 | This article relies largely or entirely on a single source .(May 2015) |
"Robin Hood and the Curtal Friar" is Child Ballad number 123, about Robin Hood.
| | This article relies largely or entirely on a single source .(May 2015) |
"Robin Hood and the Curtal Friar" is Child Ballad number 123, about Robin Hood.
This ballad is one of those appearing in later and later versions, the earlier one appearing in damaged form in the Percy manuscript but, as with Robin Hood and Guy of Gisborne the story also appears in May Day plays and there is good reason to think that it goes back to at least the fifteenth century.
The outlaws have a good hunt. Robin Hood says there is no match for Little John within a hundred miles; Will Scadlock tells him that a friar at Fountains Abbey can. Robin sets out to see this monk. He finds him by a riverside and forces the monk to carry him over, except that the friar throws him in halfway across. They battle until Robin asks a favor: to let him blow on his horn. When the friar agrees, Robin's men appear, with bows in hand. The friar asks a favor: to let him whistle. When Robin agrees, many fierce dogs appear. In the later version, Little John shoots twenty of them, and the Friar agrees to make peace with Robin. In the earlier version, Robin Hood good-humoredly refuses further combat; in both earlier and later versions Robin invites him to join the band.
Howard Pyle used this tale in his The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood as part of the tale of Alan-a-Dale: Robin needed a priest who would perform the wedding ceremony in defiance of authority, and Will Scarlet proposed Friar Tuck. [1]
The Percy Folio version of the ballad begins with the stanza:
Robert Graves in his English and Scottish Ballads used this stanza to support his argument for pagan survivals in the Robin Hood legend, and for the popular survival of a supposedly pagan thirteen-month calendar.[ citation needed ]
Robin Hood is a legendary heroic outlaw originally depicted in English folklore and subsequently featured in literature and film. According to legend, he was a highly skilled archer and swordsman. In some versions of the legend, he is depicted as being of noble birth, and in modern retellings he is sometimes depicted as having fought in the Crusades before returning to England to find his lands taken by the Sheriff. In the oldest known versions he is instead a member of the yeoman class. Traditionally depicted dressed in Lincoln green, he is said to have robbed from the rich and given to the poor.
Howard Pyle was an American illustrator and author, primarily of books for young people. He was a native of Wilmington, Delaware, and he spent the last year of his life in Florence, Italy.
Much, the Miller's Son is one of the Merry Men in the tales of Robin Hood. He appears in some of the oldest ballads, A Gest of Robyn Hode and Robin Hood and the Monk, as one of the company.
The Bishop of Hereford is a character in the Robin Hood legend. He is typically portrayed as a wealthy and greedy clergyman who is robbed by Robin and his Merry Men.
Alan-a-Dale is a figure in the Robin Hood legend. According to the stories, he was a wandering minstrel who became a member of Robin's band of outlaws, the "Merry Men".
Will Scarlet is a prominent member of Robin Hood's Merry Men. He is present in the earliest ballads along with Little John and Much the Miller's Son.
Adam Bell was a legendary English outlaw. He and his companions William of Cloudsley and Clym of the Clough lived in Inglewood Forest near Carlisle and were figures similar to Robin Hood. Their story is told in Child Ballad 116 entitled Adam Bell, Clym of the Cloughe and Wyllyam of Cloudeslee. The basis of the tale has historical roots in the criminal activities of the Folville and Coterel gangs. At one point William of Cloudsley, who is famed as an archer, shoots an arrow through an apple on his son's head at six score paces, a feat also ascribed to William Tell and other heroes. The oldest printed copy of this ballad dates from 1505 and was printed by Wynkyn de Worde. There are notable parallels between this ballad and that of Robin Hood and the Monk, but whether either legend was the source for the other cannot be established.
The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood of Great Renown in Nottinghamshire is an 1883 novel by the American illustrator and writer Howard Pyle. Consisting of a series of episodes in the story of the English outlaw Robin Hood and his band of Merry Men, the novel compiles traditional material into a coherent narrative in a colorful, invented "old English" idiom that preserves some flavor of the ballads, and adapts it for children. The novel is notable for taking the subject of Robin Hood, which had been increasingly popular through the 19th century, in a new direction that influenced later writers, artists, and filmmakers through the next century.
Will Stutely or Will Stutly is in English folklore a prominent member of Robin Hood's Merry Men. He was possibly confused with Will Scarlet because of the similarities in their surnames.
"Robin Hood and Queen Katherine" is Child ballad 145. "Robin Hood's Chase", Child ballad 146, takes up after it.
Robin Hood and the Butcher is a story in the Robin Hood canon which has survived as, among other forms, a late seventeenth-century English broadside ballad, and is one of several ballads about the medieval folk hero that form part of the Child ballad collection, which is one of the most comprehensive collections of traditional English ballads. It may have been derived from the similar Robin Hood and the Potter.
"Robin Hood and the Golden Arrow" is Child ballad 152.
Robin Hood and the Valiant Knight is Child ballad 153.
Robin Hood’s Golden Prize is Child ballad 147. It is a story in the Robin Hood canon which has survived as, among other forms, a late seventeenth-century English broadside ballad, and is one of several ballads about the medieval folk hero that form part of the Child ballad collection, which is one of the most comprehensive collections of traditional English ballads.
"A Gest of Robyn Hode" is Child Ballad 117; it is also called A Lyttell Geste of Robyn Hode in one of the two oldest books that contain it.
David of Doncaster is a member of Robin Hood's Merry Men in English folklore. Doncaster is a town near Barnsdale, where early ballads placed Robin Hood.
Arthur a Bland is, in English folklore, a member of Robin Hood's Merry Men, though his chief appearance is in the ballad in which he joins the band. Arthur a Bland is also the name of an ex British Waterways tug.
The Merry Men are the group of outlaws who follow Robin Hood in English literature and folklore. The band appears in the earliest ballads about Robin Hood and remains popular in modern adaptations.
Friar Tuck is a companion to Robin Hood in the legends about that character.
Robin Hood and Little John is Child ballad 125. It is a story in the Robin Hood canon which has survived as, among other forms, a late seventeenth-century English broadside ballad, and is one of several ballads about the medieval folk hero that form part of the Child ballad collection, which is one of the most comprehensive collections of traditional English ballads.
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