Robin Hood version of Robin Hood's life. In reaching his conclusion Ritson relied or gave weight to a number of unreliable sources, such as the Robin Hood plays of Anthony Munday, and the Sloane Manuscript. Nevertheless, Dobson and Taylor credit Ritson with having 'an incalculable effect in promoting the still continuing quest for the man behind the myth', and note that his work remains an 'indispensable handbook to the outlaw legend even now'. Ritson's friend Walter Scott used Ritson's anthology collection as a source for his picture of Robin Hood in Ivanhoe, written in 1818, which did much to shape the modern
Robin Hood in popular culture (1712), Alexander Smith's "A Complete History of the Lives and Robberies of the Most Notorious Highwaymen, Footpads, Shoplifts and Cheats" (1719), Charles Johnson's "Lives and Exploits of the Most Noted Highwaymen" (1734). In addition, there were numerous books printed throughout the late seventeenth and eigheenth centuries that went by the name of "Robin Hood's Garland". These were cheaply printed collections of later Robin Hood ballads. The first Robin Hood novel written, although not published, is Robert Southey's 'Harold, or, The Castle of Morford' (1791). This exists in manuscript form in the Bodleian Library. The first published Robin Hood novel was