Outlaw (stock character)

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Romanticised outlaws are stock characters found in a number of fictional settings.

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This was particularly so in the United States, where outlaws were popular subjects of newspaper coverage and stories in the 19th century, and 20th century fiction and Western films. Thus, "outlaw" is still commonly used to mean those violating the law [1] or, by extension, those living that lifestyle, whether actual criminals evading the law or those merely opposed to "law-and-order" notions of conformity and authority (such as the "outlaw country" music movement in the 1970s).

The colloquial sense of an outlaw as bandit or brigand is the subject of a monograph by British author Eric Hobsbawm: [2] Hobsbawm's book discusses the bandit as a symbol, and mediated idea, and many of the outlaws he refers to, such as Ned Kelly, Mr. Dick Turpin, and Billy the Kid, are also listed below.

The point about social bandits is that they are peasant outlaws whom the lord and state regard as criminals, but who remain within peasant society, and are considered by their people as heroes, as champions, avengers, fighters for justice, perhaps even leaders of liberation, and in any case as men to be admired, helped and supported. This relation between the ordinary peasant and the rebel, outlaw and robber is what makes social banditry interesting and significant ... Social banditry of this kind is one of the most universal social phenomena known to history.

— Eric Hobsbawm

List of famous outlaws

The stereotype owes a great deal to English folklore precedents, in the tales of Robin Hood and of gallant highwaymen. But outlawry was once a term of art in the law, and one of the harshest judgments that could be pronounced on anyone's head.

American

American Western

The outlaw is familiar to contemporary readers as an archetype in Western films, depicting the lawless expansionism period of the United States in the late 19th century. The Western outlaw is typically a criminal who operates from a base in the wilderness, and opposes, attacks or disrupts the fragile institutions of new settlements. By the time of the Western frontier, many jurisdictions had abolished the process of outlawry, and the term was used in its more popular meaning. Some Old West outlaws, such as Billy the Kid and Jesse James, became legendary figures in Western lore both in their own lifetime and long after their deaths.

Argentinian

Brazilian

Cangaceiros

  • Lampião – Brazilian outlaw who led the Cangaços, a band of feared marauders and outlaws who terrorized Northeastern Brazil during the 1920–1930's.

Canadian

Mexican

Panamanian

European

British

Croatian

Hajduci

Czech/Slovak

French

German

Greek

Klephtes

Hungarian

Icelandic

Irish

Italian

Norwegian

Polish

  • Slovak bandit Juraj Jánošík is known in Polish folklore as Janiczek or Janicek

Serbian

Spanish

La cueva del Gato (The cave of the Cat), 1860 painting by Manuel Barron y Carrillo depicting the hideout of the Andalusian bandolero of Spain La Cueva del Gato.jpg
La cueva del Gato (The cave of the Cat), 1860 painting by Manuel Barrón y Carrillo depicting the hideout of the Andalusian bandolero of Spain
  • Diego Corrientes Mateos Andalusian (1757–1781)
  • El Guapo Andalusian (born 1546) who is reputed to be the source for part one chapter 22 of Don Quixote by Cervantes.
  • Eleuterio Sánchez Rodríguez (born April 15, 1942), known as El Lute, was at one time listed as Spain's "Most Wanted" criminal and later became a published writer.

Others

Asians/Oceanian

Australian

In Australia two gangs of bushrangers have been made outlaws – that is they were declared to have no legal rights and anybody was empowered to shoot them without the need for an arrest followed by a trial.

  • Ben Hall – the New South Wales colonial government passed a law in 1865 which outlawed the gang (Hall, John Gilbert and John Dunn) and made it possible for anyone to shoot them. There was no need for the outlaws to be arrested and for there to be a trial — the law was essentially a bill of attainder. [4]
  • Ned Kelly – The Victorian colonial government passed a law on October 30, 1878, to make the Kelly gang outlaws: they no longer had any legal rights and they could be shot by anyone. The law was modelled on the 1865 legislation passed against the gang of Ben Hall. As well as Ned Kelly, his brother Dan Kelly was subject to the warrant as well as Joe Byrne and Steve Hart. [5]

East Asian

Indian

  • Dulla Bhatti – was a Punjabi who led a rebellion against the Mughal emperor Akbar. His act of helping a poor peasant's daughter to get married led to a famous folk take which is still recited every year on the festival of Lohri by Punjabis.
  • Papadu – South Indian bandit.
  • Veerappan, South India's most famous bandit, Elephant poacher, sandalwood smuggler
  • Phoolan Devi – one of India's most famous dacoits ("armed robber"). [6]
  • Saradiel – Known as the Robin Hood of Sri Lanka for his exploits under British Colonial rule.
  • Shiv Kumar Patel – led one of the few remaining bands of outlaws that have roamed central India for centuries. [7]
  • Thuggee – Indian network of secret fraternities engaged in murdering and robbing travellers. [8]

°Kayamkulam Kochunni a heroic outlaw from Kayamkulam who lived during the late 19th century. He was active in the Travancore area in the present-day Kerala, India. He is said to have stolen from the rich and given to the poor. Legends on his life are part of the folklore of Keralam.

Middle East

Russian

Turkish

Ukrainian

In other media

UK-based alt-rock band, Guild Theory's debut album contains a song called Outlaws, which depicts a group of thieves on the run from the law. [10]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Dacoity</span> Term used for "banditry" in the Indian subcontinent

Dacoity is a term used for "banditry" in the Indian subcontinent. The spelling is the anglicised version of the Hindi word डाकू (daaku); "dacoit" is a colloquial Indian English word with this meaning and it appears in the Glossary of Colloquial Anglo-Indian Words and Phrases (1903). Banditry is criminal activity involving robbery by groups of armed bandits. The East India Company established the Thuggee and Dacoity Department in 1830, and the Thuggee and Dacoity Suppression Acts, 1836–1848 were enacted in British India under East India Company rule. Areas with ravines or forests, such as Chambal and Chilapata Forests, were once known for dacoits.

An outlaw, in its original and legal meaning, is a person declared as outside the protection of the law. In pre-modern societies, all legal protection was withdrawn from the criminal, so anyone was legally empowered to persecute or kill them. Outlawry was thus one of the harshest penalties in the legal system. In early Germanic law, the death penalty is conspicuously absent, and outlawing is the most extreme punishment, presumably amounting to a death sentence in practice. The concept is known from Roman law, as the status of homo sacer, and persisted throughout the Middle Ages.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Salvatore Giuliano</span> Sicilian bandit (1922–1950)

Salvatore Giuliano was an Italian bandit, who rose to prominence in the disorder that followed the Allied invasion of Sicily in 1943. In September of that year, Giuliano became an outlaw after shooting and killing a police officer who tried to arrest him for black market food smuggling, at a time when 70 percent of Sicily's food supply was provided by the black market. He maintained a band of subordinates for most of his career. He was a flamboyant, high-profile criminal, attacking the police at least as often as they sought him. In addition, he was a local power-broker in Sicilian politics between 1945 and 1948, including his role as a nominal colonel for the Movement for the Independence of Sicily. He and his band were held legally responsible for the Portella della Ginestra massacre, though there is some doubt about their role in the numerous deaths which occurred.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Wild Bunch</span> Gang of outlaws in central USA in 1890s

The Wild Bunch, also known as the Doolin–Dalton Gang, or the Oklahombres, were a gang of American outlaws based in the Indian Territory in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. They were active in Kansas, Missouri, Arkansas, and Oklahoma Territory during the 1890s—robbing banks and stores, holding up trains, and killing lawmen. They were also known as The Oklahoma Long Riders because of the long dusters that they wore.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Highwayman</span> Archaic term for a mounted robber who steals from travelers

A highwayman was a robber who stole from travellers. This type of thief usually travelled and robbed by horse as compared to a footpad who travelled and robbed on foot; mounted highwaymen were widely considered to be socially superior to footpads. Such criminals operated until the mid- or late 19th century. Highwaywomen, such as Katherine Ferrers, were said to also exist, often dressing as men, especially in fiction.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Hajduk</span> Peasant irregular infantry

A hajduk is a type of irregular infantry found in Central, Eastern, and parts of Southeast Europe from the late 16th to mid 19th centuries. They have reputations ranging from bandits to freedom fighters depending on time, place, and their enemies.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Juraj Jánošík</span> Slovak outlaw

Juraj Jánošík was a Slovak highwayman. Jánošík has been the main character of many Slovak novels, poems, and films. According to the legend, he robbed nobles and gave the loot to the poor, a deed often attributed to the famous Robin Hood. The legend is known in neighboring Poland and the Czech Republic. The actual robber had little to do with the modern legend, whose content partly reflects the ubiquitous folk myths of a hero taking from the rich and giving to the poor. However, the legend was also shaped in important ways by the activists and writers in the 19th century when Jánošík became the key highwayman character in stories that spread in the north counties of the Kingdom of Hungary and among the local Gorals inhabitants of the Podhale region north of the Tatras. The image of Jánošík as a symbol of resistance to oppression was reinforced when poems about him became part of the Slovak and Czech middle and high school literature curriculum, and then again with the numerous films that propagated his modern legend in the 20th century. During the anti-Nazi Slovak National Uprising, one of the partisan groups bore his name.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Banditry</span> Type of organized crime committed by outlaws

Banditry is a type of organized crime committed by outlaws typically involving the threat or use of violence. A person who engages in banditry is known as a bandit and primarily commits crimes such as extortion, robbery, and murder, either as an individual or in groups. Banditry is a vague concept of criminality and in modern usage can be synonymous for gangsterism, brigandage, marauding, terrorism, piracy and thievery.

The noble outlaw is a literary archetype found in cultures around the world. Other phrases denoting the same or a similar concept include "knight-errant", particular to European medieval chivalric romance literature, and Byronic hero, especially in European Romanticism.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Brigandage</span> Life and practice of highway robbery and plunder

Brigandage is the life and practice of highway robbery and plunder. It is practiced by a brigand, a person who usually lives in a gang and lives by pillage and robbery.

A crime family is a unit of an organized crime syndicate, particularly in Italian organized crime and especially in the Sicilian Mafia and American Mafia, often operating within a specific geographic territory or a specific set of activities. In its strictest sense, a family is a criminal gang, operating either on a unitary basis or as an organized collection of smaller gangs. In turn, a family can be a sole "enterprise" or part of a larger syndicate or cartel. Despite the name, most crime families are generally not based on or formed around actual familial connections, although they do tend to be ethnically-based, and many members may in fact be related to one another.

Eustace Folville was an English criminal and outlaw who is credited with assassinating the unpopular Sir Roger de Beler, Baron of the Exchequer and henchman of the despised Hugh le Despencer and King Edward II. He was the most active member of the Folville Gang, which engaged in acts of vigilantism and outlawry in Leicestershire in the early 1300s, often on the behalf of others.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Social banditry</span> Lower-class social resistance

Social banditry or social crime is a form of social resistance involving behavior that by law is illegal but is supported by wider "oppressed" society as moral and acceptable. The term "social bandit" was invented by the Marxist historian Eric Hobsbawm and introduced in his books Primitive Rebels (1959) and Bandits (1969). Hobsbawm characterized social banditry as a primitive form of class struggle and resistance in pre-industrial and frontier societies. Social banditry is a widespread phenomenon that has occurred in many societies throughout recorded history, and forms of social banditry still exist, as evidenced by piracy and organized crime syndicates. Later, social scientists have also discussed the term's applicability to more modern forms of crime, like street gangs and the economy associated with the trade in illegal drugs.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Portella della Ginestra massacre</span> 1947 mass killing by Sicilian separatists in Piana degli Albanesi, Sicily, Italy

The Portella della Ginestra massacre refers to the killing of 11 people and 27 wounded during May Day celebrations in Sicily on 1 May 1947, in the municipality of Piana degli Albanesi. Those held responsible were the bandit and separatist leader Salvatore Giuliano and his gang, although their motives and intentions are still a matter of controversy.

<i>The Lone Star Ranger</i>

The Lone Star Ranger is a Western novel published by Zane Grey in 1915. The book takes place in Texas, the Lone Star State, and several main characters are Texan outlaws. It follows the life of Buck Duane, a man who becomes an outlaw and then redeems himself in the eyes of the law.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Oleksa Dovbush</span> Ukrainian outlaw and folk hero

Oleksa Dovbush was a famous Ukrainian outlaw in the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, leader of the opryshky movement, who became a folk hero.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Big Nose George</span> Late 19th century cattle rustler and highwayman in the American Wild West

George Parrott also known as Big Nose George, Big Beak Parrott, George Manuse, and George Warden, was a cattle rustler and highwayman in the American Wild West in the late 19th century. His skin was made into a pair of shoes after his lynching and part of his skull was used as an ashtray.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Betyár</span>

The betyárs were the highwaymen of the 19th century Kingdom of Hungary. The "betyár" word is the Hungarian version of "Social Bandit".

Lefteri (?–1872) was a 19th-century Greek bandit leader active in the area around the Ottoman capital Constantinople and the region of Bithynia.

References

  1. ↑ Black's Law Dictionary at 1255 (4th ed. 1951), citing Oliveros v. Henderson, 116 S.C. 77, 106 S.E. 855, 859.
  2. ↑ E. J. Hobsbawm, Bandits; Penguin Books, 1972
  3. ↑ BBC Inside Out – Highwaymen
  4. ↑ "Ben Hall and the outlawed bushrangers". Culture and Recreation Portal. Australian Government. April 15, 2008. Archived from the original on July 20, 2008. Retrieved September 19, 2008.
  5. ↑ Cowie, N. (July 5, 2002). "Felons' Apprehension Act (Act 612)". Archived from the original on January 10, 2009. Retrieved September 19, 2008.
  6. ↑ Indian bandits kill 13 villagers, BBC News, October 29, 2004
  7. ↑ Indian bandit slain in gun battle with police, International Herald Tribune, July 23, 2007
  8. ↑ BBC – Religion & Ethics – Origins of the word 'thug' Archived October 17, 2007, at the Wayback Machine
  9. ↑ Simko, Bandit Leader, Said to Have Defeated Persian Troops., The New York Times
  10. ↑ Outlaws, 2023-05-05, retrieved 2023-05-08
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