Ivanhoe Ivanhoe is a novel by Sir Walter Scott. It was written in 1819, and is set in 12th-century England, an example of historical fiction. Ivanhoe is sometimes given credit for helping to increase popular interest in the Middle Ages in 19th century Europe and America (see Romanticism). John Henry Newman claimed that Scott "had first turned men's minds in the direction of the middle ages," while Carlyle and Ruskin made similar claims to Scott's overwhelming influence over the revival, based primarily on the publication of this novel