The legends were first printed during 1837 as a regular series in the magazine Bentley's Miscellany and later in New Monthly Magazine. They proved immensely popular and were compiled into books published in 1840, 1842 and 1847 by Richard Bentley. They remained popular during the 19th century, when they ran through many editions. They were illustrated by artists including John Leech, George Cruikshank, John Tenniel, and Arthur Rackham. As a priest of the Chapel Royal, with a private income, Barham was not troubled with strenuous duties and he had ample time to read and compose stories. Although based on real legends and mythology, chiefly Kentish, such as the "hand of glory", they are mostly deliberately humorous parodies or pastiches of medieval folklore and poetry. The best-known poem of the collection is the "Jackdaw of Rheims", about a jackdaw, who steals a cardinal's ring, and is made a saint. The village pub of Denton was renamed "The Jackdaw Inn" in 1963, after the story. The collection also contains one of the earliest transcriptions of the song "A Franklyn's Dogge", an early version of the modern children's song "Bingo". Barham introduced the collection with the grandiose statement that "The World, according to the best geographers, is divided into Europe, Asia, Africa, America and Romney Marsh".
In Patrick Leigh Fermor's A Time of Gifts, Chapter 11 "The Marches of Hungary", p. 312, on seeing a remarkably dressed old Hungarian soldier or official in a coach near the Danube in 1934, complete with brown fur and gold chain around his shoulders, a medal around his neck, and a scimitar across one knee: ""
In H. Rider Haggard's 1885 novel King Solomon's Mines, Allan Quatermain describes himself as non-literary, claiming to have read regularly only the Bible and the Ingoldsby Legends. Later in the novel he quotes a poem that he attributes incorrectly to The Ingoldsby Legends, its actual source being Sir Walter Scott's epic poem Marmion.
In Henry James's 1888 essay "From London", his stay at Morley's Hotel brings to mind "The Ingoldsby Legends", he 'scarce knows why'.
In Sarah Grand's 1897 novel The Beth Book, the narrator and main character, Beth, mentions the Ingoldsby Legends as a favourite of her childhood and recites a passage from "The Execution" that appears in the collection.
In E. Nesbit's The Phoenix and the Carpet, the children consult the Ingoldsby Legends when they want to improvise a magic ritual.
Rudyard Kipling's 1914 short story "The Dog Hervey", collected in A Diversity of Creatures, references the dog Little Byngo from "A Lay of St Gengulphus".
In Dorothy L. Sayers's The Nine Tailors, Lord Peter Wimsey quotes from The Ingoldsby Legends, as he also does in her Five Red Herrings.
In Anthony Powell's 1968 The Military Philosophers, Nick Jenkins mentions reading The Ingoldsby Legends when he needs relaxation from Marcel Proust's In Search of Lost Time.
In Chapter 7 of Half Magic by Edward Eager, Katherine reads from The Ingoldsby Legends.
Edmund Wilson referenced the Ingoldsby Legends in Memoirs of Hecate County when he states that his friend, "staggered in tonight like the jackdaw of Rheims, cursed by bell and book, —". The two main characters then discuss the Ingoldsby Legends.
Kentish folk band Los Salvadores song Smugglers' Leap is based on the story of the same name featured in the Ingoldsby Legends.
P.G. Wodehouse refers to The Ingoldsby Legends in his novel A Prefect's Uncle, comparing his title character to the lady in the earlier work "who didn't mind death, but who couldn't stand pinching".
Ngaio Marsh refers to The Ingoldsby Legends in Death in a White Tie. Troy tells about coming across Lord Tomnoddy and the hanging and the 'extraordinary impression' it had on her. She also makes references in Surfeit of Lampreys, the second time with reference to The Hand of Glory.
It has been discussed at length that the oldest documented usage of the phrase "two shakes of a lamb's tail" can be found within this compilation of Barham's works. Evidences of this are found within the chapters The Babes In The Wood; Or, The Norfolk Tragedy, A Row In An Omnibus : A Legend Of The Haymarket, and The Lay Of St Aloys: A Legend Of Blois. This phrase has been attributed more modern-day importance since nuclear scientists during WWII coined a new unit of measure termed a "shake", a very short unit of time, originally related to the Manhattan Project.
In Angela Thirkell's novel Miss Bunting the Ingoldsby Legends are referred to repeatedly for comic effect as the Mixo-Slavian maid must study them very seriously in her cultural classes as examples of English humour.
