Origins: The Gay Goshawk (Child #96)

Subject: Origins: The Gay Goshawk
From: folk_radio_uk
Date: 20 Sep 07 - 06:08 AM

I've just received Pete Morton's album "Tresspass" (on Harbour Town Rercords) for airplay on Folk Radio UK. The second song is called "The Gay Goshawk". He found it in a book called "British Popular Ballads" (owned by a couple from Dorset - both in their 90's). He asks the question: how popular can it be?

Has anyone heard of it or know of its origins?

Lyrics start (hopefully I've interpreted the words correctly:

Oh well it's me with my Gay Goshawk because he can speak and flee
you carry a letter to my love you'll bring one home to me

Oh how will I your true love recognise, how will I know
when from her mouth I've never heard a word what will the old eyes show

Oh you will my true love know as soon as you see
of the fairest flower in England, the fairest flower is she

And down there by her bower door there grows a birch
I want you to go down there and sit and sing as she comes out of church

There will be 4 and 20 ladies all going to the church
ah, but you will, my true love know, for she wears gold in her skirt

Subject: RE: Origins: The Gay Goshawk
From: GUEST,clockwatcher
Date: 20 Sep 07 - 07:37 AM

There was a song with this title on the first Mr. Fox album, but this looks a bit different.

Subject: RE: Origins: The Gay Goshawk
From: masato sakurai
Date: 20 Sep 07 - 08:28 AM

"The Gay Goshawk" is Child #96. The text is here.

Subject: RE: Origins: The Gay Goshawk
From: folk_radio_uk
Date: 20 Sep 07 - 09:01 AM

Many thanks Masato. Now I can let listeners know the origin

Subject: RE: Origins: The Gay Goshawk
From: masato sakurai
Date: 20 Sep 07 - 10:49 AM

For more information, see Child's The English and Scottish Popular Ballads (Volume 2; part 4), no. 96 (pp. 355-367).

Subject: RE: Origins: The Gay Goshawk
From: robinia
Date: 20 Sep 07 - 01:45 PM

This is probably so obvious that it doesn't need saying, but maybe it does--that "speak and flee" in standard English would be "speak and fly" . . .

Subject: RE: Origins: The Gay Goshawk (Child #96)
From: Joe Offer
Date: 20 Sep 07 - 02:03 PM

There's a bit on this song in the Traditional Ballad Index, but not much. Child has eight texts, but all the other sources have just one version.

Gay Goshawk, The [Child 96]

DESCRIPTION: An English lass is forbidden to marry the Scot she loves. He sends a message by his goshawk. She asks to be buried in Scotland should she die. This granted, she feigns death. Her coffin is taken to where her lover waits; they are reunited
AUTHOR: unknown
EARLIEST DATE: 1802
KEYWORDS: love separation death burial trick reunion
FOUND IN: Britain(Scotland) Ireland
REFERENCES (9 citations):
Child 96, "The Gay Goshawk" (8 texts)
Bronson 96, "The Gay Goshawk" (2 versions, though the second, from Christie, is described by Bronson as "padded out with a second strain.")
Leach, pp. 300-303, "The Gay Goshawk" (1 text)
Flanders-Ancient3, pp. 43-44, "The Gay Goshawk" (1 fragment, with lyrics typical of this piece but too short identify with certainty)
OBB 60, "The Gay Goshawk" (1 text)
PBB 43, "The Gay Goshawk" (1 text)
Gummere, pp. 265-269+358, "The Gay Goshawk" (1 text)
DBuchan 17, "The Gay Goshawk" (1 text, 1 tune in appendix) {Bronson's #1}
HarvClass-EP1, pp. 69-73, "The Gay Goss-hawk" (1 text)
Roud #61
File: C096

---

They are gay goshawks in The Earl of Mar's Daughter and Broomfield Wager, but those appear to be birds of a different color....
Er, sorry.

-Joe-

Subject: RE: Origins: The Gay Goshawk (Child #96)
From: The Borchester Echo
Date: 20 Sep 07 - 02:58 PM

I remember Carole Pegg's rendition from (ahem) 35 years ago, but only the first line.
So I immediately composed another tune, but on playing the MIDI, it's nothing like it.
I look forward to hearing what Pete Morton's done.
If his tune's better than mine, hurrah!
I see the Mr Fox recordings are on the WWW download site but this is useless for Macusers.
You need to have WMP9 and the nasty Gates regime supports WMP for Macs only up to v.7.

Subject: RE: Origins: The Gay Goshawk (Child #96)
From: Malcolm Douglas
Date: 20 Sep 07 - 07:11 PM

Carole Pegg's song is still a great favourite of mine (I sometimes sing it while I do the hoovering, as it goes well with a drone) but it is completely unrelated to Child 96. Same title, entirely different song.

Subject: RE: Origins: The Gay Goshawk (Child #96)
From: Snuffy
Date: 21 Sep 07 - 08:17 AM

And when he's slain his gay gosshawks
It made his heart full sore
For she's eaten them up, both skin and bone
Left nothing but feathers there

Subject: RE: Origins: The Gay Goshawk (Child #96)
From: Bill D
Date: 21 Sep 07 - 11:13 AM

Pete Morton's version is quite different from two others I have heard....

This group (Ffynnon, from Wales has recorded it, and it says you can hear the first minute, though it did not work for me online. (I have the file on my computer)

It also was done by a short lived band in the UK in 1974 "Stone Angel"

(see listings on this page

Obviously, more folks need to record it.

Subject: RE: Origins: The Gay Goshawk (Child #96)
From: Lighter
Date: 21 Sep 07 - 06:10 PM

Snuffy, isn't that from Steeleye Span's "King henry"?

Subject: RE: Origins: The Gay Goshawk (Child #96)
From: folk_radio_uk
Date: 23 Sep 07 - 06:41 AM

Thanks for all this info.

Pete sings it "trespass". It's a nice album. This isn't a new release though, it was released in 1998 on Harbour Town Records, a great little label run by Bob Thomas and Gordon Jones (ex- Silly Wizard). These are the tracks on the album:

The Cuckoo
Gay Goshawk
Sylvia
Banks of the Nile
A Farmer's Boy
The Mower and the Dairymaid
Lincolnshire Poacher
Little Musgrave
John Barleycorn
Dick Turpin
Banks of the Sweet Dundee
The Rose in June
Night Visiting Song

Thanks again

Alex

Subject: RE: Origins: The Gay Goshawk (Child #96)
From: The Borchester Echo
Date: 23 Sep 07 - 07:00 AM

Steeleye Span's mangling of Child #32 must be the most horrible sound I have ever heard . . .

'More meat, more meat

Good grief, pass the gin.

Martin Carthy does King Henry to the tune Bonaparte's Retreat. And very fine it is too.

Subject: RE: Origins: The Gay Goshawk (Child #96)
From: Valmai Goodyear
Date: 27 Jul 10 - 07:01 AM

Returning to The Gay Goshawk (Child 96), does anyone know where the tune in the Digitrad comes from? Is it the one used by Pete Morton on Trespass?

Subject: RE: Origins: The Gay Goshawk (Child #96)
From: theleveller
Date: 27 Jul 10 - 08:20 AM

I've always been intrigued by this song as the title appears to be an oxymoron. Goshawks are far from 'gay', being the most shy, bad tempered and difficult birds of prey to tame. They are renowned for needing daily 'manning' by the austringer and will 'bate' at the slightest opportunity. T E White's book, 'The Goshawk' is an excellent account of training a Goshawk (he fails to do so in the end).

Is the title an indication that this is a totally fanciful tale or that there is some other hidden meaning in the song? Anyone got any ideas?

Subject: RE: Origins: The Gay Goshawk (Child #96)
From: Valmai Goodyear
Date: 27 Jul 10 - 08:37 AM

The goshawk's behaviour in the ballad certainly isn't what you'd expect of a real bird - it sings sweetly, speaks, and carries letters. Possibly it's actually a pageboy, although it's instructed to sit on a bending birch tree outside a lady's window and to sing to her.

But please can we get back to the subject of the tune? Where does the tune in the DigiTrad come from?

Valmai

Subject: RE: Origins: The Gay Goshawk (Child #96)
From: Brian Peters
Date: 27 Jul 10 - 09:36 AM

Hi Valmai,
The tune in the Digitrad is the first of two given in Bronson's Traditional Tunes of the Child Ballads (what, you mean you haven't ordered your four bargain volumes from Camsco yet?), which is from the celebrated Anna Brown of Falkland, Aberdeenshire - F J Child's favourite ballad source. It's a bit weird, but bear in mind that Mrs. Brown's tunes were transcribed by a nephew who wasn't necessarily very adept at the task.

The tune that Pete sings sounds very like one of his own - and none the worse for that.

Subject: RE: Origins: The Gay Goshawk (Child #96)
From: Valmai Goodyear
Date: 27 Jul 10 - 10:31 AM

Thanks, Brian! I should have hinted more heavily to the family in the run-up to my birthday.

The Digitrad tune is certainly weird. I've massaged it into a singable shape, more or less, although it needs a better singer than I'll ever be to do it justice.

Valmai

Subject: RE: Origins: The Gay Goshawk (Child #96)
From: GUEST,leeneia
Date: 27 Jul 10 - 10:37 AM

Yeah, leveller. And the idea of a bird of prey singing, as in the version that Masato linked to above. Definitely silly.

Surely the bird best to use to carry a note to your love and get a reply is the homing pigeon. But someone must have felt that 'The Gay Homing Pigeon' would never sell.

Subject: RE: Origins: The Gay Goshawk (Child #96)
From: theleveller
Date: 27 Jul 10 - 11:05 AM

Not sure this is the bird I'd choose to carry a fond message to my lover.

goshawk


The Gay Vulture would probably have been more appropriate.

Subject: RE: Origins: The Gay Goshawk (Child #96)
From: Steve Gardham
Date: 27 Jul 10 - 01:22 PM

One shouldn't take these matters too literally, especially in old ballads that have been long in oral tradition. In 'The Pretty Grey Hawk' the hawk is a euphemism for a lover. Many of the old ballads have a cartoon-like quality in their story telling. Many of them were written as allegories or warnings.

Subject: RE: Origins: The Gay Goshawk (Child #96)
From: GUEST,leeneia
Date: 27 Jul 10 - 05:53 PM

We aren't taking it literally. We aren't even taking it seriously.

I mean to say:

Ye bid him bake his bridal-bread,
        And brew his bridal-ale,
        An I'll meet him in fair Scotlan
        Lang, lang or it be stale.'
===========
First of all, 'or' should be 'ere.'

Second, how seriously can we take a song of 28 verses with a stale beer motif?

Subject: RE: Origins: The Gay Goshawk (Child #96)
From: Valmai Goodyear
Date: 28 Jul 10 - 02:28 AM

Beer brewed in the traditional way takes seven or eight days to ferment and will then keep at least couple of weeks. Ale brewed for a special celebration would have been stronger and kept longer. I think there could be a month in hand from the start of brewing, so there would be time for plenty more verses. The version I sing is certainly longer.

The bread would be inedible, though.

Valmai

Subject: RE: Origins: The Gay Goshawk (Child #96)
From: theleveller
Date: 28 Jul 10 - 03:40 AM

No, we're not taking it seriously, leeneia, but it is interesting (well I think it is) as well as a bit of fun.

However........

When hawking was a popular pastime, the training, character, management and use of hawks was taken very seriously - a metter of status and big business. Shakepeare's Hamlet is packed with analogies to hawks and austringers, to the extent that it has been mooted that it was written by or in conjunction with an expert hawker. Sir Walter Ralegh has been suggested as old Will communicated with him while he was in prison awaiting execution.

Subject: RE: Origins: The Gay Goshawk (Child #96)
From: Valmai Goodyear
Date: 28 Jul 10 - 06:46 AM

In The Taming of the Shrew, Petruchio uses an austringer's methods to tame Kate. She is not allowed sleep or food until she bends to his will. The bird gets no sleep or food, but this must be done without bullying or signs of force; hard to achieve when the austringer must stay awake with her. In Petruchio's case, he gets no food either. He explains exactly what he will do before starting the treatment.

This is how a wild-caught hawk, like T. H. White's, would have been trained. The process may be similar to breaking a horse. Hand-reared birds would have been easier to train.

Othello uses hawking imagery speaking of Desdemona ('If I do prove her haggard' etc).

Valmai