Illustration by Louis Rhead from the Blue Ribbon Books 1912 edition of Bold Robin Hood and His Outlaw Band: Their Famous Exploits in Sherwood Forest.
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Marian begins as a character from English May Games in the 1200s, and then later in the Robin Hood legend. She has had various personalities over the centuries: pagan, spy, aristocratic Norman, outlaw, Saxon. Through the different ballads she emerges as a skilled archer, fierce fighter, and knows her way around the wilderness with the best of the Merry Men. Working from a cloister in Nottingham she is a spy for Robin, passing him information. In the ballad Robin Hood and Maid Marian, Marian and Robin, both in disguise (she as a male), meet and fight to a standstill. Marian is asked to join the Merry Men, and then she and Robin are married. Marian is an early example of the Warrior-Woman archetype later developed into characters such as Wonder Woman, and Emma Peel of The Avengers. However, near the end of the 19th century and beginning of the 20th century, Marian's accomplishments diminished; a warrior in early Victorian novels, Marian later became a passive personality during the years of the women's suffrage movement. This removed her from her original Almost-Super-Human status.
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