The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood first published by Scribner's in 1883, and met with immediate success, ushering in a new era of Robin Hood stories. It helped solidify the image of a heroic Robin Hood, which had begun in earlier works such as Walter Scott's 1819 novel "Ivanhoe". In Pyle's wake, Robin Hood has become a staunch philanthropist protecting innocents against increasingly aggressive villains. Along with the publication of the Child Ballads by Francis James Child, which included most of the surviving Robin Hood ballads, Pyle's novel helped increase the popularity of the Robin Hood legend in the United States. "The Merry Adventures" also had
Robin Hood therefore unsurprising that medieval records mention a number of people called 'Robert Hood' or 'Robin Hood', some of whom are known to have fallen foul of the law. Another view on the origin on the name is expressed in the 1911 "Encyclopædia Britannica" which remarks that 'hood' was a common dialectical form of 'wood'; and that the outlaw's name has been given as 'Robin Wood'. There are a number of references to Robin Hood as Robin Wood, or Whood, or Whod, from the 16th and 17th centuries. The earliest recorded example, in connection with May games in Somerset, dates from