Support Your Local Legend  

Hands up anyone who hasn’t heard Of Robin Hood!  Surely there can be few legends to rival the one about the outlaw who ‘robbed the rich to give to the poor’.  The earliest reference to Robin is around the 13th century, and by the beginning of the 15th century, the story and most of the central characters were already well established in folklore. Even William Shakespeare makes reference to Robin Hood in his late 16th century play, The Two Gentlemen of Verona.  In it, the character Valentine is approached by outlaws who, upon meeting him, comment, “By the bare scalp of Robin Hood's fat friar, This fellow were a king for our wild faction!”  In the modern day, the legend has been kept alive and become internationally renowned through numerous books, comics, television series and films.

Hands up anyone who hasn’t heard Of Robin Hood!  Surely there can be few legends to rival the one about the outlaw who ‘robbed the rich to give to the poor’.  The earliest reference to Robin is around the 13th century, and by the beginning of the 15th century, the story and most of the central characters were already well established in folklore. Even William Shakespeare makes reference to Robin Hood in his late 16th century play, The Two Gentlemen of Verona.  In it, the character Valentine is approached by outlaws who, upon meeting him, comment, “By the bare scalp of Robin Hood's fat friar, This fellow were a king for our wild faction!”  In the modern day, the legend has been kept alive and become internationally renowned through numerous books, comics, television series and films.

       Robin’s arch enemy was the evil Sheriff of Nottingham, and Sherwood Forest in the County of Nottinghamshire is said to be the location where the outlaw band “hung out” and successfully evaded capture.  You would assume, therefore, that the modern day City of Nottingham would want to fully capitalise on its association with the legend, but that hasn’t always been the case.  In 2005, a new Nottinghamshire logo was developed at a cost of £125,000.  This aimed to get away from the traditional Robin Hood theme, and was basically a big, bold capital letter ‘N’ set at a slant.  A few years on, the Deputy City leader Graham Chapman, explaining why the Council would be reverting to a Robin Hood themed logo said, "People are far more attracted to Robin Hood than a slanty N.”   Nottingham North MP Graham Allen agreed, saying, "We need to get rid of the ‘wonky N’ and capitalise on our internationally renowned Robin Hood brand.”

         On a personal note, I grew up within walking distance of Nottingham Castle and its iconic statue of Robin Hood.  As a child in the 1950s/60s, I watched the actor Richard Greene in the role of Robin in a weekly TV series which seemed to run for at least a decade.  When something is as familiar as that, it’s human nature to take it for granted.  However, my appreciation for our local legend was greatly enhanced about 5 years ago.

         I was working at the National College for School Leadership, located on the Jubilee Campus of the Nottingham University site.  My boss asked me, in his absence, to “meet and greet” a group of nine Czechoslovakian head teachers who were arriving late afternoon for a two day visit to the College.  It would be a ten minute job, just making sure they had tea, coffee and biscuits on arrival, got checked into their rooms okay, and telling them that he looked forward to having dinner with them later that evening in the College restaurant.  Simple - except it didn’t work out that way.

On arrival at around 4:00pm, Petra, the only one of the group fluent in English, let it be known right away that they all wished to make an impromptu trip into the City Centre before dinner, as this was the only chance they would get on their ‘flying visit’.  In particular, they wanted to go for a drink in the ‘pub in a cave’ which a previous Czech visitor to Nottingham had told them about. Could I facilitate that in the next 30 minutes?

         No minibus driver being available at such short notice, I opted for taking them into the city centre on public transport.  We got off the bus near Market Square as I wanted to show off the new trams, but they weren’t impressed - “We have those too”.  So I took them on a short walking tour which took in the Council House, Theatre Royal and Concert Hall.  Looking at my City of birth for the first time as it might be seen by a tourist, I began to notice things which normally wouldn’t bother me -  I was so anxious that they go away with a good impression. We then made our way to the Castle, which was just closing.  We hovered aimlessly outside, and I began to feel that things weren’t going well.  The guide securing the gates kindly let us step inside to take a group photo with the Castle as the backdrop.  As we came back outside, I noticed a shabbily dressed man sound asleep on a nearby bench, probably the worse for booze.  “Oh, I hope none of them notice him!” I thought.  Too late!  Two of them had and were having a chuckle about it.

         Now it only remained for me to escort them to the ‘pub in a cave’, Ye Olde Trip to Jerusalem which is set into the rock which the Castle is built on, and claims to be the oldest inn in England. On the way down Castle Road, it didn’t occur to me to point out the statue of dear old Robin, but they spotted him, and there was a sudden burst of excitement in what had up until then been a rather subdued group.  They all knew exactly who this character was and identified with him immediately.  Another group photo in front of the statue was called for, but it didn’t stop there.  Each member of the group wanted an individual photo alongside Robin, some mimicking the famous archer stance. 

         The following morning, the Czech visitors were still talking animatedly about their trip into Nottingham, and I got a ‘Thank You’ from my boss and one of the directors for being prepared to ‘go the extra mile’ to make them feel welcome, but it was as much down to Robin as to me.

         Rock on Robin!