Robin Hood History of Robin Hood ballads

The Saylis

The Gest makes a specific reference to the Saylis at Wentbridge. Credit is due to the nineteenth-century antiquarian Joseph Hunter, who correctly identified the site of the Saylis. From this location it was once possible to look out over the Went Valley and observe the traffic that passed along the Great North Road. The Saylis is recorded as having contributed towards the aid that was granted to Edward III in 1346–47 for the knighting of the Black Prince. An acre of landholding is listed within a glebe terrier of 1688 relating to Kirk Smeaton, which later came to be called "Sailes Close". Professor Dobson and Mr. Taylor indicate that such evidence of continuity makes it virtually certain that the Saylis that was so well known to Robin Hood is preserved today as "Sayles Plantation".^[136] It is this location that provides a vital clue to Robin Hood's Yorkshire heritage. One final locality in the forest of Barnsdale that is associated with Robin Hood is the village of Campsall.

Church of Saint Mary Magdalene at Campsall

The historian John Paul Davis wrote of Robin's connection to the Church of Saint Mary Magdalene at Campsall in South Yorkshire.^[137] A Gest of Robyn Hode states that the outlaw built a chapel in Barnsdale that he dedicated to Mary Magdalene:
I made a chapel in Bernysdale,
That seemly is to se,
It is of Mary Magdaleyne,
And thereto wolde I be.
Davis indicates that there is only one church dedicated to Mary Magdalene within what one might reasonably consider to have been the medieval forest of Barnsdale, and that is the church at Campsall. The church was built in the late eleventh century by Robert de Lacy, the 2nd Baron of Pontefract. Local legend suggests that Robin Hood and Maid Marion were married at the church.

Abbey of Saint Mary at York

The backdrop of St Mary's Abbey, York plays a central role in the Gest as the poor knight whom Robin aids owes money to the abbot.