Joseph Ritson

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Joseph Ritson (2 October 1752 – 23 September 1803) was an English antiquary.

James Ritson (Engraving by James Sayers, published in 1803)

He was born at Stockton-on-Tees, of a Westmorland yeoman family. He was educated for the law, mainly by Ralph Bradley the leading conveyancer.^[1] He then settled in London as a conveyancer at the age of twenty-two. He devoted his spare time to literature, and in 1782 published an attack on Thomas Warton's History of English Poetry. The tone of his Observations, in which Warton was treated as a pretender, charged with cheating and lying to cover his ignorance, caused a sensation in literary circles.

In nearly all the small points with which he dealt, Ritson was in the right, and his corrections have since been adopted, but the unjustly bitter language of his criticisms roused great anger at the time, much, it would appear, to Ritson's delight. In 1783 Samuel Johnson and George Steevens were attacked in the same bitter fashion as Warton for their text of Shakespeare. Bishop Percy was next subjected to a furious onslaught in the preface to a collection of Ancient Songs (printed 1787, dated 1790, published 1792). In a letter (14 March 1803) to Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Robert Southey wrote that “Ritson is the oddest, but most honest of all our antiquarians, and he abuses Percy and Pinkerton with less mercy than justice.”^[2]

Ritson spared no pains himself to ensure accuracy in the texts of old songs, ballads and metrical romances which he edited. His collection of the Robin Hood ballads is perhaps his greatest single achievement. However, he gave in to his own political prejudices as a Jacobin when he included the idea, uncommon until then, that Robin Hood robbed the rich and gave to the poor rather than simply robbing the Bishops and the Sheriff of Nottingham.^[3] Sir Walter Scott, who admired his industry and accuracy in spite of his temper, was almost the only man who could get on with him. According to Scott, Ritson was “a man of acute observation, profound research, and great labour.”^[4] On one occasion, when he called in Scott's absence, he spoke so rudely to his wife that he was threatened with being thrown out of the window.

Spelling was one of his eccentricities, his own name being an example: Ritson is short for Richardson. As early as 1796, Ritson showed signs of mental collapse, and on 10 September 1803 he became completely insane, barricaded himself in his chambers at Gray's Inn, made a bonfire of manuscripts, and was finally forcibly removed to Hoxton, where he died.

Bibliography

A catalogue of the Royal and Noble Authors of England, with lists of their works, by Horace Walpole and Joseph Ritson, 1758
Verses addressed to the Ladies of Stockton. First printed in the Newcastle Miscellany, MDCCLXXII, 1780
Observations on the three first volumes of the history of English poetry by T. W. in a letter to the author, by Thomas Warton and Joseph Ritson, 1782
A Select Collection of English Songs, 1783
The Spartan Manual, or Tablet of Morality, being a genuine collection of the apophthegms, maxims and precepts of the philosophers ... and other ... celebrated characters of antiquity, etc, 1785
A Digest of the proceedings of the Court Leet of the Manor and Liberty of the Savoy, 1789
Pieces of Ancient Popular Poetry: From Authentic Manuscripts and Old Printed Copies, 1791, (Kessinger Publishing, 2007) ISBN 0-548-60052-X
The Office of Constable: being an entirely new compendium of the law concerning that ancient minister for the conservation of the peace, etc, 1791
Cursory criticisms on the edition of Shakespeare published by Edmond Malone, 1792
The Northumberland Garland; or, Newcastle Nightingale: a matchless collection of famous songs. Edited by Joseph Ritson, 1793
Law-Tracts. L.P, 1794
Poems on interesting events in the reign of Edward III. written in the year MCCCLII. ... With a preface, dissertations, notes, and a glossary by J. Ritson, by Laurence Minot and Joseph Ritson (editor), 1795
Ancient Songs and Ballads from the Reign of King Henry the Second to the Revolution in Two Volumes, (BiblioBazaar, 2009) ISBN 1-103-18694-9
Bibliographia poetica: a catalogue of Engleish sic poets, of the twelfth, thirteenth, fourteenth, fifteenth, and sixteenth, centurys, with a short account of their works, by Joseph Ritson, Philip Bliss, James Boswell, and John Payne Collier, 1802
Ancient Engleish Metrical Romancees, 1802, (Kessinger Publishing, 2009) ISBN 1-104-02459-4
An Essay on Abstinence from Animal Food, as a Moral Duty, edited by Sir Richard Philips, London, 1802, (Kessinger Publishing, 2009) ISBN 1-4367-7108-0
A catalogue of the entire and curious library and manuscripts of the late Joseph Ritson, 1803
The jurisdiction of the Court leet: Exemplified in the articles which the jury or inquest for the King, in that court, is charged and sworn, and by law enjoined, to inquire of and present, W. Clarke and Sons; 2d ed, with great additions, edition 1809
Northern Garlands, R. Triphook, 1810
The Office Of Bailiff Of A Liberty, 1811
A Select Collection of English Songs, with Their Original Airs: and a Historical Essay on the Origin and Progress of National Song, London, 1813, (Adamant Media Corporation, 2005) ISBN 1-4212-6009-3
The Caledonian Muse: A Chronological Selection of Scottish Poetry from the Earliest Times, 1821, (Kessinger Publishing, 2007) ISBN 0-548-73946-3
Some account of the life and publications of the late Joseph Ritson, esq, by Joseph Haslewood, 1824
Life of King Arthur from Ancient Historians and Authentic Documents, London, 1825, (Kessinger Publishing, 2003) ISBN 0-7661-8100-6
Annals of the Caledonians, Picts, and Scots and of Strathclyde, Cumberland, Galloway and Murray, London, 1828, (BiblioBazaar, 2008) ISBN 0-554-48196-0
Memoirs of The Celts or Gauls, Joseph Ritson and Joseph Frank, 1829, (BiblioBazaar, 2009) ISBN 1-103-37230-0
Letters from Joseph Ritson to George Paton, 1829, (Kessinger Publishing, 2008) ISBN 1-4370-2591-9
Fairy Tales, Now First Collected: To which are prefixed two dissertations: 1. On Pygmies. 2. On Fairies, London, 1831, (Adamant Media Corporation, 2004) ISBN 1-4021-4753-8
Robin Hood: A Collection of All the Ancient Poems, Songs, and Ballads, Now Extant Relative to That Celebrated English Outlaw: To Which are Prefixed Historical Anecdotes of His Life, London, 1832, (Adamant Media Corporation, 2004) ISBN 1-4212-6209-6
The Letters of Joseph Ritson edited chiefly from originals in the possession of his nephew J. Frank. To which is prefixed a memoir of the author, by Joseph Ritson, Joseph Frank, and Nicholas Harris Nicolas, 1833, (Kessinger Publishing, 2007) ISBN 0-548-72425-3
Gammer Gurton's Garland or the Nursery Parnassus: A Choice Collection of Pretty Songs and Verses, 1866, (Kessinger Publishing, 2007) ISBN 0-548-69412-5
Scotish Songs (sic), 1869, (Kessinger Publishing, 2008) ISBN 1-4371-0663-3
Fairy Tales, Legends & Romances Illustrating Shakespeare & Other Early English Writers, 1875, (Kessinger Publishing, 2003) ISBN 0-7661-4981-1
The Boy Knight ; or, Kindness Rewarded, James B. Knapp, 1877
Ancient Popular Poetry V1: From Authentic Manuscripts and Old Printed Copies, by Joseph Ritson and Edmund Goldsmid, 1884, (Kessinger Publishing, 2009) ISBN 1-104-01763-6
Ancient English metrical romances, E. & G. Goldsmid, 1884
Northern Garlands: A Collection of Songs, 1887
A dissertation on romance and minstrelsy: To which is appended the ancient metrical romance of Ywaine and Gawin, 1891, (Kessinger Publishing, 2007) ISBN 0-548-78222-9
John Carville, Artist and Ironmaster. A story of the ideal, 1902
The Romance Of Primitive Methodism, Edwin Dalton, London, 1905
The Romance of Nonconformity, W. A. Hammond, 1910
Life: the most wonderful thing in the world. Sermons and addresses of a presidential year, 1914
Joseph Ritson: A Critical Biography, by Henry A. Burd, Illinois, 1916, (BiblioBazaar, 2008) ISBN 0-554-58449-2
Nature Pioneers of the Insect World. Suggestions for addresses to children and young people, 1925
The romance of modern missions,W.A. Hammond, 1925
Joseph Ritson, scholar-at-arms. With plates, including portraits, and a bibliography, by Bertrand Harris Bronson, 1938

Notes

↑ Barczewski, Stephanie L. "Ritson, Joseph". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/23685. (subscription or UK public library membership required)
↑ Charles Cuthbert Southey (ed.), The life and correspondence of Robert Southey, New York, 1855, p. 159.
↑ Prof. Sir J. C. Holt, Robin Hood, Thames and Hudson, 1989, pp.184-185.
↑ Sir Walter Scott, Minstrelsy of the Scottish border, 1821, p. 42.

References

"Ritson, Joseph". Dictionary of National Biography. London: Smith, Elder & Co. 1885–1900. Check date values in: |date= (help)
Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Ritson, Joseph". Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press

Persondata
Name	Ritson, Joseph
Alternative names
Short description	British writer
Date of birth	2 October 1752
Place of birth
Date of death	23 September 1803
Place of death

Joseph Ritson

Bibliography

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