worth the, treason!' sayd Robyn,
'Full euyl thou art to knowe.
297    'And wo be thou! thou proud sheryf,
Thus gladdynge thy gest;
Other wyse thou behot me
In yonder wylde forest.
298    'But had I the in gren wode,
Under my trystell-tre,
Thou sholdest leue me a better wedde
Than thy trewe lewt .'
299    Full many a bow there was bent,
And arow s let they glyde;
Many a kyrtell there was rent,
And hurt many a syde.
300    The outlawes shot was so stronge
That no man myght them dryue,
And the proud[ ] sheryf s men,
They fled away full blyue.
301    Robyn sawe the busshement to-broke,
In gren wode he wolde haue be;
Many an arowe there was shot
Amonge that company.
302    Lytell Johan was hurte full sore,
With an arowe in his kne,
That he myght neyther go nor ryde;
It was full grete pyt .
303    'Mayster,' then sayd Lytell Johan,
'If euer thou loue[d]st me,
And for that ylk lord s loue
That dyed vpon a tre,
304    'And for the medes of my seruyce,
That I haue serued the,
Lete neuer the proud sheryf
Alyue now fynd me.
305    'But take out thy brown swerde,
And smyte all of my hede,
And gyue me wound s depe and wyde;
No lyfe on me be lefte.'
306    'I wolde not that,' sayd Robyn,
'Johan, that thou were slawe,
For all the golde in mery Englonde,
Though it lay now on a rawe.'
307    'God forbede,' sayd Lytell Much,
'That dyed on a tre,
That thou sholdest, Lytell Johan,
Parte our company.'
308    Up he toke hym on his backe,
And bare hym well a myle;
Many a tyme he layd hym downe,
And shot another whyle.
309    n was there a fayre castell,
A lytell within the wode;
Double-dyched it was about,
And walled, by the rode.
310    And there dwelled that gentyll knyght,
Syr Rychard at the Lee,
That Robyn had lent his good,
Under the gren -wode tree.
311    In he toke good Robyn,
And all his company:
'Welcome be thou, Robyn Hode,
Welcome arte thou to me;
312    'And moche [I] thanke the of thy confort,
And of thy curteysye,
And of thy gret kynd nesse,
Under the gren -wode tre.
313    'I loue no man in all this worlde
So much as I do the;
For all the proud[ ] sheryf of Notyngham,
Ryght here shalt thou be.
314    'Shyt the gates, and drawe the brydge,
And let no man come in,
And arme you well, and make you redy,
And to the walles ye wynne.
315    'For one thynge, Robyn, I the behote;
Iswere by Saynt Quyntyne,
These forty dayes thou wonnest with me,
To soupe, ete, and dyne.'
316    Bordes were layde, and clothes were spredde,
Redely and anone;
Robyn Hode and his mery men
To met can they gone.
The VI. fytte
317    Lythe and lysten, gentylmen,
And herkyn to your songe;
Howe the proud shyref of Notyngham,
And men of armys stronge,
318    Full fast cam to the hy shyref,
The contr vp to route,
And they besette the knyght s castell,
The wall s all aboute.
319    The proud shyref loude gan crye,
And sayde, Thou traytour knight,
Thou kepest here the kynges enemys,
Agaynst the lawe and right.
320    'Syr, I wyll auowe that I haue done,
The dedys that here be dyght,
Vpon all the land s that I haue,
As I am a trew knyght.
321    'Wende furth, sirs, on your way,
And do no more to me
Tyll ye wyt oure kyng s wille,
What he wyll say to the.'
322    The shyref thus had his answere,
Without any lesynge;
[Fu]rth he yede to London towne,
All for to tel our kinge.
323    Ther he telde him of that knight,
And eke of Robyn Hode,
And also of the bolde archars,
That were soo noble and gode.
324    'He wyll auowe that he hath done,
To mayntene the outlawes stronge;
He wyll be lorde, and set you at nought,
In all the northe londe.'
325    'I wil be at Notyngham,' saide our kynge,
'Within this fourteenyght,
And take I wyll Robyn Hode,
And so I wyll that knight.
326    'Go nowe home, shyref,' sayde our kynge,
'And do as I byd the;
And ordeyn gode archers ynowe,
Of all the wyd contr .'
327    The shyref had his leue i-take,
And went hym on his way,
And Robyn Hode to gren wode,
Vpon a certen day.
328    And Lytel John was hole of the arowe
That shot was in his kne,
And dyd hym streyght to Robyn Hode,
Vnder the grene-wod tree.
329    Robyn Hode walked in the forest,
Vnder the leuys grene;
The proud shyref of Notyngham
Thereof he had grete tene.
330    The shyref there fayled of Robyn Hode,
He myght not haue his pray;
Than he awayted this gentyll knyght,
Bothe by nyght and day.
331    Euer he wayted the gentyll knyght,
Syr Richarde at the Lee,
As he went on haukynge by the ryuer-syde,
And let [his] hauk s flee.
332    Toke he there this gentyll knight,
With men of armys stronge,
And led hym to Notyngham warde,
Bounde bothe fote and hande.
333    The sheref sware a full grete othe,
Bi hym that dyed on rode,
He had leuer than an hundred pound
That he had Robyn Hode.
334    This harde the knyght s wyfe,
A fayr lady and a free;
She set hir on a gode palfrey,
To gre'Ne wode anone rode she.
335    Whanne she cam in the forest,
Vnder the gren -wode tree,
Fonde she there Robyn Hode,
And al his fayre men .
336    'God the sau , god Robyn,
And all thy company;
For Our der Ladyes sake,
A bon graunte thou me.
337    'Late neuer my wedded lorde
Shamefully slayne be;
He is fast bowne to Notingham warde,
For the loue of the.'
338    Anone than saide goode Robyn
To that lady so fre,
What man hath your lorde [i-]take?
. . . . . .
339    . . . . . .
'For soth as I the say;
He is nat yet thre myl s
Passed on his way.'
340    Vp than sterte gode Robyn,
As man that had ben wode:
'Buske you, my mery men,
For hym that dyed on rode.
341    'And he that this sorowe forsaketh,
By hym that dyed on tre,
Shall he neuer in gren wode
No lenger dwel with me.'
342    Sone there were gode bow s bent,
Mo than seuen score;
Hedge ne dyche spared they none
That was them before.
343    'I make myn auowe to God,' sayde Robyn,
'The sherif wolde I fayne see;
And if I may hym take,
I-quyte shall it be.'
344    And whan they came to Notingham,
They walked in the strete;
And with the proud sherif i-wys
Son can they mete.
345    'Abyde, thou proud sherif,' he sayde,
'Abyde, and speke with me;
Of some tidinges of oure kinge
I wolde fayne here of the.
346    'This seuen yere, by dere worthy God,
Ne yede I this fast on fote;
I make myn auowe to God, thou proud sherif,
It is nat for thy gode.'
347    Robyn bent a full goode bowe,
An arrowe he drowe at wyll;
He hit so the proud sherife
Vpon the grounde he lay full still.
348    And or he myght vp aryse,
On his fete to stonde,
He smote of the sherifs hede
With his bright[ ] bronde.
349    'Lye thou there, thou proud sherife,
Euyll mote thou cheue!
There myght no man to the truste
The whyles thou were a lyue.'
350    His men drewe out theyr bryght swerdes,
That were so sharpe and kene,
And layde on the sheryues men,
And dryued them downe bydene.
351    Robyn stert to that knyght,
And cut a two his bonde,
And toke hym in his hand a bowe,
And bad hym by hym stonde.
352    'Leue thy hors the behynde,
And lerne for to renne;
Thou shalt with me to gren wode,
Through myr , mosse, and fenne.
353    'Thou shalt with me to gren wode,
Without ony leasynge,
Tyll that I haue gete vs grace
Of Edwarde, our comly kynge.'
The VII. fytte
354    The kynge came to Notynghame,
With knyght s in grete araye,
For to take that gentyll knyght
And Robyn Hode, and yf he may.
355    He asked men of that countr
After Robyn Hode,
And after that gentyll knyght,
That was so bolde and stout.
356    Whan they had tolde hym the case
Our kynge vnderstode ther tale,
And seased in his honde
The knyght s lond s all.
357    All the passe of Lancasshyre
He went both ferre and nere,
Tyll he came to Plomton Parke;
He faylyd many of his dere.
358    There our kynge was wont to se
Herd s many one,
He coud vnneth fynde one dere,
That bare ony good horne.
359    The kynge was wonder wroth withall,
And swore by the Trynyt ,
'I wolde I had Robyn Hode,
With eyen I myght hym se.
360    'And he that wolde smyte of the knyght s hede,
And brynge it to me,
He shall haue the knyght s londes,
Syr Rycharde at the Le.
361    'I gyue it hym with my charter,
And sele it [with] my honde,
To haue and holde for euer more,
In all mery Englonde.'
362    Than bespake a fayre olde knyght,
That was treue in his fay:
A, my leeg lorde the kynge,
One worde I shall you say.
363    There is no man in this countr
May haue the knyght s londes,
Whyle Robyn Hode may ryde of gone,
And bere a bowe in his hondes,
364    That he ne shall lese his hede,
That is the best ball in his hode:
Giue it no man, my lorde the kynge,
That ye wyll any good.
365    Half a yere dwelled our comly kynge
In Notyngham, and well more;
Coude he not here of Robyn Hode,
In what countr that he were.
366    But alway went good Robyn
By halke and eke by hyll,
And alway slewe the kyng s dere,
And welt them at his wyll.
367    Than bespake a proude fostere,
That stode by our kyng s kne;
Yf ye wyll se good Robyn,
Ye must do after me.
368    Take fyue of the best knyght s
That be in your lede,
And walke downe by yon abbay,
And gete you monk s wede.
369    And I wyll be your led s-man,
And lede you the way,
And or ye come to Notyngham,
Myn hede then dare I lay,
370    That ye shall mete with good Robyn,
On lyue yf that he be;
Or ye come to Notyngham,
With eyen ye shall hym se.
371    Full hast[ ]ly our kynge was dyght,
So were his knyght s fyue,
Euerych of them in monk s wede,
And hasted them thyder blyve.
372    Our kynge was grete aboue his cole,
A brode hat on his crowne,
Ryght as he were abbot-lyke,
They rode up in-to the towne.
373    Styf bot s our kynge had on,
Forsoth as I you say;
He rode syngynge to gren wode,
The couent was clothed in graye.
374    His male-hors and his gret somers
Folowed our kynge behynde,
Tyll they came to gren wode,
A myle vnder the lynde.
375    There they met with good Robyn,
Stondynge on the waye,
And so dyde many a bolde archere,
For soth as I you say.
376    Robyn toke the kyng s hors,
Hast ly in that stede,
And sayd, Syr abbot, by your leue,
A whyle ye must abyde.
377    'We be yemen of this foreste,
Vnder the gren -wode tre;
We lyue by our kyng s dere,
[Other shyft haue not wee.]
378    'And ye haue chyrches and rent s both,
And gold full grete plent ;
Gyue vs some of your spendynge,
For saynt[ ] charyt .'
379    Than bespake our cumly kynge,
Anone than sayd he;
I brought no more to gren wode
But forty pounde with me.
380    I haue layne at Notyngham
This fourtynyght with our kynge,
And spent I haue full moche good,
On many a grete lordynge.
381    And I haue but forty pounde,
No more than haue I me;
But yf I had an hondred pounde,
I wolde vouch it safe on the.
382    Robyn toke the forty pounde,
And departed it in two partye;
Halfendell he gaue his mery men,
And bad them mery to be.
383    Full curteysly Robyn gan say;
Syr, haue this for your spendyng;
We shall mete another day;
'Gramercy,' than sayd our kynge.
384    'But well the greteth Edwarde, our kynge,
And sent to the his seale,
And byddeth the com to Notyngham,
Both to mete and mele'
385    He toke out the brod targe,
And sone he lete hym se;
Robyn coud his courteysy,
And set hym on his kne.
386    'I loue no man in all the worlde
So well as I do my kynge;
Welcome is my lord s seale;
And, monke, for thy tydynge,
387    'Syr abbot, for thy tydynges,
To day thou shalt dyne with me,
For the loue of my kynge,
Under my trystell-tre.'
388    Forth he lad our comly kynge,
Full fayre by the honde;
Many a dere there was slayne,
And full fast dyghtande.
389    Robyn toke a full grete horne,
And loude he gan blowe;
Seuen score of wyght yonge men
Came redy on a rowe.
390    All they kneled on theyr kne,
Full fayre before Robyn:
The kynge sayd hym selfe vntyll,
And swore by Saynt Austyn,
391    'Here is a wonder semely syght;
Me thynketh, by Godd s pyne,
His men are more at his byddynge
Then my men be at myn.'
392    Full hast[ ]ly was theyr dyner idyght,
And therto gan they gone;
They serued our kynge with al theyr myght,
Both Robyn and Lytell Johan.
393    Anone before our kynge was set
The fatt venyson,
The good whyte brede, the good rede wyne,
And therto the fyne ale and browne.
394    'Make good chere,' said Robyn,
'Abbot, for charyt ;
And for this ylk tydynge,
Blyssed mote thou be.
395    'Now shalte thou se what lyfe we lede,
Or thou hens wende;
Than thou may enfourme our kynge,
Whan ye togyder lende.'
396    Up they stert all in hast,
Theyr bow s were smartly bent;
Our kynge was neuer so sore agast,
He wende to haue be shente.
397    Two yerd s there were vp set,
Thereto gan they gange;
By fyfty pase, our kynge sayd,
The merk s were to longe.
398    On euery syde a rose-garlonde,
They shot vnder the lyne:
'Who so fayleth of the rose-garlonde,' sayd Robyn,
'His takyll he shall tyne,
399    'And yelde it to his mayster,
Be it neuer so fyne;
For no man wyll I spare,
So drynke I ale or wyne:
400    'And bere a buffet on his hede,
I-wys ryght all bare:'
And all that fell in Robyns lote,
He smote them wonder sare.
401    Twyse Robyn shot aboute,
And euer he cleued the wande,
And so dyde good Gylberte
With the Whyt Hande.
402    Lytell Johan and good Scathelocke,
For nothynge wolde they spare;
When they fayled of the garlonde,
Robyn smote them full sore.
403    At the last shot that Robyn shot,
For all his frend s fare,
Yet he fayled of the garlonde
Thre fyngers and mare.
404    Than bespake good Gylberte,
And thus he gan say;
'Mayster,' he sayd, 'your takyll is lost,
Stande forth and take your pay.'
405    'If it be so,' sayd Robyn,
'That may no better be,
Syr abbot, I delyuer the myn arowe,
I pray the, syr, serue thou me.'
406    'It falleth not for myn ordre,' sayd our kynge,
'Robyn, by thy leue,
For to smyte no good yeman,
For doute I sholde hym greue.'
407    'Smyte on boldely,' sayd Robyn,
'I giue the larg leue:'
Anone our kynge, with that worde,
He folde vp his sleue,
408    And sych a buffet he gaue Robyn,
To grounde he yede full nere:
'I make myn avowe to God,' sayd Robyn,
'Thou arte a stalworthe frere.
409    'There is pith in thyn arme,' sayd Robyn,
'I trowe thou canst well shete:'
Thus our kynge and Robyn Hode
Togeder gan they mete.
410    Robyn beheld our comly kynge
Wystly in the face,
So dyde Syr Rycharde at the Le,
And kneled downe in that place.
411    And so dyde all the wylde outlawes,
Whan they se them knele:
'My lorde the kynge of Englonde,
Now I knowe you well.
412    'Mercy then, Robyn,' sayd our kynge,
'Vnder your trystyll-tre,
Of thy goodnesse and thy grace,
For my men and me!'
413    'Yes, for God,' sayd Robyn,
'And also God me saue,
I ask mersy, my lorde the kynge,
And for my men I craue.'
414    'Yes, for God,' than sayd our kynge,
'And therto sent I me,
With that thou leue the gren wode,
And all thy company;

415    'And come home, syr, to my courte,
And there dwell with me.'
'I make myn avowe to God,' sayd Robyn,
'And ryght so shall it be.

416    'I wyll come to your courte,
Your seruyse for to se,
And brynge with me of my men
Seuen score and thre.

417    'But me lyk well your seruyse,
I [wyll] come agayne full soone,
And shote at the donn dere,
As I am wonte to done.'

The VIII. fytte

418    'Haste thou ony gren cloth,' sayd our kynge,
'That thou wylte sell nowe to me?'
'Ye, for God,' sayd Robyn,
'Thyrty yerd s and thre.'

419    'Robyn,' sayd our kynge,
'Now pray I the,
Sell me some of that cloth,
To me and my meyn .'

420    'Yes, for God,' then sayd Robyn,
'Or elles I were a fole;
Another day ye wyll me clothe,
I trowe, ayenst the Yole.'

421    The kynge kest of his col then,
A grene garment he dyde on,
And euery knyght also, i-wys,
Another had full sone.

422    Whan they were clothed in Lyncolne grene,
They keste away theyr graye;
'Now we shall to Notyngham,'
All thus our kynge gan say.

423    They bente theyr bowes, and forth they went,
Shotynge all in-fere,
Towarde the towne of Notyngham,
Outlawes as they were.

424    Our kynge and Robyn rode togyder,
For soth as I you say,
And they shote plucke-buffet,
As they went by the way.

425    And many a buffet our kynge wan
Of Robyn Hode that day,
And nothynge spared good Robyn
Our kynge in his pay.

426    'So God me help ,' sayd our kynge,
'Thy game is nought to lere;
I sholde not get a shote of the,
Though I shote all this yere.'

427    All the people of Notyngham
They stode and behelde;
They sawe nothynge but mantels of grene
That couered all the felde.

428    Than euery man to other gan say,
I drede our kynge be slone;
Com Robyn Hode to the towne, i-wys
On lyue he lefte neuer one.'

429    Full hast[ ]ly they began to fle,
Both yemen and knaues,
And olde wyues that myght euyll goo,
They hypped on theyr staues.

430    The kynge l[o]ughe full fast,
And commaunded them agayne;
When they se our comly kynge,
I-wys they were full fayne.

431    They ete and dranke, and made them glad,
And sange with not s hye;
Than bespake our comly kynge
To Syr Rycharde at the Lee.

432    He gaue hym there his londe agayne,
A good man he bad hym be;
Robyn thanked our comly kynge,
And set hym on his kne.

433    Had robyn dwelled in the kyng s courte
But twelue monethes and thre,
That [he had] spent an hondred pounde,
And all his mennes fe.

434    In euery place where Robyn came
Euer more he layde downe,
Both for knyght s and for squyres,
To gete hym grete renowne.

435    By than the yere was all agone
He had no man but twayne,
Lytell Johan and good Scathlocke,
With hym all for to gone.

436    Robyn sawe yonge men shote
Full fayre vpon a day;
'Alas!' than sayd good Robyn,
'My welthe is went away.

437    'Somtyme I was an archere good,
A styffe and eke a stronge;
I was compted the best archere
That was in mery Englonde.

438    'Alas!' then sayd good Robyn,
'Alas and well a woo!
Yf I dwele lenger with the kynge,
Sorowe wyll me sloo.'

439    Forth than went Robyn Hode
Tyll he came to our kynge:
'My lorde the kynge of Englonde,
Graunte me myn askynge.

440    'I made a chapell in Bernysdale,
That semely is to se,
It is of Mary Magdaleyne,
And thereto wolde I be.

441    'I myght neuer in this seuen nyght
No tyme to slepe ne wynke,
Nother all these seuen dayes
Nother ete ne drynke.

442    'Me longeth sore to Bernysdale,
I may not be therfro;
Barefote and wolwarde I haue hyght
Thyder for to go.'

443    'Yf it be so,' than sayd our kynge,
'It may no better be,
Seuen nyght I gyue the leue,
No lengre, to dwell fro me.'

444    'Gramercy, lorde,' then sayd Robyn,
And set hym on his kne;
He toke his leu full courteysly.
To gren wode then went he.

445    Whan he came to gren wode,
In a mery mornynge,
There he herde the notes small
Of byrd s mery syngynge.

446    'It is ferre gone,' sayd Robyn,
'That I was last here;
Me lyste a lytell for to shote
At the donn dere.'

447    Robyn slewe a full grete harte;
His horne than gan he blow,
That all the outlawes of that forest
That horne coud they knowe,

448    And gadred them togyder,
In a lytell throwe.
Seuen score of wyght yonge men
Came redy on a rowe,

449    And fayre dyde of theyr hodes,
And set them on theyr kne:
'Welcome,' they sayd, 'our [der ] mayster,
Under this gren -wode tre.

450    Robyn dwelled in gren wode
Twenty yere and two;
For all drede of Edwarde our kynge,
Agayne wolde he not goo.

451    Yet he was begyled, i-wys,
Through a wycked woman,
The pryoresse of Kyrk sly,
That nye was of hys kynne:

452    For the loue of a knyght,
Syr Roger of Donkesly,
That was her own speciall;
Full euyll mot they the!

453    They toke togyder theyr counsell
Robyn Hode for to sle,
And how they myght best do that dede,
His banis for to be.

454    Than bespake good Robyn,
In place where as he stode,
'To morow I muste to Kyrke[s]ly,
Craftely to be leten blode.'

455    Syr Roger of Donkestere,
By the pryoresse he lay,
And there they betrayed good Robyn Hode,
Through theyr fals playe.

456    Cryst haue mercy on his soule,
That dyed on the rode!
For he was a good outlawe,
And dyde pore men moch god. 

End-Notes

a. Here begynneth a gest of Robyn Hode.
1-12. Printed without division of stanzas or verses.
2^2,3. Deficiency supplied from b.
4¹. gooe.
4². milsers.
4³. yuch.
6⁴. vnkoutg.
7¹. lacking in all.
8⁴. .iij. messis.
9³. The .iij.
9⁴. all ther.
13⁴. tillet.
15⁴. mynge.
18³. vnknuth.
32³. ynought.
33¹. felsauntes.
37¹. wened.
38³. Late for Litell, which all the others have.
39². of for haue.
39³. but .xx.: see 42⁴.
41¹. nowne.
41³. .xx. felinges.
46². in strocte.
46³. And.
47³. And.
47⁴. haue bene.
50^2,3. The verses are transposed.
50². God had.
54². Vutyll.
66³. to may.
68⁴. Bo .xxviij.
70⁴. To helpe: cf. 194⁴.
77³. betes.
78². clere.
79³. .xij.
82¹. ou.
82³. bernedtale.
83³. for he.
83⁴-118³. wanting; supplied from b.
119¹. a.M.
120⁴. Euen, .cccc.
121². thon.
123⁴. Bi god ... on tree. The tops of d and of th, and a part of dy, remain.
124¹. Sir ... n of lawe.
124². Only the top of N remains.
124²-127³. wanting, being torn away; supplied from b.
128². Ha.
130³. .cccc. li.
131^1,3. an C.
131³. aros we.
132¹. an ille.
132³. Worked all.
133^1,2. He purneyed hym an. Only a part of n in the last word remains.
Well harness. Only a part of n and the tops of ess remaining.
133³-136³. wanting; supplied from b.
138². Bnd.
143¹. louge.
143². doue.
150⁴. tho thy.
160³. Thougt: an C.
160⁴. he be go.
161³. And therfore.
162². gyne.
163². he wol be.
164². read hyne?
165³. anowe.
168⁴. mountnauuce.
175³. wasars.
179². sende the. Perhaps sent the, as in 384² (b).
180¹. abowe.
181³. v myle.
182². Hnntynge.
183³. Rrynolde.
185³. vij. score.
187¹. shyrel.
199¹. this xij.
201³. thy best.
202³. scade.
206¹. Johū.
206⁴. pray.
208⁴-314¹. wanting; supplied from b.
315³. These xl.: with men.
321³. welle.
330¹. fayles.
331³. ryner.
333³. an C. li.
339³. myeles.
349³. to thy.
From 349⁴ wanting; supplied from b.

b.  Title-page: Here begynneth a lytell geste of Robyn hode. At the head of the poem: Here begynneth a lytell geste of Robyn hode and his meyne, And of the proude Sheryfe of Notyngham.
2⁴. y-founde.
3³. lohan: and always.
4¹. Scathelock.
4³. no.
5¹. be spake hym.
5³. yf ye.
6¹. hym wanting.
6². I haue.
6³. that wanting.
6⁴. vnketh.
7¹. wanting.
7³. knygot or some squyere.
8⁴. Thre.
9². The other.
9³. was of.
9⁴. all other moste.
11³. that wanting: gone.
11⁴. that wanting. 13¹. than wanting.
13⁴. tylleth.
14⁴. wolde.
15⁴. ye wanting.
16¹. beholde: Ihoan.
162. shall we.
171. Robyn.
173. Scathelocke.
183. vnketh.
20. vnto.
202. yemen.
211. to wanting.
213. came there.
221. then was all his semblaunte.
231. hangynge ouer.
234. somers.
241. full wanting.
244. you.
261. is your.
263. is a.
272. all thre.
281. went that.
291. vnto.
292. gan hym.
302. thou arte.
303. abyde.
322. set tyll.
323. right wanting.
333. neuer so.
354. that wanting.
362. whan I haue.
383. Lytell lohan: Robyn hode.
391. than wanting.
392. god haue.
393, 413. but .x. s.
401. thou haue.
404. len.
414. Not one.
424. halfe a.
432. full lowe.
433. tydynge.
434. inough.
444. clothynge: thynne.
451. one worde.
453. thou were.
462. in stroke.
464. hast thou.
471.of them.
473. An .C. wynter.
474. haue be.
491. within two or thre.
493. hondreth.
502,3. The verses are transposed.
502. hath shapen.
511. than wanting.
531. of Lancastshyre.
534. both.
541. beth.
562. What shall.
574. may not.
583. frendes.
592. knowe me.
604. had wanting.
612. Scathelocke and Much also.
621. frendes.
622. borowes that wyll.
624. on a.
631. waye: than wanting.
633. I wyll.
643. me wanting.
674. loke that it well tolde.
682, 741, 773, 832. Scathelocke.
684. By eyghtene.
691. lytell Much.
692. greueth.
704. To helpe.
712. many a.
722. it well mete it be.
731. And of.
732. lept ouer.
733. deuylkyns.
734. for wanting.
743. hym the better.
744. Bygod it cost him.
751. than wanting.
752. All vnto Robyn.
752. an hors.
754. al this.
764. God leue.
782. clere.
803. Without.
811. lene.
821. went on.
822. he thought.
831. bethought.
871. wanting.
883. hondrde.
892. he is ryght.
981. wanting.
1132. gan loke.
1184. grete ye.
1192. were thou.
1214. Rewarde.
1234. By god that dyed on a tree.
1241. Syr abbot, and ye men of lawe.
1282. of my.
1283. not be.
1303. got foure hondreth.
1312. dyght.
1323. I nocked.
1331,2. purueyed hym an hondreth men
      Well harneysed in that stede.
1351. Qy? But at Wentbrydge ther was.
1362. bulle I vp pyght.
1372. in good fay.
1373. that wanting.
1383. frend bestad.
1384. I-slayne.
1392. where that.
1402. hondred: fere for free.
1452. shote.
1461. shot.
1462. sleste.
1464. gan.
1474. euer wanting: I me.
1484. wan.
1491. sir wanting: bore.
1502. Wolte.
1513. gete leue.
1532. Ge gyue.
1551. befell.
1563. to wanting.
1564. me to dyne.
1572. so longe to be.
1573. sir wanting.
1574. gyue thou.
1593. the wanting.
1601. a rap.
1602. yede nygh on two.
1603. an .c. wynter.
1604. wors he sholde go.
1612. went vp.
1613. there: made a.
1614. and wyne.
1631. second John wanting.
1632. whyle he.
1643. an householde to.
1653. to God wanting.
1654. lyketh: me wanting.
1661. and an.
1671. ful wanting.
1682. well wanting.
1694. I me.
1704. I-chaunged.
1734. same day.
1743. of full wanting.
1753. and spones.
1754. they none.
1761. they toke.
1763. dyde hym.
1764. wode tre.
1781. And also.
1792. sende the: cf. 3842.
1811. hym there.
1812. whyle.
1814. at his.
1822. hounde.
1823. coud his.
1843. syght.
1851. I se.
1853. an herde.
1861. His tynde.
1883. afore.
1884. sir wanting.
1894. now be trayed.
1912. well wanting.
1913. se his.
1921. Make good.
1924. lyfe is graunted.
1932. a gone.
1933. commaunded.
1941. cote a pye.
1942. well fyne.
1943. toke.
1953. They shall lay: sote.
1961. laye that.
1964. sydes do smerte.
1991. All these.
2001. Or I here a nother nyght sayd.
2002. I praye.
2003. to-morne.
2013. the best.
2014. That yet had the.
2023. Thou shalt neuer a wayte me scathe.
2032. or by.
2041. haue: I-swore.
2052. that he was gone.
2053. had his.
2064. pay.
2074. trusty.
2083. Scathelock.
2093. after such.
2103,4. Or yf he be a pore man
      Of my good he shall haue some.
2144. these wanting.
2152. frese our: leese your? dress your?
2161. .lii.: men wanting.
2182. you for yon.
2241. .lii.
2314. serued them.
2403. ryghtwysman.
2404. his name.
2421. artnade.
2434. Also.
2451. more sayd wanting.
2474. hondred wanting.
2671. gayne.
2721. I toke it I twyse: the second I is probably a misprint.
2791. thy .cccc. li.
2802. all of this.
2833. all ther best.
2841. all theyre best.
2922. they slist.
2932. acchers.
2991. beut.
3053. dede, second d inverted.
3144. walle.
3153. These twelue: with me.
3161. were wanting.
3164. gan they.
3172. vnto.
3193. enemye.
3194. Agayne the lawes.
3202. dedes thou.
3212. doth.
3223. yode.
3231. tolde.
3234. That noble were.
3241. He wolde: had.
3243. He wolde.
3251. wroll: sayd the.
3261. nowe wanting: thou proud sheryf: sayde our kynge wanting.
3262. the bydde.
3294. Therfore.
3301. fayled.
3304. and by.
3311. a wayted that.
3314. let his.
3323. hym home.
3324. honde and fote.
3332. on a tre.
3341. harde wanting: This the lady, the.
3342. and fre.
3351. to the.
3352. tre tre.
3361. God the good: saue wanting.
3363. lady loue.
3371. Late thou neuer.
3372. Shamly I slayne be.
3373. fast I-bounde.
3382. lady fre.
3383. I take.
3384, 3391. wanting.
3394. on your.
3402. As a: be.
3403. yonge men.
3404. on a.
3412. on a.
3413. wode be.
3414. Nor.
3421. i bent.
3423. spare.
3432. The knyght.
3434. I-quyt than.
3444. gan.
3462. so fast.
3464. At is.
3471. full wanting.
3472. at his.
3492. thou thryue.
3493. to the.
3512. his hoode.
3562. vnder-stonde.
3632. hane.
3683. walked; qy? walketh: by your.
3714. blyth.
3774. repeats verse 2: Other shyft haue not we, Copland and Ed. White's copies.
3814. I vouch it halfe on the. f and g: I would geue it to thee.
3851. brode tarpe. Copland and Ed. White's copies: seale for tarpe.
4002. A wys.
4014. the good whyte.
4024. sore.
4092. shote.
409⁴. than they met. f, they gan: g, gan they mete.
412^1,2. Copland and Ed. White: sayd Robyn to our king, Vnder this.
417². Copland and Ed. White: I wyll come.
421³. had so I wys: so Copland and Ed. White.
423¹. Theyr bowes bente: cf. f, g.
433². .xii.
433³. he had in Copland and Ed. White.
436². ferre: fayre in c, Copland and Ed. White.
437³. was commytted. Copland and Ed. White: was commended for.
440¹. bernysdade.
441². Qy? No tymg slepe.
443¹. he so.
449³. our dere in e.
454². places. Explycit. kynge Edwarde and Robyn hode and Lytell Johan Enprented at London in fletestrete at the sygne of the sone By Wynken de Worde.
a bode, a gast, a gone, a nother, a vowe, be fore, be gan, be spake, for gone, i brought, launs gay, out lawes, to gyder, vnder take, etc., etc., are printed abode, etc., etc.; I wys, i-wys; & and.
It will be understood that not all probable cases of have been indicated.

c.  26⁴. myche.
28⁴. ere for lere.
29². hym gan, as in a.
29³. he wanting.
30³. a byde.
30⁴. cures.
32¹. wesshe.
32². sat tyll.
32³. ryght inough, as in a.
33³. non so lytell, as in a.
34². Garmercy.
34⁴. all this.
35⁴. that wanting, as in b.
36². it wanting.
372. Me thynkc.
382. Lytell Johan, as in b.
391. then sayd, as in a.
392. haue parte of the.
393, 413. .x. s..
401. haue, as in b.
404. len, as in b.
414. Not one, as in b.
424. halfe a.
432. full lowe, as in b.
433. tydynge, as in b.
443. Myche, thyket.
451. one worde, as in b.
453. were, as in b.
461. haste be.
462. stroke.
463. And as in a.
464. hast led as in a.
471. nene of tho.
473. An .c. wynter.
474. haue be.
483. that syt.
491. this two yere as in a.
492. well knowe.
502,3. order as in a, b.
502. hath shapen as in b.
511. than wanting as in b.
512. thou lose.
531. lancasesshyre.
534. bothe as in a, b.
541. bothe as in a.
562. shall fall as in b.
571. wher.
574. noo better as in a.
581. eyen has fallen into the next line (eyen way).
583. frende as in a.
584. I ne haue noo nother.
591. the frendes.

d.  280². all of this as in b.
281⁴. full styll.
282². [her] keneth.
283³. all thee beste.
284¹. all there beste.
286³. ye wanting.
287⁴, 288^1,2,3. cut off.
289^1,2. transposed.
290³. I bent.
291¹. can bende.
2914. as he.
2921. shet.
2922. they clyft.
2931. Scathelocke.
2932. good in fere.
2954. then wolde.
2962. can they.
2963. the wanting.
297. cut off, except ylde forest in line 4.
3022. on his.
3023. go ne.
3032. louest.
3051. all out.
3053. woundes depe.
3061-3. cutoff.
3064. now wanting: only the lower part of the words of this line remains.
3072. vpon.
3103. Robyn hode lente.
3121. myche thanket he of the.
3123. the grete.
3144. walle as in b.
315. nearly all cut away.
3172. herkeneth to.
3193. enmye as in b.
3194. lawes as in b.
3202. [tjhou here as in b.
3233,4, 3241,2. wanting.
3243. He wolde as in b.
3261. Goo home thou proude sheryf as in b.
3262. the bydde as in b.
3294. Therfore as in b.
3311. wayted thys gentyll.
3314. his haukes.
3323,4, 3331,2. wanting.
3342. and a as in a.
3343. a wanting.
3363. ladye loue as in b.
3373. bounde as in b.
3382. so wanting.
3382. I take.
3384, 3391. wanting as in a, b.
3394. has only [y]our way.
3402. be wode.
3403. mery yonge men as in b.
3404. on rode as in a.
3412. only [th]at dyed on. preserved.
342. wanting.
3434. then shall as in b.
3444. can they as in a.
3462. so faste as in b.
3464. It is not as in a.
3471.full godd as in a.
3472. at wyll as in a.
3492. thryue as in b.
3493. to the struste.
3502. bothe sharp.

e.  436². Full fayre.
436⁴. is gone.
437³. comitted.
441². to slepe.
441³. Nor of all.
441⁴. Noutter ete nor.
442¹. longeth so sore to be in.
442^3,4, 443^1,2. wanting.
446⁴. donde.
447². can he.
447³. outlawes in.
449³. our dere.

f.  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. At the head of the poem: Here begynneth a lyttell geste of Robyn hoode and his mery men, and of the proude Shyryfe of Notyngham.
Insignificant variations of spelling are not noted.
1². freborne.
2⁴. yfounde.
3². lened vpon a.
3³. stode wanting.
4¹. Scathelocke: and always.
4². mylners.
4³. was no.
5³. if ye.
6¹. hym wanting.
6⁴. vnketh.
7¹. wanting.
7³. or some squyer.
9². The other,
9³. was of.
9⁴. of all other.
11³. that wanting: shall gone.
11⁴. that wanting.
13¹. than wanting.
13³. husbandeman.
134. with the.
144. That would.
154. ye wanting.
162. shall we.
163. farre.
181. Nowe walke ye vp vnto the Sayle.
183. vnketh.
184. By chaunce some may ye.
191. cearle misprinted for earle.
193. hym then to.
201. went anone vnto.
211. loked in B.
212. deme (for derne) strate.
213. there wanting.
221. drousli (droufli?) than: semblaunt.
231. hanged ouer: eyes.
234. on sommers.
241. full wanting.
244. are you.
253. you wanting.
261. is your. 263. is a.
264. haue I harde.
271. graunt the: wynde.
272. brethren all three.
281. went that.
283. eyes.
291. vnto.
292. gan hym.
294. downe on.
302. thou art.
303. you wanting.
323. right wanting.
333. fayleth neuer so.
334. was spred.
354. that wanting.
361. I thank the, knyght, then said.
362. when I haue.
363. By god I was neuer so gredy.
373. dere wanting.
383. Lytell John: Robyn hoode.
391. than wanting.
401. thou haue.
403. I shall lende.
414. Not any penny.
424. halfe a.
432. full lowe.
434. inowe wanting.
451. me one.
453. thou were.
461. Or yls els: haste by.
462. stroke.
464. thou wanting.
471. of them.
473, 493, 553, etc. hundreth.
482. hat be.
491. two or three yerers.
492. wanting.
502,3. transposed.
502. hath shopen.
504. god it amende.
511. than wanting.
512. lost thy.
523. wenters.
531. Lancastshyre.
562. What shall.
581. eyes.
583. frendes.
584. ne wanting.
592. knowe mee.
593. Whyles.
594. boste that.
604. had wanting: neuer me.
612. Much also.
621. frendes.
622. borowes: wyll.
623. than wanting.
624. on a.
631. than wanting.
633. I haue.
641. made me.
643. me wanting.
653. yf wanting.
674. it well tolde.
684. eyghten score,
691. lyttell Much.
692. greueth.
704. To wrappe.
712. muche ryche.
722. that well mete it.
731. And of.
732. lept ouer.
733. What the deuils.
734. for wanting.
741. lought.
743. hym the better.
744. By god it cost,
751. than wanting.
752. All unto R.
753. that knight an.
754. al this.
764. God lende that it.
781. shal.
782. clene.
784. out wanting.
794. Under the.
813. may stande.
822. he thought.
834. came,
841. spake the.
863. xij monethes.
871. wanting.
872. his lande and fee.
874, 954. Disherited.
892. is his.
894. sore.
913. came.
924. poundes.
933. The highe.
942. taken,
961. not wanting.
963. teme to.
981. wanting.
1003. corese.
1013. The shal. 1024. saluted.
1033. that the.
1034. me my.
1042. hath made.
1054. To desyre you of.
1064. defend me from.
1111,then wanting.
1122. Sende.
1123. a assaye.
1131. on then gan.
1132. wanting.
1154. canst not.
1184. Ye get ye it.
1192. were thou.
1203. of wanting.
1213. Haddest thou.
1214. I would haue rewarded thee.
1222. royall chere.
1224. fast gan.
1234. on a.
1243. I shall.
1283. not be.
1292. is wanting.
1294. came.
1303. got.
1312. stringes were well dyght.
1323. And nocked y e were with.
1333. sute.
1343. And rode.
1351. But wanting: by a bridg was.
1362. vp ypyght.
1364. burnisshed.
1372. in good fay.
1373. that wanting.
1383. fayre and frend.
1392. where ye he.
1401. the wanting.
1402. him in fere.
1411. sholdreth and: come for rome.
1422. laye than.
1424. And drynke.
1434. the wanting.
1452. shute.
1462. alway cleft.
1464. gan.
1472. a wanting.
1474. That euer I dyd see.
1481. me thou.
1483. thou wast.
1484. wining.
1491. sir wanting.
1502. Wylt.
1513. gete leue.
1523. gaue to him anone.
1532. He geue vs.
1541. me wanting.
1544. he had yete.
1563. to wanting.
1564. me meate.
1571. to long.
1572. Fasting so long to.
1573. sir wanting.
1574. geue thou.
1584. had lere.
1601. rappe.
1602. backe yede nygh into.
1603. lyueth an hundreth wynter.
1604. worse he should go.
1612. went vp.
1613. And there: a wanting.
1614. of wanting.
1623. liue this.
1624. shall ye.
1631. and also dronke.
1632. that he.
1642. hyne, perhaps rightly.
1643. an householde to.
1644. for wanting.
1653. to God wanting.
1654. do lyke wel me.
1661. a hardy.
1671. ful wanting.
1673. for wanting.
1682. wel wanting.
1694. I me.
1704. Chaunged it should.
1734. same day at nyght.
1741. The hyed.
1751. the wanting.
1753. masers and.
1754. they non.
1761. they toke.
1762. and three.
1763. And hyed.
1764. wode tree.
1774. Welcome thou art to me.
1781. And so is that good.
1782. That thou hast brought wyth the.
1792. And he hath send the.
1793. His cope.
1801. advow.
1811. there wanting.
1814. at his.
1823. coulde his.
1841. haue nowe.
1851. I se.
1853. of wanting: a.
1861. tyndes be.
1873. Buske the.
1883. afore.
1884. sir wanting.
1893. worthe the.
1894. now betrayed.
1912. well wanting.
1921. good chere.
1924. lyfe is graunted.
1933. commaunded.
1941. cote a pye.
1943. toke.
1951. wight yemen.
1953. shall: in that sorte.
1961. that proude.
1964. sydes do smarte.
1971. chere wanting.
1984. dwel longe.
1991. these.
2001. Or I here another nyght lye.
2013. the best.
2023. Thou shalt neuer wayte me skathe.
2024. nor by.
2032. by day.
2041. swore.
2042. he wanting.
2044. was any man.
2052. that he was gone.
2062. Hode wanting.
2064. pay.
2091. walke wanting: into the.
2093. And loke for some straunge.
2094. By chaunce you.
2102. a wanting.
2103,4. as in b.
2111. sterte.
2112. fraye.
2121. went than vnto.
2131. as he.
2142. can.
2144. these monkes.
2152. And bende we.
2153. harte.
2161. but lii men.
2182. Make you yonder preste.
2201. An euell.
2202. vnder the.
2211. What hyght your.
2222. shall sore rewe.
2231. a bowe.
2232. Redy.
2234. gan.
2241. twoo and fifty wyght yemen.
2242. abode but.
2262. whan he did se.
2291. an.
2311. The made.
2314. serued them.
2342. mote I thryue or the.
2362. Ye nede not so to saye.
2363. hath brought it.
2371. And wanting.
2381. broughte.
2383. the eft agayne.
2384. of me.
2403. right wise.
2412. mayest.
2421. made wanting.
2423. I do the thanke.
2434. So mote I thryue or the.
2442. not out one.
2443. hast nede.
2444. shall I: to wanting.
2451. fyne more sayd.
2454. Thereof I wyll haue.
2471. John layd.
2473. he wanting.
2474. hundreth poundes.
2484. cost.
2492. that tolde.
2493. the trust.
2521. And she haue nede of ony.
2561. And what is on the other courser.
2562. sothe we must.
2563. than wanting.
2594. second in wanting.
2631. light fro his.
2632. can.
2633. Right curteysly.
2651. good Robin.
2664. They would.
2671. agayne.
2673. than sayd.
2674. that wanting.
2681. no grefe: printed in two lines.
2683. dyd helpe.
2691. Now, by my treuthe than sayd.
2692. For that, knight, thanke.
2701. poundes.
2703. there.
2703,4. printed in one line.
2711. than wanting.
2713. her high.
2721. And I should take: twyse.
2724. thou art.
2731. And whan.
2732. laughed and made.
2744. Under this trusty.
2752. fethered.
2753. gentyl knyght.
2762. My wyll done that it be.
2773. bye the a hors.
2774. the for thy (as me, be for my, by).
2792. I dyd lende.
2802. of all his.
2803. sytteth.
2833. they that shote al of the best.
2834. The best
2841. al of the best.
2842. of goodly.
2853. fethers.
2862. his trusty.
2863, 2883. wyght yemen.
2871. mery yemen.
2871. I shall knowe.
2882. Their arowes fethere free.
2893. archers.
2894. shote.
2911. can.
2922. he clefte.
2924. the lylly white.
2941. Whan that.
2943. than was.
2944. good Robin.
2951. To him.
2953. gyft full.
2954. than would.
2962. gan the.
2972. Thus chering.
2973. Another promyse thou made to me.
2974. Within the wylde.
2981. And I had ye in the gr[e]ne forest.
2982. trusty tree.
2983. me leue.
3004. away belyue.
3014. Amonge the.
3021. John he was hort.
3022. in the.
3032. loues.
3044. nowe to.
3052. smite thou of.
3053. woundes so wyde and longe.
3054. That I after eate no breade.
3061. that wanting.
3062. slayne.
3061. Though I had it all by me.
3071. forbyd that: Much then.
3074. Depart.
3084. another a whyle.
3121. I do the thankes for thy comfort.
3122,3. And for.
3131. all the.
3141. Shutte.
3144. wall.
3151. the hote.
3153. Thou shalt these xij dayes abide.
3162. Redye.
3164. gan.
3172. vnto the.
3173. Howe the proude shirife began.
3191. can.
3193. kepest there.
3194. lawes.
3204. am true.
3212. do ye no more vnto.
3223. he went.
3234. That noble were and.
3241. He wolde: had.
3243. He wold.
3251. the kynge.
3261. Go home, thou proude sheryfe.
3262. the bydde.
3294. Therfore.
3301. Ther he.
3303. that gentyl.
3304. and by.
3311. awayted that.
3314. his hauke.
3321. misprinted To be.
3323. him home to.
3324. Ybounde.
3332. on a tree.
3334. robin hode had he.
3341. Then the lady the.
3342. a wanting.
3351. to the.
3353. There she found.
3361. Robyn Hode.
3363. ladyes loue.
3371. Let thou.
3372. to be.
3373. bound.
3382. so wanting.
3383. ytake.
3384. The proude shirife than sayd she.
339. Only this: He is not yet passed thre myles, You may them ouertake.
3402. a man: ben.
3403. mery yemen.
3404. on a tree.
3413. on a tree.
3413,4. And by him that al thinges maketh
No lenger shall dwell with me.
3421. ybent.
3432. The knight would.
3433. And yf ye he may him take
3434. Yquyte than shall he bee.
3444. gan the.
3462. so fast.
3462. That is.
3471. full wanting.
3472. at his.
3492. may thou thryue.
3493. to the.       3494. thou wast
3511. start.
3512. cut into.
3544. and wanting.
3551. them for men.
3562. vnderstode.
3571. the compasse.
3572. He wend.
3582. a one.
3583. fyude any.
3594. eyes.
3603. He should.
3612. it with.
3643. to no.
3662. By halte.
3664. And vsed.
3682. That we be.
3684. walked: by your.
3692. on the.
3694. I saye.
3704. eyes.
3711. hastely.
3713. They were all in.
3714. thyther blythe.
3752. Standinge by.
3761. toke wanting.
3764. you.
3774. Other shyft haue not we.
3782. And good.
3803. full wanting.
3813. a.
3813. I would geve it to the.
3822. And deuyde it than did he.
3823. Half he gaue to.
3842. He hath sent
3843. to wanting.
3844. and to.
3851. brode seale.
3852. lete me.
3874. trusty tre.
3881. he had.
3884. fast was.
3892. he can it.
3893. wyght yemen.
3894. Came runnyng.
3912. pene.
3921. hastely: dyght.
3922. can.
3944. Blessed may.
3952. that thou.
3953. maiest.
3954. together by lente.
3964. ben.
3971. werd.
3972. can the.
3973. fifty space.
3982. The.
4001,2. A good buffet on his head bare,
For that shalbe his fyne.
4003. And those: fell to.
4014. the lilly white hande.
4042. And than he.
4054. syr wanting.
4061. the kyng.
4072. largely.
4074. folded.
4081. geue.
4084. a tall.
4092. can wel.
4094. Togeder they gan.
4101. Stedfastly in.
4112. they sawe.
4114. wele.
4121. than sayd Robin.
4122. this trusty.
4124. for me.
4131. And yet sayd good Robin.
4132. As good god do me.
4133. aske the.
4134. I it.
4141. than wanting.
4142. Thy peticion I graunt the.
4143. So yt thou wylt leue.
4151. syr wanting.
4152. There to.
4171. But and I lyke not.
4172. I wyll.
4174. I was.
4182. now sell.
4193. To sel to me.
4201. for good.
4203. And other.
4211. his cote.
4213. had so ywys.
4214. They clothed them full soone.
4223. shal we.
4224. All this our kyng can.
4231. The bent their bowes.
4242. and as.
4243. And all they shot.
4254. kyng whan he did paye.
4261. the kyng.
4281. to the other can.
4291. hastely.
4302. them to come,
4303. sawe.
4314. of the.
4323. Robin hode.
4331. Robm hode: dwelleth.
4333. That he had.
4342. lay.
4343. and squyers.
4351. all gone.
4364. wend.
4373. commended for.
4382. Alas what shall I do.
439⁴. my.
440⁴. And there would I faene be.
441¹. might no time this seuen nightes.
441³. Neyther all this.
441⁴. eate nor.
442³. wolward haue I.
443³. nyghtes.
446³. I haue a lyttell lust.
447². can.
448³. wyght yemen.
448³. Came runnyng.
449⁴. Under the.
450¹. dwelleth.
450². yeres.
450³. Than for all.
452². Donkester.
452³. wanting.
452⁴. For euyll mot thou the.
Thus endeth the lyfe of Robyn hode.

g.  Title and heading as in f.
1[2. free borne.
1[4. y found.
2[2. Whilst: on the.
3[2. leaned vpon a.
3[3. stode wanting.
41. Scathlock, and always.
42. milners.
43. was no.5
1. bespake him.
53. if you,
61. hym wanting: Robin hood.
62. I haue.
63. that wanting.
64. vnketh.
71. wanting.
73. or some squire.
92. The other.
93. was of.
94. of all other.
101. he loued.
113. what way we: gone.
114. that wanting.
131. than wanting.
133. you: husbandman.
134. with the.
141. you.
144. That would.
151. These wanting.
154. ye wanting.
161. be wanting.
162. shall we.
172. goe with.
181. Now walke ye vp vnto the shore.
184. By chance some may ye meet.
193. him then.
201. went anon vnto.
211. looked in.
212. a deine.
213. came there.
221. All drouflye, perhaps (wrongly) drouslye: semblant.
223. on the.
224. The other.
231. ouer his eyes.
234. on summers.
241. full wanting.
244. you.
253. you wanting.
261. is your.
263. is a.
264. haue I.
272. bretheren all three.
281. went that.
283. eyes.
291. vnto the.
292. gan him.
293. he did.
294. downe on.
302. thou art.
303. you wanting.
323. right wanting.
333. neuer so.
334. was spread.
354. that wanting.
361. I thanke thee knight then said.
362. when I haue.
363. By God I was neuer so greedy.
371. ere you.
372. Me thinke is.
373. dere wanting.
383. Little John: Robin hood.
394. than wanting.
401. thou haue.
404. I shall.
414. Not any peny.
424. halfe a.
432. full lowe.
434. inowe wanting.
451. one word.
453. thou wert: a wanting.
461. hast be.
462. stroke.
464. With whores hast thou.
471. of these.
473. An hundreth winters.
474. haue be.
481. of it.
482. disgrast.
491. Within 2 or 3 yeares: said he.
492. wanting.
493, 553, 673, etc. hundreth.
502,3. transposed.
502. hath shapen.
504. God it amend.
511. than wanting.
512. lost.
523. winters.
531. Lancashire.
541. landes be.
562. What shall.
581. eyes.
583. friends.
584. ne wanting.
592. a one: knowe me.
593. Whiles.
604. had wanting.
611. misprinted ruthe they went.
612. Much also.
621. friends.
622. borrowes: will.
623. than wanting.
624. on a.
631. thy iest: than wanting.
632. I will.
633. will God.
641. made me.
642. doth misprinted for both.
643. me wanting.
653. yf wanting.
654. faileth.
674. it well tolde.
683. tolde forth.
684. eighteene score.
691. little much.
692. grieued.
694. fallen.
704. To wrap.
712. much rich.
722. that well ymet it.
731. And of.
732. leped ouer.
734. for wanting.
741. full wanting: laught.
743. the better measure.
744. By God it cost
751. than wanting.
752. All vnto R.
753. an.
754. all his good.
761. God lend that it be.
782. clene.
784. bring them.
793. months.
794. Vnder the.
813. the wanting.
822. he thought
834. came.
841. spake the.
853. vpon wanting.
863. months: there wanting.
871. wanting.
872. land and fee.
874, 954. Disherited.
883. a.
884. lay it.
892. is his.
894. sore.
903. You doe him.
924. pounds.
931. and high.
932. Stert.
933. The high.
942. taken.
953. comes.
961. not wanting.
963. to them.
981. wanting.
1003. best corse.
1004. I wanting.
1011. them to.
1013. come there.
1024. saluted.
1034. me my.
1042. hath made.
1054. To desire of.
1064. defend me against.
1092. wanting.
1113. thy lande.
1111,then wanting.
1122. Send.
1131. on them.
1132. wanting.
1134. Step thee: of the.
1161. tournaments.
1162. farre that.
1172. a wanting.
1173. Or else: safely say.
1184. Ye get not my land so.
1191. thousand pound more.
1192. were thou.
1212. that wanting. 1213. Hadst .
1214. I would haue rewarded thee.
1222. royall cheere.
1224. gan.
1232. to thee.
1234. on a.
1241. and you.
1242. held.
1283. had not.
1292. is wanting.
1294. came on the.
1303. got.
1323. And nocked they were with.
1333. suite.
1343. And rode.
1351. As he went vp a bridge was.
1361,2. wanting.
1363. with a.
1372. in good.
1372. that wanting.
1383. friend bested.
1384. Yslaine.
1392. where that.
1393. the yeoman.
1394. the loue.
1402. him in feare.
1411. all wanting.
1421. markes.
1424. And drinke.
1432. that the.
1434. the wanting.
1462. alway claue.
1464. gan.
1474. euer I did see.
1481. me thou.
1483. wast thou.
1484. wonning.
1491. sir wanting.
1492. al wanting.
1502. Wilt.
1513. ye get leave.
1523. to him anon.
1532. He giue vs.
1541. me wanting.
1544. he had yet.
1551. befell.
1554. forgot.
1562. the wanting.
1563. to wanting.
1564. me meat.
1572. Fasting so long to.
1573. sir wanting.
1574. giue thou.
1581. Shalt neither eat nor drinke.
1591. was vncourteous.
1592. on the.
1601. a rappe.
1602. backe yede nigh.
1603. liueth: winters.
1604. he still shall goe.
1612. ope.
1613. there: a large.
1614. and wine.
1621. you.
1623. you liue this.
1624. shall ye.
1631. eat and also drunke.
1633. in the.
1641. my.
1642. hine: perhaps rightly.
1643. an housholde for.
1653. to God wanting.
1654. doe like well.
1661. and a.
1671. ful wanting.
1672. toke wanting.
1673. for wanting.
1682. well wanting.
1694. euer I saw yet.
1704. changed it should.
1714. we will.
1733. ylke day at.
1741. They hied.
1742. they could.
1743. full wanting.
1744. euery one.
1751. the wanting.
1753. niasers and.
1754. they none.
1761. Also they.
1762. and three.
1763. And hied them to.
1764. wood tree.
1773. And thou.
1774. Welcome thou art to me.
1781. And so is that good yeoman.
1782. That thou hast brought with.
1792. He hath sent thee here.
1793. His cup.
1802. And by.
1811. there wanting.
1813. he ran wanting.
1814. at his.
1822. hound.
1823. could his.
1831. saue thee.
1832. you saue.
1834. haue you.
1841. haue now be in the.
1851. I see.
1853. of wanting.
1861. tindes be.
1871. my.
1873. Buske thee.
1882. A foote.
1883. afore.
1884. sir wanting.
1893. worth thee.
1894. nowe wanting.
1901. Litell wanting.
1912. well wanting.
1921. Make good.
1922. of for for.
1924. life is graunted.
1931. had all.
1933. commanded.
1934. hose and shoone.
1941. coate a pie.
1943. tooke.
1951. wight yeomen.
1953. That they shall lie in that sorte.
1961. lay that.
1964. sides doe smart.
1971. chere wanting.
1984. dwell long.
1991. All this.
2001. Or I heere an other night lie.
2002. I pray.
2003. my: to morne.
2004. wanting.
2013. the best.
2023. Thou shalt: wait: scath.
2024. nor by.
2032. or else by.
2042. home againe to.
2043. as wanting.
2044. was any man.
2052. that he was gon.
2062. But Robin said.
2064. pay.
2073. dare sweare.
2091. walke wanting: into the.
2093. And looke for some strange.
2094. By chance you.
2102. a wanting.
2103,4. as in b, excepting goods for good.
2112. in a fray.
2121. went then vnto.
2131. as they.
2133. They were ware.
2144. These monkes.
2152. And bend we.
2153. looke our.
2161. hath but fifty and two man.
2164. royall.
2171. Bretheren.
2182. Make you yonder priest.
2201. An.
2211. What hight your.
2222. sore rue.
2231. abowe.
2232. Ready.
2234. ground he gan.
2241. two and fiftie wight yeomen.
2242. abode but.
2253. Hode wanting.
2261. downe.
2262. when he did.
2264. let it.
2291. blowe we.
2314. serued him.
2323. you.
2342. So mote I thriue of thee.
2362. You neede not so to say.
2363. hath brought it.
2371. And wanting.
2381. hast the mony brought.
2383. eft againe.
2384. need of.
2401. my.
2412. not denay.
2421. made wanting.
2423. I doe thee thanke.
2432. Truth.
2434. So mought I thriue and thee.
2442. not take one.
2443. hast need of.
2444. shall I: to wanting.
2451. finde more said.
2453. spending-money.
2454. Thereof I will haue.
2464. penny let me.
2471. John laid.
2472. he wanting.
2474. Eight hundreth.
2483. true now.
2483. cost.
2492. Monke that.
2511. and to.
2513. need of.
2521. haue need of any.
2561. And what is in ye other coffer.
2562. we must.
2563. than wanting.
2582. he wanting.
2594. or D.
2631. light from his.
2632. can.
2633. Right for So: down.
2651. bespake good Robin: Hode wanting.
2663. for wanting.
2664. They would.
2673. then said.
2674. And that.
2681. take no griefe.
2683. did I helpe.
2684. they put.
2691. Now by my truth then.
2692. For that knight thanke.
2701. than wanting.
2703. there is: also wanting.
2711. then said.
2713. her hie.
2721. And I should take it twice.
2722. forme.
2731. And when.
2732. He laughed and made.
2744. this trusty.
2751. do he said.
2752. fethered.
2753. the gentle.
2762. My will doone that it be.
2763. Go and fetch me foure: pounds.
2773. buye thee.
2783. shalt not.
2784. Whilste I.
2791. well for.
2792. I did send.
2802. of all his.
2803. sitteth.
2811. take.
2812. wend.
2834. And they that shoote all of the best.
2834. The best.
2841. all of the best.
2843. of goodly.
2851. he should.
2853. and feathers.
2854. the like.
2862. his trusty.
2863. ye ready you wight yeomen.
2871. merry yeomen.
2873. I shall know.
2882. Their takles.
2883. of wanting: wight yeomen.
2893. were: archers.
2894. shot.
2911. The first.
2914. the buttes where.
2922. he claue.
2924. lilly-white.
2934. they would.
2943. then was.
2951. To him.
2953. guift full.
2954. then would.
2962. A great horn gan he.
2971. be to thee.
2972. Thus cheering.
2973. An other promise thou madest to me.
2974. Within the greene.
2981. But and I had thee there againe.
2982. the trusty.
2983. giue me.
2993. was torne.
3004. away beliue.
3011. broke.
3014. the for that.
3021. he was.
3022. on the knee.
3032. you loued.
3052. thou off.
3053. wounds so wide and long.
3054. That I after eat no bread.
3061. that wanting.
3062. wert slaine.
3064. Though I had it all by me.
3071. forbid that: Much then.
3074. Depart.
3083. he set.
3102. of the.
3113. be thou wanting.
3121. I do thee thanke for.
3122,3. And for.
3131. all the.
3144. the wall.
3151. thee hite.
3152. And sweare.
3153. Thou shalt these twelue daies abide with me.
3162. Ready and.
3164. gan.
3172. hearken vnto the.
3172. sheriffe began.
3193. there: enemies.
3194. all law.
3201. what I.
3204. a wanting.
3212. doe ye.
3213. you wit your.
3223. he went.
3234. noble were and.
3241. He would: had.
3243. He would.
3251. said the.
3254. will I.
3261. Goe home thou proude: sayde our kynge wanting.
3262. I you bid.
3294. Therefore had.
3301. there he.
3303. that gentle.
3311. Euer awaited that.
3312. of the.
3314. his hauke.
3321. To betray this gentle knight.
3323. him home.
3324. Ybound.
3332. on a tree.
3333. had rather then a.
3334. That Robin hood had hee.
3341. Then the lady the.
3342. a wanting.
3351. to the.
3353. There found she.
3354. merry menye.
3363. loue for sake.
3371. Let thou.
3373. bound.
3382. so wanting.
3383. thy lord ytake.
3384. The proud sheriffe then said she.
339. he is not yet passed three miles,
      you may them ouertake:
340. Vp then start good Robin,
      as a man that had been wake:
Buske ye, my merry yeomen,
      for him that dyed on a tree.
3412. on a tree.
3413. And by him that all things maketh.
3414. shall dwell.
3421. ybent.
3422. More.
3423. they spared none.
3432. The knight.
3433. if ye may him ouertake.
3434. then shall he.
3444. gan.
3452. so fast.
3454. thy boote.
3471. full wanting.
3472. at his.
3491. the for thou.
3492. may thou.
3493. to thee.
3503. it on.
3504. driue.
3512. cut in.
3532. leasind.
3544. hode if.
3551. them for men.
3562. vnderstood.
3564. all the knights land.
3571. The compasse of.
3572. wend.
3582. many a one.
3583. finde any.
3594. eyes.
3602. vnto.
3603. He should.
3604. of for at.
3612. it with.
3623. O my.
3642. his best.
3643. to no.
3662. halt.
3663. he slew.
3664. And vsed.
3682. now be.
3683. by your.
3684. a monks.
3691. lodesman.
3692. on the.
3694. come at.
3704. eyes.
3711. hastily.
3713. They were all: monks weeds.
3714. thither blithe.
3724. to wanting.
3741. sommer.
3743. Vntill.
3752. by the.
3763. sayd wanting.
3764. you.
3774. Other shift haue not wee.
3782. good for gold.
3803. full wanting.
3811. I wanting.
3813. an.
3814. I would giue it to thee.
3822. And deuided it then did he.
3823. Halfe he gaue to.
3824. to wanting.
3832. Syr wanting.
3842. He hath sent.
3851. broad scale.
3863. be my.
3871. tyding.
3874. the trusty.
3881. he had.
3884. full was fast.
3892. gan it.
3893. wight yeomen.
3894. running for redy.
3921. hastily: dight
3922. can.
3934. the good ale browne.
3944. may thou.
3951. I for we.
3952. Or that.
3953. maist.
3954. be lend.
3964. beene.
3972. can.
4001,2. A good buffet on his head beare for this shall be his fine.
4003. And those: fell in.
4012. claue.
4014. lilly white.
4032. Fore: freends faire.
4033. of wanting.
4042. then for thus.
4054. syr wanting.
4061. said ye.
4062. be for by, as often.
4072. largely.
4074. folded.
4084. a tall frier.
4092. can.
4094. gan they meet.
4102. Stedfast in.
4111. the said!
4112. sawe.
4121. said Robin to.
4122. this trusty.
4124. and for mee.
4131. And yet said good R.
4132. As good God do me.
4133. aske thee.
4134. I it.
4141. than wanting.
4142. Thy petition I graunt thee.
4143. So that thou wilt leaue.
4151. syr wanting.
4152. There to dwell.
4171. But and I like not.
4172. I will.
4174. I was.
4182. nowe wanting.
4193. To sell.
4211. his cote.
4213. had so ywis.
4214. They clothed them full.
4222. the gray.
4223. Now shall we.
4224. All this: can.
4231. They bent their.
4243. And all they.
4254. king when he did pay.
4261. said the.
4264. I shot.
4281. togither can.
4284. leaueth not one.
4291. hastely.
4302. to come againe.
4303. saw our.
4314. of the.
4323. Robin hood.
4331. Robin hood dwelled.
4333. That he had.
4343. and squires.
4344. a great.
4351. gone.
4354. hym wanting.
4362. faire.
4364. wend.
4373. was commended for the.
4382. Alas what shall I doe.
4404. there would I faine be.
4411. might no time this: nights.
4412. one for ne.
4413. all this.
4414. nor for ne.
4423. haue I.
4433. nights.
4463. I haue a little lust for.
4472. can.
4483. wight yeomen.
4484. running for redy.
4494. Vnder the.
4502. yeeres.
450³. Then for dred.
452². Dankastre.
452³. wanting.
452⁴. For euill: they thee.
455³. good wanting.
Thus endeth the life of Robin hood 

Additions and Corrections

44. 'A Robynhode,' etc.

In the Convocation Books of the Corporation of Wells, Somerset, vol. ii, "under the 13th Henry 7, Nicholas Trappe being master, there is the following curious entry, relative, apparently, to a play of Robin Hood, exhibitions of dancing girls, and church ales, provided for at the public expense.

"'Et insuper in eadem Convocatione omnes et singuli burgenses unanimi assensu ad tune et ibidem dederunt Magistro Nicolao Trappe potestatem generalem ad inquirendum in quorum manibus pecuniæ ecclesiæ ac communitatis Welliæ sunt injuste detentæ; videlicet, provenientes ante hoc tempus de Robynhode, puellis tripudiantibus, communi cervisia ecclesiæ, et hujusmodi. Atque de bonis et pecuniis dictæ communitati qualitercunque detentis, et in quorumcunque manibus existentibus. Et desuper, eorum nomina scribere qui habent hujusmodi bona, cum summis, etc.'" H.T. Riley in the First Report of the Historical Manuscripts Commission, 1874, Appendix, p. 107.

The passage in the Wells Convocation Records is perhaps illustrated by an entry in the Churchwardens' Accounts of the Parish of Kingston-upon-Thames, cited by Ritson, Robin Hood, 2d ed., I, cxviii, from Lysons, Environs of London, 1792, I, 228:

"16 Hen. 8. Recd at the church-ale and Robynhode all things deducted 3 10 6."

With this may be compared the following:

"Anno MDLXVI, or 9 of Eliz., payde for setting up Robin Hoodes bower 18"

(Churchwardens' Accompts of St. Helen's [at Abingdon, Berks], Archæologia, I, 18). This latter entry is loosely cited by Ritson, I, cxiv, 2d ed., as dating from 1556. Ibidem may be found his opinion as to R.H.'s bower (n. *). Hampson, Medii Ævi Kalendarium, I, 265, quotes this entry, also with the wrong year. He has no doubt about the Bower: "An arbour, called Robin Hood's Bower, was erected in the church-yard, and here maidens stood gathering contributions." I, 283. (All the above by G.L.K.)

P. 46 b, note. The Sloane Manuscript cited by Ritson as No 715 is No 780 (which is bound up with 715) and is "paper, early xviith century:" Ward, Catalogue of Romances, etc., I, 517. This correction is also to be made at p. 121 b, note; pp. 129 a, 173 b, 175 b.

51 b, sts 62-66.

The late Miss Hamilton McKie, New Galloway, told me this story:

A sturdy beggar, or luscan, came to a farm-house among the hills and asked quarters for the night. The gudewife, before entrusting him with the bedclothes in which to sleep in one of the outhouses, required a pledge or security for their return. He said he had none to offer but his Maker, and got his night's lodging. In the morning he walked off with the bedclothes, but, becoming bewildered in a mist, he wandered about the whole day, and in the evening, seeing the light of a house, made towards it and knocked at the door. A woman opened it and said, "Your Cautioner has proved gude!" He had come back to the same house.

Mactaggart gives the story in his Gallovidian Encyclopedia, p. 325, but without the trait of the security. (W. Macmath.)

To be Corrected in the Print.
46 b, line 9. Read S.S. for S.G.

P. 40 ff. Thomas Robinhood is one of six witnesses to a grant in the 4th of Richard II. (June 22, 1380 - June 21, 1381). See Historical Manuscripts Commission, Fifth Report, Appendix, p. 511, col. 2. The pronunciation, Robinhood (p. 41 a, note †), is clearly seen in the jingle quoted by Nash, Strange Newes, 1593, Works, ed. Grosart, II, 230: "Ah, neighbourhood, neighbourhood, Dead and buried art thou with Robinhood."

Among the disbursements of John Lord Howard, afterwards Duke of Norfolk, occurs the following: "And the same day, my Lord paide to Robard Hoode for viij. shafftys xvj. d." (This is Friday, Sept. 26, 1483.) Household Books of John Duke of Norfolk and Thomas Earl of Surrey, temp. 1481-1490, ed. by J.P. Collier, 1844, Roxburghe Club, p. 464. Collier, p. 525, remarks that "the coincidence that the duke bought them of a person of the name of Robin Hood is singular."

The Crosscombe Church-Wardens' Accounts (in Church-Wardens' Accounts of Croscombe, Pilton, Yatton, etc., ranging from 1349 to 1560, ed. by Right Rev. Bishop Hobhouse, Somerset Record Soc. Publications, IV, 1890):

"Comes Thomas Blower and John Hille, and presents in xl s. of Roben Hod's recones." 147 6/7 (accounts for 147 5/6), p. 4.

"Comys Robin Hode and presents in xxxiij s. iv d." 148 2/5 (for 148 1/2), p. 10.

"Ric. Willes was Roben Hode, and presents in for yere past xxiij s." 148 3/4 (for 148 2/3), p. 11.

"Comys Robyn Hode, Wyllyam Wyndylsor, and presents in for the yere paste iij l. vj s. viij d. ob." 148 6/7 (for 148 5/6), p. 14.

"Robyn Hode presents in xlvj s. viij. d." 149 4/5 (for 149 3/4), p. 20.

And so of later years.

A pasture called Robynhode Closse is mentioned in the Chamberlains' Accounts of the town of Nottingham in 1485, 1486, and 1500: Records of the Borough of Nottingham, III, 64, 230, 254. A Robynhode Well near the same town is mentioned in a presentment at the sessions of July 20, 1500 (III, 74), and again in 1548 as Robyn's Wood Well (IV, 441). Robin Hood's Acre is mentioned in 162 4/5 (IV, 441). Robbin-hoodes Wele is mentioned in Jack of Dover, his Quest of Inquirie, 1604, Hazlitt, Jest-Books, II, 315. (The above by G.L.K.)

49 b. Italian robber-songs. "Sulle piazze romane e napoletane ognuno ha potato sentire ripetere i canti epici che celebrano le imprese di fainosi banditi o prepotenti, Meo Pataca, Mastrilli, Frà Diavolo:" Cantù, Documenti alla Storia universale (1858), V, 891.

53 a. Note on 243-47. The same incident in The Jests of Scogin, Hazlitt's Jest-Books, II, 151. (G.L.K.)

53 f., 519 a. See also the traditional story how Bishop Forbes, of Corse, lent his brother a thousand marks on the security of God Almighty, in The Scotsman's Library, by James Mitchell, 1825, p. 576. (W. Macmath.)

To be Corrected in the Print.
41 b, third paragraph, second line. Read Manuscript for Mr

P. 40 b. References to Robin Hood in the 15th century.

  And many men speken of Robyn Hood
And shotte nevere in his bowe.

Reply of Friar Dow Topias, in Wright's Poetical Poems and Songs relating to English History, II, 59, dated by Wright 1401, which may be rather too early. The proverbial phrase shows that Robin Hood had long been familiar to the English People.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

P. 43, note §. Right-hitting Brand is one of the attendants of Robin in A. Munday's Metropolis Coronata (1615), Fairholt, Pageants, I, 40. J.M. Manly.

52 and note. See further on Le prêt miraculeusement remboursé, M. René Basset, in Revue des Traditions populaires, IX, 14-31.

54. Mr. Macmath has sent me a transcript of another copy of the song in Deuteromelia which exhibits some variations. It was found April 5, 1895, in a bundle of papers that had belonged to John, Duke of Roxburghe. This copy is in a 17th century hand, and at the end is written: "This song was esteemed an old song before the rebellion broke out in 1641."

76, st. 412. The first two verses should be corrected according to f, g, thus:

  'Mercy,' then said Robyn to our kynge,
'Vnder this.'

To be Corrected in the Print.
49 a, 12th line. Read alcaldes.

51 b, last two lines. Read (extracted from Histoire Litt. de la France, XXX), p. 49.