folk hero
{{Short description|Type of hero}}
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A folk hero or national hero is a type of hero – real, fictional or mythological – with their name, personality and deeds embedded in the popular consciousness of a people, mentioned frequently in folk songs, folk tales and other folklore; and with modern trope status in literature, art and films.
Overview
Although some folk heroes are historical public figures, many are not. The lives of folk heroes are generally fictional, their characteristics and deeds often exaggerated to mythic proportions.{{Citation needed|date=October 2020}}
The folk hero often begins life as a normal person, but is transformed into someone extraordinary by significant life events, often in response to social injustice, and sometimes in response to natural disasters.{{Citation needed|date=October 2020}}
One major category of folk hero is the defender of the common people against the oppression or corruption of the established power structure. Members of this category of folk hero often, but not necessarily, live outside the law in some way.
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|File:Jeanne d'Arc - Les vies des femmes célèbres.jpg|Joan of Arc depicted on horseback in an illustration from a 1505 manuscript. The martyr and saint Joan of Arc is a national hero in France.
|File:Giuseppe Garibaldi 1861.jpg|Giuseppe Garibaldi, one of Italy's "fathers of the fatherland", is celebrated as one of the greatest generals of modern times,{{Cite web |title=Scholar and Patriot |url={{Google books|iWK7AAAAIAAJ|page=PA133|keywords=Garibaldi+one+of+the+greatest+generals+of+modern+time|text=|plainurl=yes}} |publisher=Manchester University Press |via=Google Books}} and as the "Hero of the Two Worlds" because of his military enterprises in South America and Europe.{{Cite web |title=Giuseppe Garibaldi (Italian revolutionary) |url=https://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/225978/Giuseppe-Garibaldi |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140226091529/https://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/225978/Giuseppe-Garibaldi |archive-date=26 February 2014 |access-date=6 March 2014}} He fought in numerous military campaigns that led to the Italian unification
|File:Portrait of Davy Crockett.jpg|Davy Crockett, an American folk hero
|File:Grotepier TN.JPG|Statue of Pier Gerlofs Donia, a Frisian folk hero
|File:Mustafa Kemal Atatürk.png|Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, a Turkish national hero
|File:100 años del natalicio del Santo -i---i- (36184746106) (cropped).jpg|El Santo, a Mexican folk hero
|Ned Kelly in 1880.png|Ned Kelly, an Australian folk hero
|File:Midnight Ride of Paul Revere by Edward Mason Eggleston.jpg|Paul Revere, American folk hero depicted in his famous Midnight Ride
|File:Otger cataló.png|Otger Cataló, A fictional Catalan folk hero who legend credits with resisting the Moorish conquerors of Catalonia.
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See also
Citations
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General and cited references
- Seal, Graham. [https://catalogue.nla.gov.au/catalog/29134 Encyclopedia of Folk Heroes]. ABC-CLIO, 2001.
External links
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