Freethought & Rationalism Archive

Clivedurdle · 04-14-2010, 09:47 AM

http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/2010/...-russell-crowe

This article starts by discussing the various films of Robin and then continues about his history.

Quote:

"The great thing about the Robin Hood legend is that, because it's so iconic, it has outgrown and overtaken all the issues which are unproven. People just like the principle of the story; what it stands for. It's like they say in the films of the 1940s: 'If the truth gets in the way, print the legend.'"

This is not what I want to hear. I am looking for the prototype of Robin Hood, the origin of the stories that have spun out of control over the centuries. Over coffee in the castle's cafe, I ask White: what is the reality of Robin? "The tale as it's come down to us is a mixture of different stories," he says. "The most common thought is that it started with the troubadours, probably as part of the May Day 'green man' idea [a spirit of the forest, clad in leaves, celebrating the coming of spring] – Rob of the Hood, or Robin the Hood, who was a significant character in medieval plays. They were taken around the country, the troubadours would add stories when they came back the following year, and so the story grew."

Might Mark be an early Walter Scott or Ridley Scott retelling of local folk tales of the saviour messiah?

Steven Carr · 04-14-2010, 01:29 PM

Mark might be just that.

How do you intend to test such a hypothesis?

Clivedurdle · 04-14-2010, 02:14 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Steven Carr

Mark might be just that.

How do you intend to test such a hypothesis?

I thought that was what threads here enabled!

But isn't it quite simple?

What are the choices gmark might be?

To do this what is similar?

What is it more like? What are the probabilities of the different options?

andrewcriddle · 04-14-2010, 03:33 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Clivedurdle

http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/2010/...-russell-crowe

This article starts by discussing the various films of Robin and then continues about his history.

Quote:

"The great thing about the Robin Hood legend is that, because it's so iconic, it has outgrown and overtaken all the issues which are unproven. People just like the principle of the story; what it stands for. It's like they say in the films of the 1940s: 'If the truth gets in the way, print the legend.'"

This is not what I want to hear. I am looking for the prototype of Robin Hood, the origin of the stories that have spun out of control over the centuries. Over coffee in the castle's cafe, I ask White: what is the reality of Robin? "The tale as it's come down to us is a mixture of different stories," he says. "The most common thought is that it started with the troubadours, probably as part of the May Day 'green man' idea [a spirit of the forest, clad in leaves, celebrating the coming of spring] – Rob of the Hood, or Robin the Hood, who was a significant character in medieval plays. They were taken around the country, the troubadours would add stories when they came back the following year, and so the story grew."

The whole idea of the May Day 'green man' is disputed by modern folklorists.

It mixes up the enigmatic 'Green Man' carvings from late medieval churches with the post-1600 'Jack in the Green' May Day celebrations.

Andrew Criddle

Clivedurdle · 04-16-2010, 02:21 AM

Quote:

Robin Hood and the woodland orgies

The Guardian, Friday 16 April 2010

Of course there was no Robin Hood (In search of the real Robin Hood, G2, 14 April). The name is a corruption of Robin of the Wood or Robin in the Hood and refers to Robin Goodfellow/Puck, the spirit of the woods, a pagan nature god who lived on well beyond the Christianisation of this island (Robin is often quoted in witchcraft trials as the name the witches chose for their familiars).

He was no “tricksy spirit” but a powerful green god – perhaps seen in one aspect in the images of the Green Man that adorn so many of our great medieval churches and cathedrals. Mayday (a movable feast dependent upon the first blossoming of the hawthorn) was the signal for all and sundry to hie them away to the woods for a mass orgy.

Harsh winters and poor diet meant low fertility, so the best way to ensure a good stock of babies was for women to have as many sexual partners as possible. Any children born of the woodland orgies that went under the name of the Robin Hood games became known as Robson, Robinson or Hudson (Robert Graves – The White Goddess). Men in tights might work very well for the film-makers and the tourist boards – green gods that encouraged fecund fornication probably wouldn’t figure highly in the naming of airports.

And Maid Marian? Mary the Virgin Mother, the maid, consort of the Green Man perhaps. Morris dancers? Well that phallic symbol the maypole was brought out of the woods accompanied by a gang of dancers – morris men. (Mary’s men?) Until Cromwell came along and did away with maypoles and bonking in the bower, England was a much more ribald and perhaps even merry place.

Perhaps the Tories who want a Big Society and a return to merry England could revive the maypole and spontaneous and widespread woodland nookie – bit late to put it in the manifesto though.

Mike Harding

Author of A Little Book of the Green Man

http://www.guardian.co.uk/travel/201...oodland-orgies

Clivedurdle · 04-16-2010, 02:35 AM

Quote:

The Face In The Leaves

His face stares down at us from the roofs , pillars and doorways of our great cathedrals and churches, he appears on second century Roman columns in Turkey and in Jain temples in Rajasthan.

He is found all over England, some parts of Wales and Scotland and a few rare places in Ireland.

On the continent he has been seen and noted in Germany, France, Italy, Holland and is said to be found in Spain, Hungary and Poland. India and Malaysia have their own Green Man and though he doesn’t seem to appear in Native American traditions he can be seen in his modern role as a bringer of fortune on the walls of banks in New York and Chicago.

His roots may go back to the shadow hunters who painted the caves of Lascaux and Altimira and may climb through history, in one of his manifestations through Robin Hood and the Morris Dances of Old England to be chiselled in wood and stone even to this day by men and women who no longer know his story but sense that something old and strong and tremendously important lies behind his leafy mask.

One of the earliest English epic poems Gawain and The Green Knight may refer to yet another manifestation of the Green Man as the God that dies and is reborn.

He is the Green Man, Jack in the Green, the Old Man of the Woods, Green George and many other things to many other men but one common theme runs through all the disparate images and myths, death and rebirth and the Green that is all life.

http://www.mikeharding.co.uk/greenma...-in-the-leaves

And what would be interesting is a proper discussion of why the myth of the Green Man was replaced by the myth of the Christ.

What is it about the Green Man that is so terrifying to the Christ followers? Is it all about sex and control?

Christ dies on a tree......

Clivedurdle · 04-16-2010, 02:40 AM

Is it about the change in world view from a nature, season, flowing ideas to geometric, reading and writing?

From the forests and flows of life and death to the Logos on a cross?

The development of settled urban hierarchical structured ways of being?

Xianity as a religion of Empires that somehow lost the ability to learn and observe and think?

storytime · 04-16-2010, 04:07 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Clivedurdle

http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/2010/...-russell-crowe

This article starts by discussing the various films of Robin and then continues about his history.

Quote:

"The great thing about the Robin Hood legend is that, because it's so iconic, it has outgrown and overtaken all the issues which are unproven. People just like the principle of the story; what it stands for. It's like they say in the films of the 1940s: 'If the truth gets in the way, print the legend.'"

This is not what I want to hear. I am looking for the prototype of Robin Hood, the origin of the stories that have spun out of control over the centuries. Over coffee in the castle's cafe, I ask White: what is the reality of Robin? "The tale as it's come down to us is a mixture of different stories," he says. "The most common thought is that it started with the troubadours, probably as part of the May Day 'green man' idea [a spirit of the forest, clad in leaves, celebrating the coming of spring] – Rob of the Hood, or Robin the Hood, who was a significant character in medieval plays. They were taken around the country, the troubadours would add stories when they came back the following year, and so the story grew."

Might Mark be an early Walter Scott or Ridley Scott retelling of local folk tales of the saviour messiah?

Folk tales aren't handed down to us as the original first telling of the tale. It takes building on additional imagination with quirks and turns. The bible story is just such a compilation in its tale of a saviour messiah, the hero of all hero's, the dying and rising god-man.

"Men in tights work very well for the film-making and the tourist boards."

Yeah, I remember sitting in front of the TV watching almost every episode of Robin and his merry men as they robbed from the rich to give to the poor. And Robin was always smarter than the sheriff of Notenham and managed to avoid execution whereas Jesus allowed himself to become a martyr.

Although Robin's stealing was condemned, the act of theft was excused in helping to feed the poor. And if I'm not mistaken that's an approved behavior in the OT.

"People just like the principle of the story, what it stands for."

We could even work this story into how people view government and the working class today. But who is playing that green guy in the hot pants?

mountainman · 04-16-2010, 05:25 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Clivedurdle

And what would be interesting is a proper discussion of why the myth of the Green Man was replaced by the myth of the Christ.

Authority, power and greed

Quote:

What is it about the Green Man that is so terrifying to the Christ followers?

Subject to no human authority he resides in an organic ecosystem in which Sol Invictus rules supreme and requires no external "churches".

Quote:

Is it all about sex and control?

Authority, control, donations, subscriptions, money, postal orders, gold, gifts, authority, silver, tithings, rental income, tax exemptions, power and authority, gold, bonds, investments, securities, property, gold and authority, lands, estates, states, gold, authority, control, etc, etc, etc

Quote:

Christ dies on a tree......

In one account Joseph grew the tree and made the cross.

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04-14-2010, 01:29 PM	#2
Steven Carr Veteran Member Join Date: Jul 2001 Location: England Posts: 5,629	Mark might be just that. How do you intend to test such a hypothesis?

04-16-2010, 02:40 AM	#7
Clivedurdle Contributor Join Date: Mar 2003 Location: London UK Posts: 16,024	Is it about the change in world view from a nature, season, flowing ideas to geometric, reading and writing? From the forests and flows of life and death to the Logos on a cross? The development of settled urban hierarchical structured ways of being? Xianity as a religion of Empires that somehow lost the ability to learn and observe and think?

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