I was a bit pushed for time while painting this minifigure (I think Lego call him a forestman, but we all know who he is really, don't we?), and while I started painting him in daylight, I had to finish under artificial light. We've got halogen lamps in the dining room, where I was working; goodness knows how the colour balance in those compares to daylight. But regardless of what it does to the colours, the shadows and reflections all change, too, when you switch an overhead light on. Fortunately, I was at the point of adding detail to the map and the printed bits on the minifigure when the light had to be turned on, which wasn't too bad.
I've given Mr. Hood a proper longbow - filched from the elf - because the standard bows are, quite frankly, rather pathetic. A longbow, as I understand it, was typically as tall as its user.
It shouldn't be difficult to guess where he is on the map, although - according to my current reading material (J. C. Holt's classic investigation of the legend, "Robin Hood") - he's probably in the wrong place.
Acrylic on canvas, 7 x 7 cm.
Evidently you were all so certain that I'd put Robin Hood in Sherwood Forest (he's standing more or less on the site of the Major Oak in the Sherwood Forest Country Park) that you didn't trouble to say as much! But how many of you knew that the earliest evidence (from the surviving ballads) suggests that his true home was more likely to have been Barnsdale in South Yorkshire?
ReplyDeletedidn't know that, strange how things get moved over time. I do wonder about King Arthur sometimes, did he really hang out in Tintagel? It's a bit windy for a castle up there!
ReplyDeleteTintagel supposedly belonged to Gorlois, Duke of Cornwall - the cuckolded husband of Igraine (Arthur's mum). Do you recall the plot-line about Merlin disguising Uther (Arthur's dad) as Gorlois one wild and windy night?
ReplyDeleteI think Arthur has been tenuously located at Caerleon in South Wales, where there is an amphitheatre that has been excavated and reburied. And then there's the round table at Winchester...