“For my own part, I often think that if I were some years younger and perfectly independent, I would venture myself among the inhospitable savages of Connaught or Munster, of whom Twiss was so much afraid, in order to acquire their language in its original purity...I can make nothing, however, of his "Vindication of the Ancient History of Ireland." He seems to be somewhat in the condition in which Festus (I think it was) supposed Paul; as, if much learning have not made him mad, it has made him, at least, completely ridiculous and absurd.”

English antiquary

Joseph Ritson was an English antiquary active in the late 18th and early 19th centuries. He is known for editing the first scholarly collection of Robin Hood ballads in 1795, and for his work on English nursery rhymes. He became a strong supporter of the French Revolution after visiting France in 1791, and later emerged as an influential advocate of vegetarianism. He also assembled nursery rhyme collections such as Gammer Gurton's Garland, or The Nursery Parnassus, published in London by Joseph Johnson, including familiar verses like "Roses Are Red" and "Little Bo-Peep".