> There's a lot to digest in Bruce's magisterial note to the song, but it looks as though the chapbook "Derby" version can be dated to the 1790s, but "Fyvie" not till 1828.

> So "Derby" can be taken as the likely original, barring new discoveries, of course.

The extant dateable copies certainly make "Derby" earlier than "Fyvie", but I was wondering whether that's the only evidence that way. On the basis of the internal evidence of the story as told in the songs, the Fyvie version seems to me to make better sense, with not merely a single place name being changed as was common with many ballads, but a whole string of local place names instead of the abrupt move from Derby to Ireland. If the Fyvie version was derived from the Derby version (or some lost antecedent of both) whoever did that made a very good job of it.