Was Gwen the name of robin hood's daughter?

Answer 1

In simplest terms, most historians would likely say, "No." However, history is never that simple. Let's begin at the beginning: Much that was written about Robin Hood came long after he died and therefore has fueled much debate over whether there was even a real Robin Hood at all. That aside, there appears to be little written by those first poets and Robin Hood balad writers mentioning anything about Robin fathering children or even having a love interest. In fact, Matilda -- known as Maid Marion -- doesn't come onto the scene until around the 16th century -- more than 300 years after the life and death of the "real" Hood. When Hood's children do come onto the scene, they appear to do so in Francis Child's work The English and Scottish Popular Balladswritten in the late 19th century. In Ballad 103 "Rose the Red and White Lily", a woman named Rogee Roun (Red Rose) says she is nine-months with child after being with Robin Hood. Go to http://www.contemplator.com/child/cmpltchl.html to see a complete list of Child's ballads, many of which contain links to the lyrics. The website, Bold Outlook.com, verifies this account, mentioning at http://www.boldoutlaw.com/robspot/0305.html#history that Child didn't even feel this account was a true account of Robin Hood but instead was a name-dropping exercise of an earlier account about two women with an evil step-mother who go in search of a fellow named Brown Robin. Even later Robin Hood tales talk of his children; one by 20th century American author Parke Godwin who in the 1990s introduces us to Robin's two children birthed by his love interest Maid Marion -- a boy named Edward and a girl named Moira. Gwyn seems to be a Disney invention. One history buff who calls Robin Hood "my favorite folk hero" has done a nice job of highlighting the actual history -- if it does indeed exist -- of Robin Hood at The Fyrefly Jar: http://www.fyreflyjar.net/rhtale.html In that piece, the author states that what can be considered the actual history of Robin Hood -- as much as can be researched and believed to be factual -- doesn't line up with much of what we see in today's novels and movies. So in a word, "No." Gwyn apparently was not the daughter of Robin Hood.