It is possible that some of the stories about Hereward mutated into tales about Robin Hood or influenced them. Hereward nevertheless remained a minor figure until the Victorian period, when the idea of native Anglo-Saxon heroism became popular. Charles Kingsley’s 1865 novel "Hereward the Wake: the Last of the English" elevated Hereward to the position of a national hero. It drew on the theory that traditional English liberties were destroyed by the "Norman yoke", an idea earlier popularised in Walter Scott's novel "Ivanhoe". Both novels helped create the image of a romantic Anglo-Saxon England violated by Norman tyranny. After its publication Hereward appears in numerous popular historical works.