Simon Mattacks
speaker
2,981 appearances
17 recordings
3 series
first heard Dec 2024
last heard 13 Sep
Simon Mattacks’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.
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recordings per month · last 12 monthsRecordings per month over the last 12 months — 14 in all, peaking in Aug 2026 with 3.
Appearances
And you may recall that the reigns of the five Edwards ranged from 1272 to 1483.
This is at odds with almost all the modern interpretations of Robin Hood.
which place him in the earlier time of King Richard the Lionheart and his brother, the detestable King John, from 1189 to 1216.
And that's why modern audiences expect the earlier time period to be the setting.
But the fact is, of the early sources that mention a king at all, none of them are Richard or John.
only Edward.
There are also those who suggest that Robin Hood was just an alias for one of the other daring outlaws of the day.
Historian Sam Taran unpacked the possibilities in an article he wrote about crime gangs in the East Midlands area of medieval England, where Robin Hood supposedly roamed.
Two of the real-life crime families operating there at the time were the Cotterells and the Folvilles.
In keeping with Robin Hood mythology, these two groups thrived in the fairly dense wilderness that included Sherwood Forest.
It was a great place to be an outlaw back then because it was easy to make mischief and quickly vanish.
As background, in the early 14th century, Edward II had been a weak king who allowed people to curry favor with him.
Eventually, he was deposed by his own wife, Isabella, and her lover, Roger Mortimer.
His infant son, Edward III, was placed on the throne.
So people were not feeling upbeat about their monarchy at the time, and there was a lot of room for resentment and corruption.
The Cottrell and Folville gangs stepped into this vacuum because they probably saw it as an opportunity.
It's important to note that, unlike the early Robin Hood, who was a commoner, these corrupt groups were filled with men of privilege and connections.
They were sons of landowners, for example, or even minor lords.
Taron points out that the Folvilles even had endowed villages in their names.
In the Folville family, the leader was named Eustace.
Showing 1621–1640 of 2,981 · page 82 of 150
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