Showing posts with label Robin Hood History. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Robin Hood History. Show all posts

Ivanhoe & The Lionheart’s Ballad


I was pleased to recieve a comment recently by Laurence, regarding my article about the ‘medieval' chant used during one of the scenes of Walt Disney’s Story of Robin Hood and his Merrie Men (1952). 

You can view my post here:- The Chant of the Crusaders.


Prince John (Hubert Gregg) watches his brother King Richard leave for the Holy  Land

Laurence says:
“Interestingly, the same theme is used for background music to the prologue in ‘Ivanhoe’, scored, of course, by Miklos RózsaIt is reputed to be based on a tune written by Richard the Lionheart himself. Rózsa's sleeve notes for 'Ivanhoe' state, “ Under the opening narration I introduced a theme from a ballad actually written by Richard the Lionhearted”.
In my opinion, the 1950’s were a golden era for films such as theseIvanhoe is another of my favourite movies, released the same year as Walt Disney’s live action film The Story of Robin Hood.  Our regular contributor Neil Vessey, has a fantastic web site dedicated to Films of the Fifties. Take a look!

MGM’s Ivanhoe (1952) starred Robert Taylor as the Saxon knight, loyal to King Richard the Lionheart who has been captured and ransomed. Also appearing in this epic adventure are Elizabeth Taylor, Joan Fontaine and George Sanders. The film is based on the novel by Sir Walter Scott, first published in 1819.


Ivanhoe lobby card

Richard the Lionheart’s Ballad
As Laurence says, it was Miklos Rózsa (1907-1995) who scored the music for MGM's Ivanhoe and in 1953 he was nominated for both Academy and Golden Globe awards for his work. Rózsa is known for composing the music for nearly a hundred films. 

In 1987 Rózsa described to Bruce Duffie the medieval sources that inspired him to write the soundtrack for Ivanhoe:
“The various themes in Ivanhoe are partly based on authentic Twelfth Century music, or at least influenced by them. Under the opening narration I introduced a theme from a ballad actually written by Richard the Lionhearted. The principle Norman theme I developed from a Latin hymn by the troubadour Giraut de Bornelh. This appears the first time with the approaching Normans in Sherwood Forest. Later during the film, it undergoes various contrapuntal treatments. The love theme for Ivanhoe and Rowena is a free adaptation of an old popular song from the north of France. The manuscript of this I found in a collection of songs in the Royal Library of Brussels. It’s a lovely melody, breathing the innocently amorous atmosphere of the middle ages, and I gave it modal harmonizations. Rebecca needed a Jewish theme, reflecting not only the tragedy of this beautiful character but also the persecution of her race. Fragments of medieval Jewish motives suggested a melody to me. My most difficult job was the scoring of the extensive battle in the castle because the producers wanted music to accompany almost all of it. I devised a new theme for the Saxons, along with a motive for the battering ram sequence, thereby giving a rhythmic beat which contrapuntally and polytonally worked out with the previous thematic material, forming a tonal background to this exciting battle scene. Scoring battles in films is very difficult, and sadly one for which the composer seldom gets much credit. The visuals and the emotional excitement are so arresting that the viewer tends not to be aware that he or she is also being influenced by what is heard.”         (Movie Music UK) 

Ivanhoe sings King Richard's ballad outside the castle walls.


As my regular readers know, I have posted many times on various aspects on the life of Richard the Lionheart. He is a king who has always interested me. So I was keen to investigate this ballad that has been attributed to him and used in Ivanhoe

The Lionheart is Captured
On his way back from the third Crusade in 1192, King Richard I (1157-1199) was captured by Leopold V, Duke of Austria and sent to a strong castle built high on a mountain-slope over-looking the Danube: the castle of Durnstein. Legend states that Blondel, King Richard's faithful minstrel, travelled the length and breadth of Germany in search of his missing lord. He visited castle after castle and outside each one sang the first lines of a song which he and Richard had composed together.

One day while resting in a garden at the foot of a tower in which Richard was held, the king saw him and sang, ‘ for he sang very well- the first part of a song which they had composed and which was known only to the two of them’ . This was the inspiration for the opening scene of the film, Ivanhoe (1952).

Blondel’s Song
In its earliest known form, this story was told in a Rheims prose chronicle written in about 1260. But it wasn’t until the eighteenth century that the legend took off. There was a troubadour known as Blondel de Nesle who lived at the same time as King Richard I. He was a native of Picardy whose work showed the influence of Gregorian chant. Twenty three of his songs have survived. But sadly, there is not a shred of evidence to link him to the legend or that he ever met the Lionheart.


Blondel outside the castle in Durnstein

So what was this ballad ‘actually written’  by King Richard the Lionheart, that Rózsa used?

King Richard's Ballads?
Two songs do exist that are attributed to King Richard I in early troubadour manuscripts, the ‘ rotrouenge’  said to have been composed in captivity and a ‘sirventes’  aimed at Dauphin of Auvergne. It is impossible to to be absolutely certain that Richard did write them, but the evidence that he was unusually interested in music is overwhelming. Richard was well educated, his upbringing would have included music. His mother was Eleanor of Aquitaine and a generous patron of poets and musicians. Richard grew up almost exclusively in Eleanor’s court. He was surrounded by the poetry and troubadour culture throughout his childhood.

The incredibly beautiful song, written in captivity, Ja nus hons pris, translates as "no man who is imprisoned' and is said to have been addressed to Richard's half-sister, Marie de Champagne, expressing the feeling that he had been abandoned by her and his barons to an unfair fate. 

Is this what Rózsa based his opening theme on for Ivanhoe?

Ja Nus Hons Pris
Original Old French
I
Ja nus hons pris ne dira sa raison
Adroitement, se dolantement non;
Mais par effort puet il faire chançon.
Mout ai amis, mais povre sont li don;
Honte i avront se por ma reançon
—
Sui ça deus yvers pris.

II

Ce sevent bien mi home et mi baron–
Ynglois, Normant, Poitevin et Gascon–
Que je n’ai nul si povre compaignon
Que je lessaisse por avoir en prison;
Je nou di mie por nule retraçon,
—
Mais encor sui [je] pris.

III

Or sai je bien de voir certeinnement
Que morz ne pris n’a ami ne parent,
Quant on me faut por or ne por argent.
Mout m’est de moi, mes plus m’est de ma gent,
Qu’aprés ma mort avront reprochement
—
Se longuement sui pris.

IV

N’est pas mervoille se j’ai le cuer dolant,
Quant mes sires met ma terre en torment.
S’il li membrast de nostre soirement
Quo nos feïsmes andui communement,
Je sai de voir que ja trop longuement
—
Ne seroie ça pris.

V


Ce sevent bien Angevin et Torain–
Cil bacheler qui or sont riche et sain–
Qu’encombrez sui loing d’aus en autre main.
Forment m’amoient, mais or ne m’ainment grain.
De beles armes sont ore vuit li plain,
—
Por ce que je sui pris

VI

Mes compaignons que j’amoie et que j’ain–
Ces de Cahen et ces de Percherain–
Di lor, chançon, qu’il ne sunt pas certain,
C’onques vers aus ne oi faus cuer ne vain;
S’il me guerroient, il feront que vilain
—
Tant con je serai pris.

VII


Contesse suer, vostre pris soverain
Vos saut et gart cil a cui je m’en clain
—
Et por cui je sui pris.

VIII

Je ne di mie a cele de Chartain,
—

La mere Loës.


Translation:
I
No prisoner can tell his honest thought
Unless he speaks as one who suffers wrong;
But for his comfort as he may make a song.
My friends are many, but their gifts are naught.
Shame will be theirs, if, for my ransom, here
—
I lie another year.
II

They know this well, my barons and my men,
Normandy, England, Gascony, Poitou,
That I had never follower so low
Whom I would leave in prison to my gain.
I say it not for a reproach to them,
—
But prisoner I am!
III

The ancient proverb now I know for sure;
Death and a prison know nor kind nor tie,
Since for mere lack of gold they let me lie.
Much for myself I grieve; for them still more.
After my death they will have grievous wrong
—
If I am a prisoner long.
IV

What marvel that my heart is sad and sore
When my own lord torments my helpless lands!
Well do I know that, if he held his hands,
Remembering the common oath we swore,
I should not here imprisoned with my song,
—
Remain a prisoner long.
V

They know this well who now are rich and strong
Young gentlemen of Anjou and Touraine,
That far from them, on hostile bonds I strain.
They loved me much, but have not loved me long.
Their plans will see no more fair lists arrayed
—
While I lie here betrayed.
 VI
Companions whom I love, and still do love, Geoffroi du Perche and Ansel de Caieux, Tell them, my song, that they are friends untrue. Never to them did I false-hearted prove; But they do villainy if they war on me,
—While I lie here, unfree. 
Tell them, my song, that they are friends untrue.
Never to them did I false-hearted prove;
But they do villainy if they war on me,
—
While I lie here, unfree.
VII

Countess sister! Your sovereign fame
May he preserve whose help I claim,
—
Victim for whom am I!
VIII

I say not this of Chartres’ dame,
—
Mother of Louis!
Click here to hear Ja Nus Hons Pris



Ivanhoe (Robert Taylor) sings to King Richard the Lionheart


My Heart Was A Lion
As Ivanhoe (Robert Taylor) rides past several castles, in search of his king, he sings:

My heart was a lion, but now it is chained,
Far do I travel, and will travel and sing
I travel, I travel in search of my heart
I vowed me a vow and I pledged this to be, 
Far will I travel until thou art free.


I think John Haines, in his book, ‘Music in Films on the Middle Ages’, sums it all up very well:

“As it turns out, ‘My Heart Was A Lion,’ is not based on any surviving medieval melody. It does not even occur in Sir Walter Scott’s ‘Ivanhoe.’ It does, however, resemble a modern folk song. Both music and text are apparently new to the 1952 film. It is possible that someone other than Rózsa wrote the music for this song. In the composers sketches for the film, dated November 1951 to January 1952, the music for ‘My Heart Is A Lion’ is nowhere to be found. If Rózsa did not write the song, then quite possibly his orchestrator, fellow Hungarian Eugene Zador - whose daughter once accused Rózsa of not giving enough credit to, ‘young former friend and colleague, the glorified copyist’ - made it up.
Whoever composed it, the song exhibits a few vaguely medieval touches, namely its use of a minor scale and its stepwise approach to cadences. But, in the main, it is a patently modern creation. . .The minstrel song in Ivanhoe bears only the slightest resemblance to the medieval ‘Ja Nus Hon Pris’. The word ‘chained’ vaguely matches Richard’s description of himself as a prisoner (hons pris), but that is all. And its melody has little to do with the music that survives in medieval manuscripts for ‘Ja Nus Hons Pris.’  In short, rather than medieval influences, Ivanhoes’s horseback song bears the marks of modern musical traditions, including that of a singing cowboy”.

John Haines: Music in Films on the Middle Ages Routledge (2013)


Many thanks to Laurence for getting in touch.

Edward II: The Unconventional King by Kathryn Warner (and how I met Jules)





Edward II: The Unconventional King by Kathryn Warner


My review:

Jules read Kathryn's book first (of course), and loved it. When I finally managed to pick it up, it felt a privilege to hold such ground-breaking material.

As regular readers of Kathryn's blog will know, Edward II: The Unconventional King is the culmination of many years of intensive research, driven by her tireless passion to get to the truth.  That passion is immediately apparent, as you witness her steadily dismantle centuries of myths surrounding Edward II's reign.  


The tomb of Edward II

One example of this is the traditional story of Edward's murder by the use of a 'red-hot poker'. Kathryn has forensically examined the contemporary records, one by one, to reject it as a lurid invention. Kathryn's close analysis of contemporary manuscripts also provides fascinating details of Edward's household. These include the names and costs of his minstrels and entertainers, something which I found particularly interesting.


Kathryn Warner

Kathryn gives fresh insight into the life of this maligned monarch. Her research reveals a fiercely emotional king who not only enjoyed the company of  his 'common subjects' and their pastimes, but who was also remarkably generous and kind to the people who pleased him. Edward II was also openly a lover of men, and this unconventional and often eccentric behaviour led to the utter failure of his reign. But, paradoxically, Edward was ahead of his time, and that was the tragedy of his life. 

Kathryn's work has a special place on our bookshelf. It is superbly written, meticulously researched and is a much needed re-assessment of Edward's reign. I thoroughly recommend it to anyone interested in the Plantagenet kings of England.


***

Edward II and Robin Hood 


When I was at school, I wasn't taught anything about Edward II. I heard about Richard the Lionheart, Henry VIII and Edward III of course, but not Edward II. After all, he was considered to be just a weak king who brought about an English civil war. It wasn't until I was thumbing through a book in my college library during a dinner break that I became fascinated by his reign.


An early image of Robin Hood

The book was a version of Winston Churchill's History of the English Speaking Peoples. Included in the great statesman's account of the Lancastrian revolt during the reign of Edward II, was a feature about the findings of the 19th century antiquary called Joseph Hunter. The article included details of his discoveries of a Robin/Robert Hood recorded in Edward II's household chamber accounts. Hunter's ground-breaking research also uncovered a Robert Hood living in Wakefield, part of Lancastrian lands during the time of the Battle of Boroughbridge (1322). After the battle, Hunter believed that this Robert Hood, a tenant of Thomas Earl of Lancaster, would not have only been outlawed, but may also have been the same Robert Hood brought to court by Edward II during his progress through the northern counties in 1323. 


Joseph Hunter (1783-1861)

Remarkably, Hunter's findings mirrored details in one of the earliest ballads about the outlaw, the Geste of Robyn Hode, written circa 1500, which describes a 'comely' King Edward who travelled though 'all the pass of Lancasshyre'' to capture him. 
I was transfixed.


Court rolls of Edward II

Books and More Books

I had always enjoyed watching Robin Hood films (particularly Walt Disney's live-action Story of Robin Hood) and the classic Richard Greene tv series, but never dreamed there may have been some historical fact in the legend. So, from that moment on, like a manic magpie I began to accumulate books and more books on the origins of Robin Hood. Eventually, I compiled a chronological list of all the important discoveries regarding the celebrated outlaw.


'Some' of my collection of books on Robin Hood


The Computer Age

As the computer age dawned I soon realised that the possibilities for research were endless. Now, it was not necessary to join various libraries and trawl through the dusty shelves of secondhand bookshops. (Although I still do!) The excitement of owning my own computer was palpable. Soon, doors (or should that be windows?) began to open. Kathryn Warner's very informative website on Edward II was one of the first places I discovered.

As 'Clement Glen', I joined several forums and found myself entering into long-winded discussions about the origins of the Robin Hood legend. But, sadly they often became over-heated. So, I decided to step back from it all and, inspired by Kathryn's site, I started my own Robin Hood blog. But how could I make it different from all the others? 


My blog header

The Story of Robin Hood

In my opinion, Walt Disney's Story of Robin Hood and his Merrie Men (1952) is the best film version of the legend ever-made. From the first time I saw it at my local cinema, I was awe-struck by its wonderful actors, colourful pageantry and thrilling action. So, I decided to create a web page that combined information about this movie with the facts I had discovered about the ancient tradition that inspired it. After ten years, my blog has had world wide popularity.


Jules Frusher

In 2010, I posted an article about Joseph Hunter's discoveries. I received many kind comments afterwards, never realising at the time that one of those messages would change my life forever! One came from Kathryn Warner (whose successful website about Edward II I had discovered a few months earlier). Kathryn kindly congratulated me on a 'fascinating post' and the excellent research. Following that came a message from a certain Jules Frusher who described my piece as an 'interesting read,' and 'lots of food for thought.' 

Jules and Kathryn knew each other through their investigations into Edward's reign, with Jules specialising in the life and times of Hugh Despenser. Jules's tremendous website about Hugh can be seen here.

Five years later Kathryn had her first book, 'Edward II: The Unconventional King' , published and . . .  Jules and I got engaged!


Jules Frusher

Did this 'comely' monarch who enjoyed the company of lowborn subjects meet Robin Hood? After decades of debate, many historians agree that Edward's northern progress of 1323 is a rare factual element in one of the earliest ballads about the outlaw. There is a lot more information on my website. So perhaps the 'Edward our comely king' referred to in the Geste of Robyn Hode was Edward II. Ironic, then, that such a reviled king influenced the legend of such an adored hero. 

Robin Hood and The Spy


It has been a while since I have reviewed a book on this blog. But for me 'The Watchers' by Stephen Alford has been one of the most riveting books I have read this year. Not only does Alford throw open a window on the murky world of Elizabethan espionage, but also introduces us to one particular spy who has fascinated me: the man who changed the Robin Hood legend forever.

Stephen Alford takes us back to the reign of Elizabeth I. This is a Tudor period celebrated for its glorious achievement but what is often forgotten is that it was also a time of intense national insecurity. The new Protestant queen was regarded by the Catholic powers of Europe as a bastard and heretic. Pope Pius V tried to depose her and King Philip of Spain attempted an invasion. What also added to the country's anxiety was the fact that the Virgin Queen refused to name a successor. So the stability of the country depended entirely on Elizabeth's survival. The stakes could not have been higher.

To give us an insight into how fraught the times were, Alford's first chapter creates a doomsday scenario that haunted Elizabeth's advisors in which she is assassinated and England is faced with a full-scale invasion by the Spanish:

"Hidden behind the doors of her privy chamber, Elizabeth was mortally sick, in a deep fever, unable even to talk to her secretary. In the presence of her ladies, chaplains and most intimate advisers, she died very early in the morning.”

But Alford then returns us back to the shady chronological path as England is faced with the dilemma of bands of martyr-priests and pamphlets being smuggled in from the continent, the continual popish plots and Mary, Elizabeth's Catholic cousin, scheming over the Scottish border.

It was left to Elizabeth's enigmatic Secretary of State, Francis Walsingham, to counter these threats. He sanctioned the use of torture against Catholic priests and employed 'watchers' to track suspected conspirators - particularly those exiled on the continent. 

Alford sheds light on secret files that vividly detail the exploits of Walsingham's agents in this new discipline of 'spyery'. We witness the chilling but compelling world of the dark arts - from the encoded letters in casks of ale, to the use of cyphers, aliases, forgeries, double agents, espionage and cryptography.

But what has it to do with the legend of Robin Hood I hear you ask? Well bear with me and let me try and explain.

Out of the shadows of this period appears a 'watcher' that I have been particularly interested in - Anthony Munday. Many have probably never heard of him but it was this former spy who made the most influential contribution to the Robin Hood legend. 

Anthony Munday (1560?-1633) was a budding writer and adventurer who seems to have fallen into the world of spying by accident. Alford describes how on his travels Munday quickly realised that he was able to tell all that he had seen and heard of the 'wicked conspiracies' of Queen Elizabeth's Catholic enemies. Once back in England he sold his stories in books and pamphlets in London. The priests, who had been Munday's friends in Rome were quickly captured and imprisoned on their return and tried for treason. He confronted his former friends with the evidence of their hatched crimes and helped to see them to the gallows, including Edmund Campion who was hung, drawn and quartered at Tyburn in 1581. 
"The young writer felt a flush of satisfaction at seeing justice done." (p.116)

Edmund Campion's death at Tyburn


 So what began for Munday as an exciting enterprise soon became deadly serious as he reported on the terrible dangers facing Queen Elizabeth from her 'Roman enemies.' Soon his detecting of these conspiracies aroused the bitter animosity of the Jesuits and with his cover blown he turned his attention back to writing prose and verse. By 1589 he was a distinguished enough writer of theatrical productions to appear in a list of playwrights that included the name of William Shakespeare.

Stephen Alford's fascinating details about Munday's early life finish here, although his book continues to take up the exploits of many more Elizabethan watchers. It is a gripping read. 

But now I would like to continue with the later career of Anthony Munday and his famous two plays, 'The Downfall of Robert Earl Of Huntington' and 'The Death of Robert Earl of Huntington.' Both were probably written by Munday in 1598 (seven years after Campion's execution) and evidence shows he was helped by Henry Chettle, who had some part in the writing of the 'Death' and possibly re-worked the 'Downfall.' A court performance in 1598 is recorded as by 'the Earl of Nottingham's men.' This was Charles Howard who had recently been made Lord Admiral and was a patron of the theatre.

In his two plays the Robin Hood of ancient minstrelsy is transformed into an earl. Munday is the first person to name him Earl of Huntington (as he spells it) and the play (within a play) is set as a rehearsal for a revel to be presented inside the court of Henry VIII by the poet John Skelton. The 'good yeoman' had now been gentrified. 



Munday had also softened many of Robin's radical elements for the Elizabethan stage by relocating him in time, class and moral authority, crucially excluding any sense of social challenge through outlawry.




Both of these Huntington plays stress betrayal by family and church. The danger is closer to home, which no doubt resonated with audiences who had witnessed the Reformation.




Earl Robert is told of his outlawry at a feast to celebrate his betrothal to Marian. He has been betrayed by his uncle Gilbert Hood, the Prior of York and Warman his 'treacherous' steward. The wicked prior rewards Warman for his treason by making him Sheriff of Nottingham. Robert's third enemy is Sir Doncaster, who appears as a priest in the 'Downfall' and a knight in the 'Death.'

Earl Robert flees to the forest. Meanwhile Queen Eleanor (who lusts after him) hatches a plot to disguise herself as Marian and elope with the earl instead. Luckily Eleanor's plans are foiled and Marian is reunited with her lover in Sherwood.  They are eventually joined by Much the miller's son, Little John, Scarlet, Scathelock and a girl named Jinny.

Even as late as the seventeenth century Robin Hood and Maid Marian were not strongly linked. In the medieval ballads, Robin has no love interest, only a strong devotion to the Virgin Mary, which of course was idolatry to Protestants. So for his two plays, Munday combined Robin's May Games consort Maid Marian with the historiographical Matilda Fitzwalter who had appeared in Drayton's tragic poem 'Matilda the faire chaste daughter of Lord Robert Fitzwalter' in1594. Munday then created a love triangle between Robin, Marian and Prince John. 

Bizarrely, in the early scenes of 'The Downfall' she is known as Marian daughter of Lord Lacy but later she switches to Matilda daughter of Richard I's faithful baron Fitzwater. This could be an example of some of the fixing and re-working of the material that Henslowe paid Henry Chettle for. Or, an indication of how Munday had only sourced Drayton's poem after starting his play.

Friar Tuck is introduced and 'played' by John Skelton, Henry VIII's teacher and the former poet laureate. So for the first time both Friar Tuck and Maid Marian now have an integral place in Robin's band outside of the May Games.




Using Stow's reference to Robin Hood in his 'Annales of England' (1592), Munday set the time-period during Richard the Lionheart's absence on crusade. Unlike later plays Prince John, although hot tempered, is a more positive character and not quite the evil villain. He does try and seize Richard's throne, but he chooses exile when his brother returns and enters the forest. Disguised as 'Woodnet' he fights with Friar Tuck and is honoured by him as a 'proper man.' This is no doubt due to a favourable Tudor attitude towards King John's battle with the Pope.






Robin dies at the hands of his enemies in Act I of 'The Death.' His uncle, the prior of York plans to poison the king, but Robin, for no clear reason, drinks the poison instead and we witness his slow demise:


And:



The rest of the play follows John's pursuit of Marian, who has been gifted the title of Countess of Huntington by King Richard. 

So Anthony Munday, the former spy, had pulled together the Robin Hood narrative tradition as it was known to the Elizabethans. He processed and censored written sources and popular oral ballads of the time to make them acceptable to his patrons and the Tudor court. In doing so he created a framework in his two plays that clearly influenced later productions. 

Elements like Robin's early betrayal in the action, his escape from powerful enemies to the forest, his defiant speech to his men, the jovial friar and Marian's disguise and torment by a lustful nobleman will be continually replicated in various forms down the centuries. This would subsequently leave an indelible impression on a legend that would outlive Munday's own reputation.



Jason Connery as Robert Earl of Huntingdon

Three hundred and eighty eight years after Anthony Munday penned his pair of plays, Jason Connery performed the part of Robert Earl of Huntingdon in the hugely successful 'Robin of Sherwood' TV series written by Richard Carpenter. Along with Little John, Will Scarlet and Much, he was accompanied (of course) by Lady Marian and Friar Tuck.

The Watchers by Stephen Alford  Penguin Books (2013).
Playing Robin Hood: The Legend as Performance in Five Centuries by Lois Potter
Old English Plays by W. Carew Hazlitt
The Death of Robert Earl of Huntington by J. Payne Collier
Anthony Munday and Civic Culture by Tracey Hill
Anthony Munday and the Catholics 1560-1633 by Donna B. Hamilton

The Bird That Woke Robin Hood

                                                                                                                                                                                                        
'Robin Hood and Guy of Gisborne' from Percy's 'Reliques' 

Since moving to the beautiful county of Gloucester I have been astonished by the amount of birds that regularly visit our garden.  My fiancee and her mother are attempting to teach me the various species and their calls. So with my interest in the Robin Hood legend, I decided to ask them if they knew of a bird called a Woodweete. I was greeted by puzzled looks. So I explained to them that it was this bird that woke Robin Hood from a dream in the ballad Robin Hood and Guy of Gisborne. They had never heard of such a bird, so I decided to spend some time investigating this mysterious creature.

First some information about the ancient ballad. It was Thomas Percy, Bishop of Dromore in Ulster, (1729-1811) who ensured the survival of the original manuscript of Robin Hood and Guy of Gisborne and it was published for the first time in his Reliques of Ancient English Poetry (1765). Percy's collection (including eight Robin Hood ballads) later became known as the Percy Folio.

David Fowler in his Literary History of the Popular Ballad (1968) described the Percy Folio as:
      the most important single document relative to the history of balladry  
Percy explained how, when visiting the home of Humphrey Pitt in 1753, he saw the collection of manuscripts 'unbound and torn, lying on a dirty floor' being used by parlour maids to light the fire! He was already interested in old poetry and rescued the remains of the folio. On closer inspection he discovered that it contained ballads, historical songs, metrical romances and sonnets dating from between the fourteenth and seventeenth centuries. 

It had not been treated well, probably because the owners would have found the Middle English and Border dialect used in the manuscript incomprehensible. Many of the pages, Percy explains, were badly 'mutilated and imperfect.'


 Percy's 'Reliques of Ancient English Poetry'

The publication of Percy's Reliques of Ancient English Poetry not only revived scholarly interest in ballad poetry but inspired people like Robert Burns, William Wordsworth, William Blake, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, the brothers Grimm and the whole 'Romantic Movement'. Sir Walter Scott recalled that at the age of thirteen he forgot his dinner because he was so enthralled by his first perusal of the Reliques.

The ballad Robin Hood and Guy of Gisborne, saved by Percy, only survives in this portfolio. It is written continuously in an early seventeenth-century hand (with possible omissions) but Percy discovered that 'it was a ballad of Robin Hood which had never before been printed and carried marks of much greater antiquity than any of the common popular songs on this subject.' 


Thomas Percy (1729-1811)

Even more damage was done to the manuscripts when Percy had the collection bound together. The bookbinder trimmed off the edges of the pages, losing some of the first and last lines. Not only this, but being compliant with the age he deemed it important to 'correct' and edit the ballads he published, sometimes even re-writing, conflating and softening the text for his eighteenth century readers. This is something he would later be criticized for by scholars. One of the alterations he made was the name of the bird that awoke Robin Hood from his dream in the forest. The original seventeenth century manuscript has:
The woodweele sang and wold not cease
Percy does not hesitate in altering woodweele to woodweete (as seen in the image at the top of this post) and describes the bird as:
a Golden Ouzle, a kind of Thrush.
But when John Hales and Frederick Furnivall edited the Reliques in 1868 they suggested Percy's 'woodweete' as :
a Witwall, the Great Spotted Woodpecker
Later, the great American ballad collector Francis J Child in his English and Scottish Ballads (5 vols. 1882-98) printed the ballad with woodweele but in his glossary has woodweete.

Confused? It doesn't get any easier! The Romaunt of the Rose, a French allegory partially translated by Chaucer, seems to refer to the same mysterious bird :




Can we assume that this poem in Middle English is referring to the same bird? If we do than what do the Chaucerian experts think the bird was?

John Urry in The Works of Geoffrey Chaucer (1721) explains in his glossary that wodwale is 'witwall' known as the golden ousel a bird of the thrush-kind.

Fifty four years later Thomas Tyrwhitt's glossary to The Canterbury Tales (page 645) has:
WODEWALE: n. of a bird. Widewael. BELG.Oriolus. Killian . According to Ray, our Witwall is a sort of Wood-pecker.
The famous English philologist Walter William Skeat (1835-1912) admitted the great confusion in these names:





North of the border, John Jamieson in his Etmological Dictionary Of The Scottish Language (1818) has:





Arthur Quiller-Couch (1863-1944) in his Oxford Book of Ballads (1927) describes the 'woodweele' in the ballad of Robin Hood and Guy of Gisborne as:
                       woodweele]woodlark, thrush?

In modern times there has been a surge in research into the legend of Robin Hood. In 1976 R. B. Dobson and J. Taylor reproduced a collection of  thirteen ballads with accompanying notes known as the Rymes of Robyn Hood. In their glossary of the ballad Robin Hood and Guy of Gisborne  (p.141) they explain that 'woodweete: woodwall, is usually identified with the golden oriole, noted for its singing voice.' 

Other current experts on the legend like Professors Stephen Knight and Thomas Ohlgren go with woodwall (golden oriole).

I decided to consult the RSPB site on the golden oriole and was frustrated to see that this beautiful singing bird only colonizes on the south or east coasts of England in the summer. Nowhere near Sherwood Forest or Yorkshire's Barnsdale, where the ballad is set. Whereas the green woodpecker, like the song thrush, is a resident across all of England's ancient woodland.

But what I did not take into consideration was the 'medieval warm period' or the Medieval Climatic Anomaly. This, I learned, ran from about 950 AD to 1250 and would have encouraged the golden oriole's breeding range in north west Europe. The bird is a great wanderer, especially the males in their first two years. So it is possible that during the 13th Century the golden oriole could have visited the forests of central and northern England.



Robin Hood and Guy of Gisborne is (as Percy mentioned) of great antiquity and has many ancient motifs, notably Guy's horse-hide and head, which seem more like ritual costume. Was the 'woodweele' chosen for it's traditional mythical elements or as a metaphor? 

It seems - from all this - we have at least three possible candidates for the 'woodweele' in Robin Hood and Guy of Gisborne. These are the song thrush, golden oriole and green woodpecker. Down the centuries, birds like these have established a substantial amount of folk-lore about them. 


Golden Oriole

The golden oriole is known in ancient lore as a 'transfigured magical image of the blackbird.' Like the blackbird, the oriole's flute-like calls make it a piper of the dawn and its cheerful notes have been described as 'merry as its clothing.'

This beautiful, but secretive bird, spends a lot of its time aloft in tree tops. It is known in legend for its healing virtues and when looked upon by a person with jaundice, it cures the sufferer-but sadly dies during the process.


Song Thrush

The song thrush, meanwhile, has been described as the 'very spirit of spring' and likes to nest in forests with good undergrowth. The male's distinctive song has musical phrases (sometimes over a hundred), which are repeated two or three times interspersed with grating noises and mimicry (including other birds and man-made objects). The song thrush has a unique voice box, known as a 'syrinx', which enables them to sing two notes at once and blend them beautifully. For its weight the song thrush also has one of the loudest bird calls.

Many famous poets have celebrated the song thrush in verse. Including Robert Browning in his Home Thoughts, from Abroad:
That's the wise thrush, he sings each song twice over
Lest you think he could never recapture
The first fine careless rapture. 


Green Woodpecker

The green woodpecker would also have had a song loud and persistent enough to awaken Robin Hood. The 16th Century antiquarian John Aubrey noted that this particular bird was used for divination. In Norse mythology, the green woodpecker was the bird of Thor, god of thunder and lightning and was able to cure illness and prolong life.

This haunter of forests was described as a 'living barometer' by our ancestors and can become very vociferous when a storm approaches. Did the poet include the woodpecker's 'ceaseless calling' as a warning to Robin of his imminent brutal confrontation with Guy of Gisborne?


Below are three clips of the birdsong of our possible candidates, the green woodpecker, song thrush and golden oriole.


Green Woodpecker




Song Thrush






Golden Oriole




After a great deal of consideration, I believe it was the green woodpecker (with its 'joyous laugh') that woke Robin Hood in the greenwood. 

What do you think? 

Sources:

The Golden Oriole by Paul Mason, Jake Allsop
Fraser's Magazine by Thomas Carlyle
Popular Music of the Olden Time... by William Chappell and George Alexander Macfarren
Chronicle of Scottish Poetry from the Thirteenth Century... by James Sibbald
British Birds in Their Haunts by Charles Alexander
An Etymological Dictionary of the Scottish Language by John Jamieson
Notes and Queries February 1855
Reliques of Ancient English Poetry by Thomas Percy
Bird Life and Bird Lore by Reginald Bosworth Smith
RSPB Handbook of British Birds by Tim Cleeves and Peter Holdern