Robin Hood's Death

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Robin Hood's Death, also known as Robin Hoode his Death, is an Early Modern English ballad of Robin Hood. It dates from at the latest the 17th century, and possibly originating earlier, making it one of the oldest existing tales of Robin Hood. It is a longer version of the last six stanzas of A Gest of Robyn Hode, suggesting that one of the authors was familiar with the other work and made an expansion (if Gest came first) or summary (if Death came first) of the other, or else both were drawing from a lost common tale. The surviving version in the Percy Folio is fragmentary, with sections missing. A more complete but later version is from the middle of the 18th century, and is written in modern English. Both versions were later published by Francis James Child as Child ballad #120 in his influential collection of popular ballads. In Robin Hood's Death, Robin travels to Kirklees Priory, but is betrayed by his cousin, the prioress. She improperly takes too much blood while bloodletting...

Read on Wikipedia · Image N. C. Wyeth, Public domain