Fulk FitzWarin

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Fulk FitzWarin (also called Fulke or Fouke FitzWaryn or FitzWarren) was a medieval landed gentleman turned outlaw, from Whittington Castle in Shropshire. The traditional story of his life survives in an "ancestral romance", extant in English, French and Latin versions, which is based on a lost verse romance.

According to the tale, Fulk FitzWarin was, as a young boy, sent to the court of King Henry II, where he grew up with the future King John. The latter becomes his enemy after a childhood quarrel. When he grows up, Fulk is stripped of his family's holdings, and takes to the woods as an outlaw. The story probably confuses the lives of two Fulk FitzWarins, father and son, who lived in the late 12th and early 13th centuries.

The tale of Fulk FitzWarin has been noted for its parallels to the Robin Hood legend. It is also similar to that of other medieval outlaws such as Eustace the Monk and Hereward the Wake.

A modern fictional re-telling of Fitzwarin's story can be found in Elizabeth Chadwick's Lords of the White Castle. The book Shadows and Strongholds tells of the loss of the familial holding of Whittington to the Welsh family of Powys and of the relationship between Brunin Fitzwarin (later, Fulke Le Brun, father of Fulke Fitzwarin) and Hawise de Dinan (later Hawise Fitzwarin, mother to Fulke Fitzwarin).