The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #92595 Message #3000998
Posted By: Abby Sale
06-Oct-10 - 10:39 AM
Thread Name: Lyr Req/ADD: McGinty's Meal and Ale (Thompson/Kemp
Subject: RE: Lyr Req: McGinty's Meal and Ale (Thompson, Kemp)
I see I've never explained this. Sorry. On croaking this out the other day, I was asked for the reference so I'd better get my pigs in a row. Since few are likely to read this, I can pretty safely thank that group now for not stoning me for it, though I believe the group leader was considering tar and feathers about the 18th incoherent verse.
It was writen by George Bruce Thompson and submited to Grieg's column in the Buchan Obsever about 1910. It was printed in Folk Songs of the North-East by Gavin Greig as "M'Ginty's Meal and Ale." I took the title and words from that 1963 Goldstein book of facsimiles of the newspaper series. In The Greig~Duncan Folk Song Collection, Vol. 3, p. 508 (song #630) and also in Norman Buchan, 101 Scottish Songs, 1962, it's given as "McGinty's Meal-an-Ale". The inestimable Emily Lyle, editor of the Greig~Duncan volume, wrote me that the copy in Thomson's own hand reads "McGinty." It is unknown whether Greig or Greig's publisher used the common abbreviation "M'Ginty."
I also failed to include my glossary - deeply sorry about that. I do see that several words in the song are a tad obscure. ===
0 Meal-an-Ale = party 1 mixter = mixture 2 beef-brose = beef soup 3 sowens = fermented oat-flour porridge 4 sautie = salty 5 bannocks = griddle oatcakes 6 pess = Easter 7 tinkies = tinkers (travelers/"gypsies") 8 howe = hollow 9 jinkies = high-jinks 10 butt = around 11 hoose = house 12 heelster-gowdy =topsy-turvey, head-over-heels 13 skyrl = screech (of the bagpipe) 14 teuchit = peewit or lapwing 15 ashet = serving/carving dish 16 dreepin' = cooking fat 17 peel't = scraped 18 croon = pate 19 haud = hold off 20 greetin' = weeping 21 skyelf = shelf 22 ricklin' = rattling 23 kirnin' = churning (thrashing) 24 piz-meal = pea meal 25 yirnin' = rennet 26 gollach = a beetle 27 tricle = treacle 28 girnin' = whining 29 soss = soggy mess 30 Syne = in a while 31 fan = when 32 tuggit = tugged 33 ruggit = were rough 34 tatties = spuds 35 backet = basin/bucket 36 spurtles = porridge stirrers 37 gar = make 38 claw = scratch 39 yokin' = working [I think] 40 fou = full (drunk) 41 dokin = dock leaf (a thing of no value) 42 eely pigs = oil jars 43 jeely pigs = jam jars 44 hidet = hid 45 roset = resin 46 harl't = threw at 47 troch = trough (ie, as if he'd been stuccoed) 48 barley bree = whiskey 49 widder = widow 50 keegerin' = messing about 51 dubs = mud puddles 52 gyang = go 53 na weel = not well 54 thegidder = together 55 doot = doubt 56 anidder = another