Of Robin Hood's merry men, perhaps the most unlikely was Friar Tuck. He was introduced to us in Sir Walter Scott's Ivanhoe as the Clerk of Copmanhurst. In the legends of Robin Hood, the blustery and combative cleric is described as paunchy, wearing a russet habit of the Franciscan order, having a red corded girdle with a gold tassel...and carrying a wallet.

     I don't think St. Francis of Assisi would have approved. Devoted as Tuck may have been to the poor, if he were a Franciscan, he would have been an odd duck, indeed, and flashy at that. Franciscans (known in England as Grey Friars for the color of their habits) were renowned for humility, passivity, and especially poverty, being expressly forbidden to carry money.

     Besides, the Robin Hood legends are almost always tied to the regency of John during the reign of Richard the Lionheart (who died in 1199). This would really have come as a shock to good St. Francis--as he didn't found his order until 1208.

Acknowledgments: 3, 4