Origins: Come All You Little Streamers

Subject: RE: Origins: Come All You Little Streamers
From: Richard Mellish
Date: 14 Jan 25 - 04:25 PM

Until listening to that RTÉ programme I had not realised that Magilligan is a real place. It even has, up on the high ground, a mansion (Downhill) with an outer wall a bit like a castle, probably not visible from the strand but visible from out to sea.

Subject: RE: Origins: Come All You Little Streamers
From: Steve Gardham
Date: 14 Jan 25 - 01:51 PM

Great stuff!

Subject: RE: Origins: Come All You Little Streamers
From: The Sandman
Date: 14 Jan 25 - 02:15 AM

https://www.rte.ie/radio/doconone/646812-radio-documentary-by-the-strands-of-magilligan-derry

Subject: RE: Origins: Come All You Little Streamers
From: The Sandman
Date: 14 Jan 25 - 02:09 AM

Magilligan peninsula is an area in the Roe valley, the most northerly parish in Co. Derry located at the mouth of Lough Foyle. It is a huge 32 km2 coastal site, part British army firing range, part nature reserve.

A Martello Tower was built there in 1812.

This documentary looks at the people who live there.

Unusually, this is an area of northern Ireland where Irish has survived and the population is made up in the majority of pre-planation stock.

The history of the Magilligan area is varied - and influenced by diverse aspects of history such as Scots dialet and cricket.

It was once a good rabbit area but farm patterns have changed.

Produced by Proinsias O' Conluain

First broadcast 5th November, 1975

An Irish radio documentary from RTÉ Radio 1, Ireland - Documentary on One - the home of Irish radio documentaries

Subject: RE: Origins: Come All You Little Streamers
From: The Sandman
Date: 13 Jan 25 - 05:09 PM

It would appear LEB was mistaken

Subject: RE: Origins: Come All You Little Streamers
From: Steve Gardham
Date: 13 Jan 25 - 04:09 PM

I can't remember what conclusions Stephen and I came to about Green Mountain, but Nick was certainly correct about strings of floaters (commonplaces) being put together to make new songs, and confound those who would try to follow a song's evolution, and Little Streamers is definitely one of those. It appears to have evolved in a Mondegreenish way from Streams of Lovely Nancy which is Mondegreen for The Strands of Magilligan from Northern Ireland. The 'strands' (if you'll excuse the pun) seem to run from Northern Ireland to a Liverpool broadside and spread slowly south with a mixture of rewriting and oral tradition Mondegreens, until it reached southern England where it appeared on broadsides as 'Streams of Lovely Nancy' spawning and acquiring floaters on the way. It is a shame Stephen hasn't got round to publishing his detailed findings yet. I'm sure we have discussed this before.

Subject: RE: Origins: Come All You Little Streamers
From: The Sandman
Date: 12 Jan 25 - 03:12 PM

Thankyou. that will be interesting

Subject: RE: Origins: Come All You Little Streamers
From: Nick Dow
Date: 12 Jan 25 - 12:14 PM

Here (for anybody) are the journals from 1899 to 1931

https://archive.org/details/pub_folk-song-society-journal

Subject: RE: Origins: Come All You Little Streamers
From: Nick Dow
Date: 12 Jan 25 - 11:11 AM

OK Sorry Black Auk. The place to go is Jstor.com. If you get stuck PM me with an Email and I'll copy them and send them. I have found Lucy Broadwood had such a wide knowledge of songs and tunes that it covered European folklore and art music that her writings can be invaluable in research.

Subject: RE: Origins: Come All You Little Streamers
From: GUEST,Black Auk
Date: 12 Jan 25 - 10:59 AM

> Black Auk I am assuming you are the Guest who posted Lucy Broadwood's notes.

Not I, squire. I will certainly see if I can find The EFDSS Journals (not always one of my strong points!)

Subject: RE: Origins: Come All You Little Streamers
From: The Sandman
Date: 12 Jan 25 - 05:07 AM

Cecil Sharp is also respected[ he has a house named after him, however his judgement of songs was coloured by the time he lived in, he bowdlerised songs, which had sexual connotations[ although he kept the originals]
Baring Gould was another collector, who bowdlerised songs.
All these collectors including the Broadwoods had a vested interest in popularising the songs for the piano, cleaning them up AND REMOVING SEXUAL CONTENT so they were acceptable for Victorian standards of prudery
the sholarship of all these collectors needs to be seen in the context of their times, and questioned and challenged , in a similiar way Lloyds scholarship has to be challenged for different reasons.
The scholars of the Victorian era, need to have their scholarship SEEN IN THE CONTEXT OF THEIR TIME, The utterances of these scholars is not gospel, but just their opinion, the same applies to Lloyd, for different reasons

Subject: RE: Origins: Come All You Little Streamers
From: Nick Dow
Date: 12 Jan 25 - 04:39 AM

Black Auk I am assuming you are the Guest who posted Lucy Broadwood's notes. Even if you are not, can I point you (and Guest) in the direction of The Journal of the EFDSS December 1964. The first article is the publication of all LEB's letters received from a vast number of her contemporaries and also a couple of singers. They make wonderful reading I think it's available on line. She was well respected.

Subject: RE: Origins: Come All You Little Streamers
From: The Sandman
Date: 12 Jan 25 - 04:06 AM

to quote Carthy,"the only damage you can do to a song is not sing it"
.If the song moves you sing it interpret it, how you like, and PRACTISE IT before you sing it in public.
in my opinion the attempt by scholars to nail a song,and give it a cast iron definition is reminscent of knowing the price of everything and the vale of nothing

Subject: RE: Origins: Come All You Little Streamers
From: The Sandman
Date: 12 Jan 25 - 03:57 AM

I think LEB does not have it right, so we must agree to disagree.
As with most songs people prefer their own picture of the song.
I am not at all convinced by Broadwoods theory, any more than i am of some of Lloyds scholarship

Subject: RE: Origins: Come All You Little Streamers
From: Nick Dow
Date: 11 Jan 25 - 07:46 PM

The Newfoundland version refers to a sailor and his true love, which might explain verse three of the version above. I think that the song is a confusion of a sailors 'farewell' song, and a selection of floating verses. This is not unheard of in the tradition where we find for example the broken token theme confused in the 'Bold Fisherman'. Equally confused is 'Deep in love' which is based upon the theme of 'Waly Waly ' and combined with other floating verses. This does not in any way devalue the songs, however it is advisable to opt for the simplest explanation I have found, and not look for esoteric explanations as it has been with the likes of 'Polly Vaughn' and 'The Derby Ram' and others including 'The streams of lovely Nancy'. I think LEB had it right, she usually did.

Subject: Origins of Greensleeves Folk Song
From: GUEST
Date: 11 Jan 25 - 06:56 PM

Please provide additional information or insights about the origins of the folk song "Greensleeves".

Subject: RE: Origins: Come All You Little Streamers
From: The Sandman
Date: 11 Jan 25 - 04:42 PM

lucy Broadwood was a writing at a time when victorian prudery AS was the case with Sharp, MIGHT POSSIBLY have coloured her opinion.
My Opinion is that the song the Streams of lovely Nancy, is about two lovers, in my opinion, the song has strong sexual overtones.in that respect the somng has a similiar feel to. Just as the tide was flowing
The song may or may not have originated in Cornwall, the remarks about asking streamers about where the true lover is nothing more than speculation.
In my opinion both songs that i have mentioned [Streams and tide flowing] are euphemisms for sex, just the sort of thing that in 1913 Sharp and Broadwood did not want to admit to publicly and whchich Sharp and Baring Gould liked to bowdlerise so that it was suitable for children

Subject: RE: Origins: Come All You Little Streamers
From: GUEST
Date: 11 Jan 25 - 09:14 AM

Lucy Broadwood wrote in Journal of the Folk-Song Society 4 (1913) p.313:

For the majority of readers the obscurity of the versions here printed is increased by the fact that the lover begs "little streamers" to direct him to his true love. That the streamers are people is plain, from the fact that they "walk the meadows gay" and are asked to write to the "true love". Ordinary dictionaries are silent as to this kind of streamer but the word is in constant use, its meaning is given in Wright's Dialect Dictionary, and thanks to its presence in the song and to the preservation of the stream-name as "Nant-si-an" by at least two old people (one of Mr. Baring-Gould's singers in Cornwall and one of the late Mr. H. Hammond's singers in Dorset), I hope to show that the song probably originated in Cornwall, and in the southern part of that county.

No account of Cornish mining omits a description of the ancient practice of "streaming" ore, but Hunt, in his Romances and Drolls of the West of England (1864, etc.) gives a concise explanation of the term. He states that there is scarcely a spot in Cornwall, valley or hill, which has not been worked over by the "old men," as the ancient miners are always called. Every valley has been "streamed" (i.e. the deposits washed for tin). "Wherever the 'streamer' has been ... we are told the' Finician' has been, or the Jew has mined." The Cornish valleys are called bottoms (cf. "At the bottom of this mountain"), and they contain numerous "streamworks" since the running water, by wearing the soil away, leaves the ore exposed and ready to be washed still further. The processes of streaming are dealt with by the late Sir Francis Head who describes the skill with which they are performed by children of seven or eight as well as by older girls and boys (see Murray's Guide to Cornwall, I893, Introduction and pp. 79 and 8o, etc.). This fact at once makes sense of the song-text, corrupt though it may otherwise be. We have here a lover, in some versions apparently home after long absence, asking the young streamers or tinners where his true love now is.

Subject: RE: Origins: Come All You Little Streamers
From: GUEST,Black Auk
Date: 11 Jan 25 - 07:47 AM

Many thanks for all your helpful replies. I will try to look up the references you give! :)

Subject: RE: Origins: Come All You Little Streamers
From: Richard Mellish
Date: 11 Jan 25 - 07:30 AM

This song and its close relations were discussed on an off in the New Book: Folk Song in England" thread. See particularly some posts from Steve Gardham and me
this, this, this (but Steve's work didn't get into his Dungbeetle series).

I subsequently exchanged a few emails with him. As far as am aware Stephen Reynolds' work on these songs still remains to be published.

One of the versions has "purling streams". That could have got folk-processed to streamers.

Subject: RE: Origins: Come All You Little Streamers
From: The Sandman
Date: 11 Jan 25 - 03:43 AM

lovers that walk by the streams.

Subject: RE: Origins: Come All You Little Streamers
From: Nick Dow
Date: 11 Jan 25 - 03:41 AM

Might be worth having a look at Bert Lloyd's notes in Penguin No 1. They are expanded in the reprint 'Classic Folk songs'. Old George Dowden from White Lackington Dorset had the song. He was a character, a retired sea captain who used to sing in the Blue Vinney Pub in Puddletown in 1908. I came across a Newfoundland version of the song decades ago and recorded it, and there is another in English County Songs (Lucy Broadwood) It might be worth seeing what Lucy B. has to say in the Journals. They are all available on line. Sorry for the rushed reply. If you have any questions please ask.

Subject: RE: Origins: Come All You Little Streamers
From: Robert B. Waltz
Date: 11 Jan 25 - 03:10 AM

Steve Roud considers it a version of #18820, which is a fairly amorphous item that seems to mix with "The Streams of Lovely Nancy" and others. Another common title is "(The) Green Mountain." Steve Gardham traces the earliest version of "Green Mountain" to the famous Forget-Me-Not Songster, although the song is also known in Canada and Britain. I can verify versions back to at least 1893.

There are dozens of versions known; search for Roud 18820.

Subject: ADD: Come All You Little Streamers
From: GUEST,Black Auk
Date: 11 Jan 25 - 02:45 AM

Does anyone know what a streamer is in the song Come All You Little Streamers? All I get from Google is references to streaming music or videos.

The only mention is in Mainly Norfolk, and there's a recording of the Shirley Collins and the Etchingham Steam Band on Spotify.

This is how it goes:

COME ALL YOU LITTLE STREAMERS

Oh, come all you little streamers wherever you may be
These are the finest flowers that ever my eyes did see.
Fine flowery hills and fishing dells and hunting also
At the top all of this mountain where fine flowers grow.

At the top all of the mountain where my love’s castle stands
It’s over-decked with ivory to the bottom of the strand.
There’s arches and there’s parches and a diamond stone so bright;
It’s a beacon for a sailor on a dark, stormy night.

At the bottom of this mountain there runs a river clear.
A ship from the Indies did once anchor there,
With her red flags a-flying and the beating of a drum,
Sweet instruments of music and the firing of her gun.

So come all you little streamers that walks the meadows gay
And write unto my own true love wherever he may be
For his sweet lips entice me, but his tongue it tells me “No!”
And an angel might direct us and it’s where shall we go?