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 Professor Holt who is the former Master of Fitzwilliam College and Professor of Medieval History at the University of Cambridge has much to say about Nottingham's claim to Robin Hood which was first propagated by Mr. William Stukeley [1687-1765] then taken up and used by Mr. Lees and later by his nephew Mr Robert Henshaw. The extract below is taken from Professor Holt's book, “Robin Hood” published by Thames and Hudson, 1996. The book is copyright and I thank the publisher’s for their permission to quote from it. G.K.
It seems that lovers of Robin Hood have been hoodwinked for two and a half centuries by a false pedigree concocted by William Stukeley who invented a fictitious earl resulting in students being thrown into confusion by his inventive fabrications. He misrepresented the information provided in William Dougdale’s Baronage of 1675, and then added families and individuals who were entirely fictitious. He concocted a marriage between Gilbert de Grant and Rohaise, a daughter of Richard fitz Gilbert. He gave them a fictitious daughter called Maud who he married to a fictitious husband Ralph fitz Ooth, stating that Ralph was commonly called Robin Hood. He then attaches the fitz Ooths to a genuine family who were the lords of Kime in Lincolnshire, giving the whole fabrication a false sense of authenticity. He gives a date for Robin Hood’s death of c.1274, which has no foundation in fact and that has caused Robin Hood to be placed in the reign of kings from around that period.
This flawed and false pedigree was taken up by Mr J Lees of Nottingham who transferred William fitz Ooth into the custody of Robert de Vere which is wrong, and so the whole sorry state of affairs has gone from bad to worse. First Nottingham’s candidate was Robert Fitzooth, and then it changed to Robert-de-Kyme (1210 to 1274 or 78). They say he fought at the Battle of Evesham in 1265 and later changed his name to Robin Hood. The Complete Peerage says, “Robin Hood, otherwise Robert Fitzooth, the famous forest outlaw, popularly ennobled in legend as Earl of Huntingdon, never possessed that Earldom or any other title of dignity.”
Professor Holt has more to say and dismisses Nottingham’s case very emphatically: -
“Since Mr. J. Lees (The Quest for Robin Hood, Nottingham 1987), has tried to revive Stukeley’s pedigree in a revised form it may be useful to summarise a few of the salient errors.
First, the critical figure for both Stukeley and Mr. Lees is William FitzOoth who (Stukeley) or whose heir (Lees) was transferred to the custody of Robert de Vere, earl of Oxford, in 1214. In reality the William son of Otho, whose heir or heirs were placed in the custody of Aubrey de Vere, earl of Oxford, in 1205 and transferred to Robert de Vere, earl of Oxford, in 1214, had nothing to do with the family of Kyme, or with the earls of Huntingdon, still less with Robin Hood. He is well known as an official of the Mint, holding his office in charge of the manufacture of the royal dies as a sergeanty. By 1219, he was succeeded by his son, Otho son of William, who still held office in 1242-3. It follows therefore that ‘Robert fitz Ooth’ is entirely fictitious; so is the alleged link between ‘FitzOoth and Kyme, and so are the grounds for seeking an original Robin Hood in the Kyme family.
Secondly, there is no evidence that any Robert of Kyme mentioned by Mr. Lees was outlawed. The instance on which he relies is a royal remission of wrath and indignation incurred by an appeal of rape against a Robert of Kyme at Wenlock In 1226; there is no mention of outlawry.
Thirdly, Mr. Lees’s ‘Robert of Kyme is compounded of at least two distinct individuals, none of them an outlaw and none of them a disinherited elder son; many of the relationships he proposes within the Kyme family are quite unsupported by any contemporary evidence.”
THE GEOGRAPHICAL SETTING
Professor Holt goes on to say, “The recent attempt by Mr. J. Lees (The Quest for Robin Hood. Nottingham 1987) to alter the accepted geography of the tales by placing Barnsdale in Sherwood is quite unacceptable. It involves an elementary misreading of the Geste: the knight was travelling south through Barnsdale, not north, as he insists, for he was intending to voyage to the Holy Land; it is only later, after leaving Robin in Barnsdale, that he visits St. Mary’s, York in order to repay his debt. It is also based on a tendentious and uncritical evaluation of the place name evidence. ‘Brunnisdale’ in Basford. Notts. cannot be equated with Barnsdale. ‘Brunnis’ is most probably ‘brun’, i.e. brown; ‘Barn’ comes from the personal name ‘Beorn’. Moreover, the evidence linking Wentbridge, Sayles, Barnsdale, and Watling Street is quite clear and certain. The main facts concerning the use of Watling Street as a name for the Great North Road in the Barnsdale area, which Mr. Lees questions, are incontrovertibly presented in The Place Names of the West Riding of Yorkshire. vii. Page 145.”
Speaking about the location of Barnsdale, the antiquary to Henry VIII John Leland said this. "Along on the left honde, ? miles of betwixt Milburne and Feribridge, i saw the woodd and most famous forest of Barnsdale, where thay say that Robyn Hudde lyvid like an outlaw." Itinerary, V.101.
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