Out of the Greenwood

From day one I’ve resisted the temptation to include advertising on my blog. However, today I’m going to make an exception because I have just had my first Kindle book published. It’s called “Robin Hood – Out of the Greenwood: His Gay Origins Revealed”.

I began researching this book long before I began this blog. At the time I was working as a tour guide at Nottingham Castle, and we were discouraged from mentioning Robin Hood. The city council who paid my wages insisted that someone who broke the law was not a good role model, and that he didn’t exist anyway. Even today the same council do next to nothing to promote Robin Hood. Even so, tourists were always wanting to know about Robin Hood and it was necessary to answer their questions.

Robin Hood has been mentioned on this blog a few times. A lot of these mentions have been in relation to the theory I expand in my new book. Basically, I believe that Sir John Clanvowe, a poet and courtier, was the person most likely to have compiled the ballad which was later printed as “A Geste of Robyn Hode”. It is in this ballad that we get all of the most familiar stories about this world famous outlaw which have been retold in thousands of books, films and television programmes ever since (along with a few later additions, like Maid Marian, Friar Tuck and Prince John, none of whom featured in the medieval ballads).

The theory is based on research I conducted into Sir John Clanvowe and the man acknowledged during his lifetime as the man he “married”. This partner was Sir William Neville, the Constable of Nottingham Castle from 1381. A lot of the characters and plot details in “A Geste of Robyn Hode” seem to be based on people, places and events in Sir William Neville’s family background. You can type “Clanvowe” into the search box at the side to find out more about this couple.

It was only after I left Nottingham Castle (not from choice) that I was able to do more extensive research, and eventually I put it all together in a display for Nottingham’s first celebration for LGBT History Month in 2008. From there I began writing the book, which has undergone several revisions since then.

My theory is too complex to be restricted to a few blog posts, so a fuller explanation in book form was the only way to go.

As my book is now published on Kindle Amazon (on Amazon.co.uk here) I’m not expecting a huge response. All I expect is that people get a new perspective on a familiar legend and, perhaps, realise that the medieval world wasn’t how they might think.

It is my hope that this will be the first in a series of books based on some of my blog articles and on other, non-lgbt, history research.

That’s enough advertising for now. If you’re interested, take a look and buy a copy.

Homohoax : The City of Lesbians

It’s April Fool’s Day again, and here’s another hoax in the lgbt community.

This particular homohoax originated ten years ago. A report published by the Xinhau news agency told of a city in Sweden called Shakebao (translated into English as Chako Paul) which was inhabited solely by lesbians.

It’s not really clear whether the report was a deliberate hoax. It may have been just a misinterpretation of an actual location, or an elaboration of an urban legend. Given the origin of this “hoax” is in China we may never know for sure, the Chinese media are not known for being open about their sources. As far as people in Sweden were concerned the presence of a lesbian city was news to them.

Let’s see if we can get to the root of the story. First of all, the report was published in August 2009 by Xinhau, the official state news agency. This is a translation of part of their report:

“In Sweden there is a place that is respectful of women’s love, ... This is Shakebao. The town holds around 25,000 women, all from around Europe. If men transgress into the forbidden city they will be beaten half to death. The citizens of Shakebao are mostly engaged in the forest industry, … Some go into nearby cities to work and return to Shakebao by night. Shakebao’s tourism industry is increasingly prosperous, with hotels and restaurants everywhere that cater specifically to women around the world.”

It wasn’t long before the story was picked up other Chinese news agencies. The story’s impact produced a flood of internet searches, reported later to have all been by men though I expect some Chinese women were just as interested, causing an effect that was described as “crippling the nation’s data network”. Swedish tourist organisations were also inundated with requests from China for more information.

If anybody knew of Shakebao’s existence it would be the Swedes, right? Not so. Claes Bertilsson, a spokesman for the Swedish Association of Local Authorities and Regions, had never heard of it, nor of any other settlement populated by 25,000 women. For Sweden that’s a major-sized city – someone would have noticed it. Even the tourist office for the area in which the city was supposed to be located couldn’t find it.

The plot thickened after another report appeared, this time from the Harbin news agency, of a Chinese woman who had actually been there. The woman, identified as Niu Xiaoyu from Shangdong, was a student at a Swedish university (the report doesn’t say which one). At university she fell in love with a male college teaching assistant. When Xiaoyu came back to their shared apartment with another male Chinese student the boyfriend went into a jealous rage. Xiaoyu broke off their relationship and determined to end all contact with men.

Stories of Shakebao must have been going around the university because Xiaoyu decided to move there. At first she tried to fit in and follow the common activities. She found lumberjacking (lumberjilling?) too hard and strenuous, and nothing else seemed to suit her temperament. To make matters worse in her eyes was that the city stores didn’t stock many cosmetics.

After a few weeks Xiaoyu’s Swedish ex-boyfriend arrives, disguised as a woman tourist, to apologise and he tried to persuade her to come back with him. But Xiaoyu was adamant and stayed. The boyfriend then returned back to university.

It should have become apparent to Xiaoyu that she was obviously in the wrong place. It was only after another woman tried to seduce her that she realised she had made the wrong decision in coming here and she made a hasty return back to her ex-boyfriend.

Now, given that this lesbian city was an invention of imaginative Chinese journalists it seems obvious that the story of Nui Xioayu was false as well. When I first read this story I was immediately struck by its similarity to many old folk tales. As well as being a fan of legends and mythology I’m acquainted with the Perry and Aarne-Thompson indexes of folk motifs. These are lists of hundreds of story and plot elements from all the folk-tales and legends from around the world grouped together by related themes.

The story of Nui Xiaoyu can easily be placed into the same folk motif group as “The Country mouse and the City Mouse”. In essence this group inclludes the story of an individual who goes to a place where he/she hopes to find a better life or to escape some bad situation. However, disappointment and/or abuse leads the individual to yearn for home and he/she leaves to do so, realising that things weren’t really as bad as they had thought. There are several old Chinese folk-tales which are virtually identical to the story of Nui Xiaoyu, leading me to believe that her story was as fake as the city of Shakeboa itself.

Above is a screenshot of the top part of the Xinhau report. It includes a photo of an impressive castle. This is implied as being the entrance to the city, but in fact it is a building in Scotland called Taymouth Castle. Further down the article was a photo of a scantily clad young woman in a seductive pose. Obviously, both images were grabbed off the internet and included to add some credence to the story.

As I said at the beginning the story of a lesbian city may not have been a deliberate hoax, but seems more like sloppy journalism. Whether the Chinese state-run media want to admit to reporting what is no more than a modern spin on an old urban legend or folk motif or not, the fact that the did has only elevated its status and profile.

More Lgbt Olympians Than Ever

For up-to-date information on the opening day of Tokyo 2020 go here.

There’s only just over a year until the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games kicks of with the lighting of the Olympic flame at Olympia on 15th March 2020. Here are my updated lgbt Olympian lists. I had hoped to come up with a new format but haven’t had time to come up with one. Hopefully I will by next year.

The number of lgbt Olympians still grows. On average I add 2 new names every month.

Below are the new lists. I have split the Summer and Winter games into separate lists. The Winter list also includes the known lgbt athletes who competed in Olympic trials and qualifying tournaments, plus a handful of coaches, judges and officials.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/10e6OsTkESee3vmHASoHtrCeaeLJUW2-r/view?usp=sharing

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1yqp69ce-Pzt7vxB8Nx5UcCtSVwJkNr-i/view?usp=sharing

One of the exciting prospects for Tokyo 2020 is that there could be the high probability that there will be 100 out lgbt Olympians at the same games for the first time. It is also likely, given past experience, at least 2 athletes will come out during those games.

While it is still a concern to many that there are two few openly lgbt Olympians it may be encouraging to know that there is a large number who compete in trials and qualifying tournaments who don’t perform quite good enough to be selected for their national team. To illustrate this I’ve produced the table below in which I show the total number of known lgbt athletes who aspire to Olympic selection against those who succeed.

Records of which events are official qualifying events are difficult to determine prior to 1948 so the table only includes statistics from the 1956 Melbourne Summer Olympics onwards where events are specifically designated as an Olympic qualification event. I’ve not included the 1980 Moscow Olympics because of the boycott by many athletes making it even more difficult to determine who would have been there.

Bear in mind that the number in the Trials column are those who competed in trials and qualifying events but were not selected for the Olympics. For the complete total of lgbt athletes just add the Trials and Olympics figures together. For example, 6 lgbt athletes competed in the trials, etc., for the 1956 Melbourne games but only 3 were selected and competed at the games while 3 weren't.

Season	Games	Trials	Olympics	Total
Summer	1956 Melbourne	3	3	6
Winter	1964 Innsbruck	4	1	5
winter	1968 Grenoble	5	2	7
summer	1968 Mexico City	1	6	7
winter	1972 Sapporo	1	3	4
summer	1972 Munich	2	6	8
winter	1976 Innsbruck	0	4	4
summer	1976 Montréal	2	10	12
winter	1980 Lake Placid	2	3	5
winter	1984 Sarajevo	8	6	14
summer	1984 Los Angeles	4	13	17
winter	1988 Calgary	6	9	15
summer	1988 Seoul	1	22	23
winter	1992 Albertville	5	5	10
summer	1992 Barcelona	3	21	24
winter	1994 Lillehammer	7	5	12
summer	1996 Atlanta	8	27	35
winter	1998 Nagano	17	9	26
summer	2000 Sydney	7	64	71
winter	2002 Salt Lake City	15	14	29
summer	2004 Athens	9	46	55
winter	2006 Turin	20	21	41
summer	2008 Beijing	24	64	88
winter	2010 Vancouver	14	26	40
summer	2012 London	35	74	109
winter	2014 Sochi	15	26	41
summer	2016 Rio de Janeiro	39	84	123
winter	2018 PyeongChang	10	18	28

Looking at the figures there are some interesting conclusions to make. First of all, we can see that the number of lgbt athletes has already exceeded 100 if we take into account those who competed in trials, with London 2012 taking us to 109. Secondly we have to rake into account that the number of athletes of all sexualities vastly outnumbers the one who made it onto their national Olympic team. In sports such as swimming or track and field there could be hundreds of competitors in the national trials, particularly in the USA, and only 3 spaces available for the same Olympic event.

This in itself gives us a more optimistic overview of lgbt athletes. Look at the figures for the 1976 Innsbruck Winter Games. There were only 4 known lgbt athletes at the games, all of whom competed in the trials. That’s a 100% success rate, however small the number.

In terms of success it is gratifying to know that in most cases the number of lgbt athletes who competed at an Olympic games outnumbers the lgbt athletes who didn’t. But don’t forget, the same is true with non-lgbt athletes.

If we need to decide which Olympics can be considered as the best with regard to lgbt conclusion (in terms of numbers rather than percentage) then it has to be Sydney 2000. Of the 71 known athletes who competed in the trials and qualifiers only 7 didn’t make it to Sydney. That’s a lower number but a higher percentage than either London 2012 or Rio 2016 where over 100 competed in trials.

If you study the figures more closely I’m sure you’ll find something that reveals positive trends that are hidden underneath the official Olympic numbers.

I hope you find these tables and charts of interest, and bear in mind that ongoing research could easily make them out of date within a month!

That’s it for LGBT History Month UK. I’ll be back in April with another month of lgbt heritage, which will include an article to celebrate the 10th anniversary of the Mr. Gay World contest, the 600th anniversary of the death of Leonardo da Vince, and a look at one of the darkest and most far-reaching legacies that a member of the lgbt community has ever produced.