He was loyal to (insert whichever king, but usually Richard the Lionhearted) and was fighting against forces looking to usurp the throne from him while he was away (usually on crusade, but the stories vary).

In any case, he was far from a revolutionary. He was more akin to the Tories during the American Revolution than the American Revolutionists, themselves; fighting to maintain the rule of the king in the face of a movement to unseat him and take over.

I’ve never actually heard anyone try to frame him as a revolutionary, which is where my confusion in the first sentence springs from. I’ve seen him presented as a sort of Marxist hero, sure, due to the whole “steal from the rich, give to the poor” thing, but even that wasn’t in an attempt to overturn the social order of the time, but rather to punish those who were disloyal to the King, and garner popular support among the peasantry for his efforts.