Yeoman
Yeoman /ˈjoʊmən/ is a noun originally referring either to one who owns and cultivates land or to the middle ranks of servants in an English royal or noble household.
By the late 17th century, yeoman became a rank in the Royal Navy for the common seamen who were in charge of ship's stores, such as foodstuffs, gunpowder, and sails.
The Oxford English Dictionary (OED) has proposed that yeoman is derived from yongerman, which first appeared in a manuscript called Pseudo-Cnut's Constitutiones de Foresta.
But only a legal definition was given: (1) a social class immediately below a Gentleman; and (2) a freeborn man who can sell "his own free land in yearly revenue to the summe of 40 shillings Sterling".
In the First Fitte (the first section of the ballad),[15] Robin gives money to a poor knight to pay his debt to the abbot of St Mary's Abbey.
I sat me down, Devised a new commission, wrote it fair— I once did hold it, as our statists do, A baseness to write fair, and labored much How to forget that learning; but, sir, now It did me yeoman's service."
[31][32] Halidon Hill is where the 20-year old Edward III learned how to combine archers and dismounted men-at-arms – tactics that he would employ during his Crécy campaign in France.
By negating the tactical advantage of large numbers of cavalry (mounted knights and men-at-arms) with their ability to rapidly fire volleys of arrows, Yeoman Archers are considered part of the Infantry revolution of the 14th century.
This royal act recognized their bravery and loyalty in doing their duty, and designated them as the first members of a bodyguard to protect the King (or Queen) of England forever.
In their first official act on 1 October 1485, fifty members of the Yeoman of the Guard, led by John de Vere, 13th Earl of Oxford, formally escorted Henry Tudor to his coronation ceremony.
[37] This places the Merchant's Tale of Beryn about the same time as the Robin Hood and the Monk manuscript, and shortly before the end of the Hundred Years War.
To understand the connections between yeoman and the early English navy, it is necessary to examine King Edward III's reign and the beginning of the Hundred Years War.
[38]: 85 Early in the Hundred Years War, the largest existing merchant ships, such as the cog, were converted to warships with the addition of wooden castles.
Among the various chapters on the use of mathematics in sea navigation and gunnery, the author suggests "He [the Gunner] must be careful in making Choice of a sober honest Man, for the Yeoman of the Powder.
(Note 13: Richardson and Sayles 1930 p 44–45) According to Michael Prestwich: "What was necessary was to ensure that every conceivable means of removing the King was adopted, and the procedures combined all possible precedents".
[45][47] Sir Anthony Richard Wagner, Garter Principal King of Arms, wrote that "a Yeoman would not normally have less than 100 acres" (40 hectares) "and in social status is one step down from the Landed gentry, but above, say, a husbandman".
It wasn't until 1794, when the worsening US relations with Great Britain and France, as well as the continuing attacks by Barbary pirates, forced Congress to appropriate funds to construct 6 frigates.
The historical Robyn Hode was (or were, in the case of there possibly being several men whose exploits were melded into the single individual of the ballads) is of secondary importance to his cultural symbolism for succeeding generations.
William Langland, the author of Piers Plowman, has Sloth say that he does not know his Pater Noster (Latin for the Our Father prayer) as perfectly as the priest sings it, but he does know the rhymes of Robin Hood.
This entire scene is reminiscent of the contracted indenture offered by Edward III, where pardons were granted for war service (see Yeoman Archers).
These earliest ballads contain clues to the changes in the English social structure which elevated the yeoman to a more powerful and influential level (see A Chivalric Rank).
In the tale told by the Friar, the devil assumes the disguise of a yeoman dressed in a green tunic, a hat with black fringes, and carrying a bow and some arrows.
Albert E Hartung proposes that the Canon's Yeoman's Prologue is a device to include a previously written story into the Canterbury Tales as the Pars Secunda[74]: 111-128 .
Jackson J. Campbell proposes the interruption of the pilgrims' journey by the Canon and his yeoman so near to Canterbury is a device to prepare for the Parson's Tale, which is actually a sermon.
[73]: lines 722–736 Campbell describes the self-revulsion felt by the Yeoman for the futility of alchemy, and the deception and dishonesty employed while searching for the philosopher's stone.
Chaucer is preparing the reader (or listener) for the Parson's Tale, which a sermon about penitence, "which can not fail to man nor to woman who through sin has gone astray from the right way to Jerusalem celestial".
When they hear a veteran speak of what happened on St Crispin's Day, "gentlemen in England" will be ashamed of being asleep in bed at the time such deeds were done.
Simeone points out that Scott deliberately made Robin Hood a yeoman as well as an outcast in order to show that ordinary men, and not just the rich and powerful, have an important part to play in the making of a nation.
At the victory feast under the Tryst Tree, Locksley shares his high table with Cedric, the Saxon franklin, and the Norman Black Knight.
Locksley's insistence on the Black Knight taking the horn as protection against Prince John's evil henchman Fitzurse demonstrates that he bows to the lawful authority of the King.
