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MAJOR OAK OF SHERWOOD FOREST
Robin Hood Legend in Nottingham
Robin
Hood, the legendary outlaw of Sherwood Forest in Nottinghamshire in the
midlands of England
has made his way into all sorts of legends, entertainment stories and
social consciousness, without a doubt one of the most famous of historical
characters who may or may not have ever existed. His story has been told
in books, poems and movies, from Errol Flynn’s iconic portrayal in
the 1940s Warner Brothers film, sword dueling with Basil Rathbone, (more
familiar as Sherlock Holmes), to the comic Mel Brooks version of “Men
in Tights”, a recent TV science fiction incarnation which had him fighting
a dragon, to a brand new film version of “Robin Hood” in 2010,
a big budget extravaganza with Russel Crowe and director Ridley
Scott giving the medieval hero the “Gladiator” treatment. The
original script called “Nottingham” took
the story in a revisionist direction, but apparently has veered back toward
the tried and true legend.
The
new film of “Robin Hood” which was shot partly in the Nottingham
area will receive a special premier in May 2010 in the environs of Sherwood
Forest where the spirit of Robin Hood exists in statues and one legendary
tree, known as the Major Oak. Large sections of the vast forest called Sherwood
which once vastly spread north from the city of Nottingham have long since
fallen to the woodsman’s ax, though an English public park remains
protecting a grove of the vernal woods surrounding a massive knarled oak
tree, over 1,000 years old and so bent with age, its branched must be supported
by steel spars where, as the story is told, Robin Hood hid in a cavity from
his pursuers. The Sherwood Forest National Nature Reserve Park has a public
center with activities for kids revolving around nature and the heroic legend,
with the primary features being a Robin Hood exhibit, a restaurant and nature
trails. The Major Oak tree is a 15 minute walk deep into the thick protecting
woods, past many other aged oaks which seem as likely candidates. The major
oak is guarded by a wooden fence, with a picnic area cleared before it, for
contemplating its bent and craggy branches while gnawing on a purloined chicken
leg. Entrance to the park, open from April to October, is free with a nominal
charge for parking in busy summer seasons.
Who
was the real Robin Hood? What we know most familiarly of Robin Hood as
a minor Saxon English lord, hiding
in
the woods with his
band of outlaws, his land and title taken by
the Normans, done injustice by the Sheriff of Nottingham under the tyranny
of King John attempting to usurp his brother’s throne while Richard
the Lionheart was being held for ransom on his return from the third Crusade
(see Varazdin
Castle), comes to us from the anonymous tales of middle-ages
troubadours and later fictionalizations. The story of a wronged man seeking
redress of social injustice by taking from the rich to give to the poor,
fighting for rights of the downtrodden is a powerful idea which has resonated
and inspired over the ages. Yet, like many grand characters from a dark and
lost history, the historical person of the legend seems most likely
a combination of figures - a real outlaw who hid out in the
forest hunted by Reginald de Grey (see Ruthin
Castle Wales), a Sheriff
of Nottingham who was paid 100 marks in 1272 to "rid the counties of
Nottinghamshire, Derbyshire and Leicestershire of robbers who molest
religious and other persons and spoil them of their sport", and perhaps
a noble named Robert or Robin Hode of Loxley, a hundred years
later in Yorkshire, pardoned by Richard II in 1382 for his conflict with
Sir John
of Gisburne, though a number of other sources for the legend are subject
to
debate, the longest suggested to be an earlier Earl of Huntingdon
whose grave at Kirklees Priory in West Yorkshire, bears a marker to such
effect. Robin
Hood is
claimed by both Nottinghamshire and Yorkshire,
though the edge
in the PR war over ownership of England’s most famous romantic hero
belongs to Nottingham and the onetime Royal Hunting Forest of Sherwood, where
game would have been plenty for England's greatest archer and a great tree
still stands.
The Sherwood
Forest National Reserve is about a half hour drive from Nottingham
with the entrance just
at the edge of the the village of Edwinstowe, a suburb
of Mansfield. There are several small hotels and bed & breakfasts in
the area as well as camping parks. On a Robin Hood tour, a visit to the Sherwood
Forest park might be combined with other area historic attractions, Rufford
Abbey,
a
county
park also with free entry, Newstead Abbey, home of England’s
other most famous of notorious romantic figures, Lord Byron (see Bryon’s
Newstead Abbey) and in Nottingham itself, where the Sheriff
of Nottingham would have controlled the surrounding land, the once nearly
invincible Nottingham
Castle is mostly gone, replaced with a 17th Century manor house and museum,
you'll find more Robin Hood statues and lore. Below is the tunnel which led
to the downfall of England’s other great would be usurper, Roger de
Mortimer, known as Mortimer’s Hole (see Traitor's
Gate to Mortimer's Hole). © Bargain
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See Also:
DONINGTON
PARK GRAND PRIX RACE CAR MUSEUM
BURGHLEY HOUSE - GREAT ELIZABETHAN MANOR
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