Robin Hood of Wakefield, West Yorkshire

The Reverend Joseph Hunter in his book The Great Hero of Minstrelsy of England, Robin Hood, published in 1852, was the first to suggest Robin Hood’s Yorkshire origin.

In the ballad, the Lytell Geste of Robyn Hode, he read of an area called the Sayles which still exists today in the village of Wentbridge, just outside Wakefield. The Great North Road, known in the Geste as Watling Street, passed through this wooded valley which is today spanned by the AI flyover. Furthermore, Hunter pointed out, a Robert Hood and his wife Matilda were mentioned in the medieval Wakefield court rolls, and just outside the town the great forest of Barnsdale stretched down as far as the royal hunting park of Sherwood.

The Wakefield historians Jean Forrester and Harold Speake also did important research into the Wakefield Robin Hood connections but sadly it seems that they, along with Hunter and JW Walker, have been forgotten.