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"Robin Shoots with Sir Guy" by Louis Rhead. Illustration to Bold Robin Hood and His Outlaw Band: Their Famous Exploits in Sherwood Forest

Sir Guy of Gisborne (also spelled Gisburne, Gysborne or Gisborn) is a fictional character in the Robin Hood legends. In The Ballad of Robin Hood and Guy of Gisborne (Child Ballad 118), he hunts Robin for the Sheriff of Nottingham, but Robin kills him and cuts off his head. He is described so:

There were they ware of a wight yemàn, [wight = sturdy]

His body lean’d to a tree.

A sword and a dagger he wore by his side,

Of manye a man the bane;

And he was clad in his capull-hyde [capull-hyde = horse-hide]

Topp and tayll and mayne

[...]

‘I dwell by dale and downe,’ quoth hee,

‘And Robin to take I’me sworne;

And when I am callèd by my right name

I am Guy of good Gisborne.’^[1]

There is some evidence that he originally had an independent legendary tradition which became absorbed in the Robin Hood tradition.

Although he has made many appearances in variants of the Robin Hood legends, his only constant is appearing as a villain. In Howard Pyle's Merry Adventures of Robin Hood, he is a rude, coarse outlaw, known for his cruelty and murders; in Errol Flynn's The Adventures of Robin Hood, he is a suave nobleman, Prince John's chief supporter, and a much more prominent adversary than the Sheriff of Nottingham, who is a bumbling fool, and indeed, Prince John proposes him to Maid Marian, a royal ward in this variant, as a husband; he often appears as a rival to Robin for Maid Marian's affections.^[2]

The role of Guy of Gisbourne has been played by such actors as Basil Rathbone (The Adventures of Robin Hood, 1938), Tom Baker (The Zany Adventures of Robin Hood, 1984), Robert Addie (in the British television series Robin of Sherwood, 1984-6) and Michael Wincott (in the movie Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves). He does not appear in the 1973 cartoon version of Robin Hood, although the snake Sir Hiss is similar. In the 1991 TV movie, Jurgen Prochnow plays "Sir Miles Folcanet," a character with much in common with modern versions of Guy of Gisbourne.

In the 1990s CBBC comedy series Maid Marian and her Merry Men, Guy of Gisbourne, played by Ramsay Gilderdale, is the nephew of Prince John, and is portrayed as an overgrown mother's boy. He is foolish to the point of deluded, believing himself to have a friend from outer Space named "Plop Bop", occasionally dressing up as a sugar-plum fairy, or more usually as a jester, and is generally held in contempt by the heroes and villains alike.

In the BBC's 2006 Robin Hood, Guy is played by Richard Armitage, and is the Sheriff of Nottingham's second-in-command. While Robin was away fighting in the crusades, Guy managed his estate, and eventually takes it when Robin is outlawed. A dark character with skewed morals, he is shown as an active enforcer of the Sheriff's cruelty, but at the same time, he is in love with Marian, showing conflicted attempts to redeem himself in her eyes. He pursues her throughout the series, eventually proposing to her. He and Robin are directly pitted against one another when Robin discovers that Guy tried to assassinate King Richard in the Holy Land, and is the one who gave him an almost fatal stab wound in the chest.

• Text of The Ballad of Robin Hood and Guy of Gisbourne
• Robin Hood and Guy of Gisborne
• Robin Hood and Guy of Gisborne with commentary