# Robin Hood had a barn? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [November 4, 2005, 5:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/robin-hood-had-a-barn/329501 "2005-11-04T17:00:53Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 11\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![OtakuLoki](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/ac8455/32.png) [@OtakuLoki](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/OtakuLoki)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2005, 5:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/robin-hood-had-a-barn/329501/1 "2005-11-04T17:00:53Z")
In the MPSIMS thread about [odd measuring units](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=342886), something has come up that I’d like my fellow Dopers to help me with. It’s a literary cliche that I’d always thought was a racial ephitet that has since lost its origin and bite, much like **Paddywagon**. And directed against the same people. I’d always heard it as having to go **'round Robinson’s barn**. But, **AskNott** , to use the example I’d most recently seen, knows it as thus: > [@AskNott](#): > > "It’s only three miles as the crow flies, but to get there you have to go **'round Robin Hood’s barn."** How many people have heard this line as ‘round Robin Hood’s barn?’ I’d never encountered that version of the cliche until I started poking about the Web, after college. Which is the more common usage? ---
**Author:** ![Khadaji](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/9e8a1a/32.png) [@Khadaji](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Khadaji)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2005, 6:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/robin-hood-had-a-barn/329501/2 "2005-11-04T18:44:07Z")
Actually, I’m not familiar with either expression. ---
**Author:** ![Sal\_Ammoniac](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/8dc957/32.png) [@Sal\_Ammoniac](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sal_Ammoniac)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2005, 6:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/robin-hood-had-a-barn/329501/3 "2005-11-04T18:53:46Z")
I’m not familiar with those expressions either, but I have heard the expression, “She looks like she just stepped out of Robin Hood’s barn!” Meaning, “She looks like a million bucks!” Anyway, this is not what you’re looking for, but it does suggest that in the popular mind, Robin Hood has a barn. ---
**Author:** ![OtakuLoki](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/ac8455/32.png) [@OtakuLoki](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/OtakuLoki)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2005, 6:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/robin-hood-had-a-barn/329501/4 "2005-11-04T18:58:13Z")
> [@Sal Ammoniac](#): > > I’m not familiar with those expressions either, but I have heard the expression, “She looks like she just stepped out of Robin Hood’s barn!” Meaning, “She looks like a million bucks!” Anyway, this is not what you’re looking for, but it does suggest that in the popular mind, Robin Hood has a barn. Egads, never heard that one. And I grew up near where you are, now. ---
**Author:** ![Sailboat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sailboat/32/461_2.png) [@Sailboat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sailboat)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2005, 7:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/robin-hood-had-a-barn/329501/5 "2005-11-04T19:33:24Z")
Never, ever heared “Robinson’s barn.” I _have_ hear “Robi Hood’s barn.” Perhaps this is like those mis-heard song lyrics? The context I’ve heard is “We had to go all around Robin Hood’s barn to find the store.” See, Robin’s an outlaw. He can’t live in a building because the Sherriff of Nottinham would find him there. So he lives in the woods. Presumably his barn is also the woods. So this phrase always meant, to us, “I had to wander all over the countryside” and was ususally used in cases of getting lost or taking the long way. I’ve never heard anyone imply that it had anything to do with beauty. Sailboat ---
**Author:** ![bibliophage](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bibliophage/32/7615_2.png) [@bibliophage](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bibliophage)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2005, 8:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/robin-hood-had-a-barn/329501/6 "2005-11-04T20:10:53Z")
> [@Sailboat](#): > > See, Robin’s an outlaw. He can’t live in a building because the Sherriff of Nottinham would find him there. So he lives in the woods. Presumably his barn is also the woods. So this phrase always meant, to us, “I had to wander all over the countryside” and was ususally used in cases of getting lost or taking the long way. My mother was from rural New Hampshire and used this expression all the time. She explained it as above. ---
**Author:** ![AskNott](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/asknott/32/5790_2.png) [@AskNott](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AskNott)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2005, 9:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/robin-hood-had-a-barn/329501/7 "2005-11-04T21:38:43Z")
Mom explained it as **Sailboat** did, but up until now, I never heard anybody else use it. As I said in the other thread, I suspected she cadged a UK expression because she married a Nottingham. At least I assume it started in the UK; did it? ---
**Author:** ![TellMeI\_mNotCrazy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tellmei_mnotcrazy/32/3419_2.png) [@TellMeI\_mNotCrazy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TellMeI_mNotCrazy)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2005, 10:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/robin-hood-had-a-barn/329501/8 "2005-11-05T10:29:40Z")
I still like my mother’s corruption of several themes… If something was a big, convoluted hassle, my mother would declare it a “round robin hood’s nest”. I’m sure if she’d know the “Robin Hood’s Barn” phrase, it would have made its way in there as well. ---
**Author:** ![Rayne\_Man](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/df705f/32.png) [@Rayne\_Man](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rayne_Man)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2005, 11:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/robin-hood-had-a-barn/329501/9 "2005-11-05T11:02:39Z")
After a searching the web I have only come across one mention of this phrase in the UK. This was on a website called “Buckinghamshire Vocabulary”. The explanation goes thus :- _“all round Robin Hood’s barn,” = in all directions, everywhere, on all sides. “I’ve looked all round Robin Hood’s barn, and I can’t find him.” The considerable stretch of country which contained Robin Hood’s provisions (deer, etc.) might metaphorically be called his “barn,” and so the phrase be applied to any large space._. I have never heard this expression before , even though I now live in Nottinghamshire. ---
**Author:** ![Stratocaster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/stratocaster/32/16393_2.png) [@Stratocaster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stratocaster)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2005, 1:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/robin-hood-had-a-barn/329501/10 "2005-11-05T13:04:10Z")
I have heard and used it. It means just what people have said. I’ve generally heard it in the context of someone making an extremely complicated and meandering explanation for what turned out to be something that really had a simple answer. “Boy, we really had to go around Robin Hood’s barn to get to that?” ---
**Author:** ![don\_t\_ask](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e68b1a/32.png) [@don\_t\_ask](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/don_t_ask)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2005, 1:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/robin-hood-had-a-barn/329501/11 "2005-11-05T13:31:43Z")
Supposedly a [Victorian Saying](http://romancereaderatheart.com/victorian/Trivia2.html) : Go Around Robin Hood’s Barn: originated in 1854 and meant to take a round-about-way instead of direct route to something. A more common phrase is “beat about the bush”.