Robin Hood and the Monk

Robin Hood and the Monk is Child ballad 119, and among the oldest existing ballads of Robin Hood, existing in manuscript from about 1450 AD.[1]

It may have been originally recited rather than sung; it refers to itself as a "talking" in its last verse:

Thus endys the talkyng of the munke
And Robyn Hode i-wysse;
God, that is euer a crowned kyng,
Bryng vs all to his blisse

There are notable parallels between this ballad and that of Adam Bell, Clym of the Cloughe and Wyllyam of Cloudeslee, but whether either legend was the source for the other can not be established.[2]