Lyr Req: To Daunton Me / To Dawt on Me (R Burns)

Subject: To daunton me
From: robinia
Date: 31 Jul 02 - 06:49 AM

Does anyone out there recognize this verse to (I presume) the Burns song, "An auld man shall never daunton me"? I found it on a scrap of paper in neat handwriting that I don't recognize and cannot altogether decipher. To wit: "He hirples twa festd [???] as he dow/ Wi' his teethless gab and his auld bald pow/ And the rain rains doon frae his red-bleared ee/ That auld man shall never daunton me." It's a great song, and I'd like to add the new verse (which reminds me, in its scathing physical detail, of the Burns song, "What shall a young lassie do wi' an auld man?" Of course I'd also like to know where these words come from...

Subject: RE: Help: To daunton me
From: Mikey joe
Date: 31 Jul 02 - 06:52 AM

Is it also mentioned in McPhersons Rant??. I'm afraid I'm lost as well as to what it is

Subject: RE: Help: To daunton me
From: IanC
Date: 31 Jul 02 - 06:58 AM

Well, the verse is in the Burns poem here.

:-)
Ian

Subject: RE: Help: To daunton me
From: nickp
Date: 31 Jul 02 - 07:41 AM

the link gives the meaning 'daunt' so I suppose it means she won't be afraid or something similar

Subject: RE: Help: To daunton me
From: IanC
Date: 31 Jul 02 - 09:05 AM

of course ... [me]Daunten

Subject: RE: Help: To daunton me
From: IanC
Date: 31 Jul 02 - 11:45 AM

Looks like Burns probably did his usual with this one and altered an existing song ... at

least BruceO's entry for Scottish Tunes href=http://users.erols.com/olsonw/SCOTTUNS.HTM>here would suggest this:

To Daunton me [SMM #182. Glen, ESM p. 120, cites tune in Atkinson MS, 1694, as "This Wife of mine."]/; Be Valiant still [Logan, The Pedlar's Pack, p. 164, 1869, notices this as the title of a broadside ballad of c 1700, sung to the tune of "The old carle to daunton me." A song of this title, and to the tune of "To Daunton me," given in J. Hogg's Jacobite Relics, II p. 89, is evidently of much later date.]; MHF 38: To Dauntin me; OS1 38: To daunton me; MG2 27: To dauntin me; CPC1 16: To danton me; MBG2 23:

The phrase itself also occurs in "Thomas The Rhymer" (Child, Part II., p. 317. usually attributed as C17th), which Burns knew well.

"Harp and carp, Thomas," she said,
"Harp and carp, along wi' me,
And if ye dare to kiss my lips,
Sure of your bodie I will be!"

"Betide me weal, betide me woe,
That weird sall never daunton me;
Syne he has kissed her rosy lips,
All underneath the Eildon Tree.

The word Daunten is quite popular in Middle English, having been used by Langland (Piers Plowman) "And David shal be diademed and daunten hem alle" as well as Chaucer (Romaunt of The Rose) "The god of Love, that can devyde/Love, as him lyketh it to be./But he can cherles daunten, he,/And maken folkes pryde fallen."

:-)
Ian

Subject: RE: Help: To daunton me
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 31 Jul 02 - 11:46 AM

To hirple is to limp,I take twa fested to be two fisted, although this would not fit with limping. Gab is mouth or pertaining to speech, i.e. to gab is to gossip or shoot the breeze, and is I presume the root of gob e.g. " Shut yer gob " Daunton is old usage of daunt " Bold brave and undaunted, rode young Brennan on the moor " Pow of course is head. "A blessing on yer frosty pow, John Anderson ma jo" I was born in Glasgow, and brought up around there, up to age 17, and many of these words were still in use then, but some I can't understand at all although a lot of Burns stuff is in Ayrshire dialect, a region not too far from Glasgow. People didn't travel much in those days so some words are very localised indeed.
Failte.....Giok

Subject: RE: Help: To daunton me
From: IanC
Date: 31 Jul 02 - 12:00 PM

help ... any joeclones around to tidy up the BruceO link (and the gap between [at] and [least] which appeared unrequested) ... this post could go too!

Subject: RE: Help: To daunton me
From: robinia
Date: 31 Jul 02 - 01:06 PM

Thank you Ian! I should have guessed there'd be a Burns web site. It clears up my misreading of "twa fold" (and how obvious the word now appears!) which fits with "hirples" -- he's limping mightily -- though I'm still fuzzy on "dow" (and presume that a "beld pow" is indeed, as I misread it, a bald one. Of course, I still don't know where my scrap of paper came from.... BTW, for those who find the word "daunton" a puzzle, just think of our "undaunted."

Subject: RE: Help: To daunton me
From: GUEST,Guest, Big Tim
Date: 31 Jul 02 - 02:43 PM

Great lyric. Tremendous recording done by Ewan MacColl in 1960s.

Subject: RE: Help: To daunton me
From: GUEST,Bruce O.
Date: 31 Jul 02 - 05:06 PM

The wording of the note in my Scots Tunes index was unfortunate. A song of this title should be "To daunton me", not "The old carle to daunton me" (now revised).

James Hogg in 'Jacobite Relics', II, 1821, gives no less than four songs to the tune "To Daunton me", the 3rd is that from 'A Collection of Loyal Songs, Poems', 1750, and the 4th is "Be Valiant still". The first and third of Hogg's songs have the 'to daunton me' in them, but Burns' song is related to none of Hogg's four. Burns may have known a fragment of 'The old carle to daunton me' (original apparently unknown), and based his song on that.

Subject: RE: Help: To daunton me
From: robinia
Date: 31 Jul 02 - 05:52 PM

Yes, and I learned the song from MacColl's recording, which doesn't, however, include this final verse. But he does include, on the same record, "What can a young lassie" (what shall a young lassie, what can a young lassie do wi' an auld man?) -- a song with some marvelously descriptive verses too, like "He's always compleenin' frae mornin' to eenin'/ He hoasts and he hirples the weary day lang/ He's doyl't and he's dozin' ; his blood it is frozen/ O dreary's the nicht wi' a crazy auld man." And look this other song up for a humdinger of a final verse too (it's in the spirit -- and the storyline -- of Chaucer's Wife of Bath...)

Subject: Lyr Add: TO DAWT ON ME (Robert Burns)
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 21 Jan 11 - 11:29 PM

Be sure to read the first footnote for this version! Note: I have been unable to identify the editor of this particular edition.

From The Complete Works of Robert Burns (Self-Interpreting), Volume 2 by Robert Burns (Philadelphia: Gebbie & Co., 1886), page 163:

TO DAWT ON* ME.
(JOHNSON'S MUSEUM, 1788.)

The blude-red rose at Yule may blaw,    blow
The simmer lilies bloom in snaw,
The frost may freeze the deepest sea;
But an auld man shall never dawt on me.

REFRAIN.—To dawt on me, to dawt on me,
An auld man shall never dawt on me.

To dawt on me, and me sae young,
Wi' his fause heart and flatt'ring tongue,    fa1se
That is the thing you shall never see,
For an auld man shall never dawt on me.
To dawt on me, &c.

For a' his meal and a' his maut,**    malt
For a' his fresh beef and his saut,    salt
For a' his gold and white monie,
An auld man shall never dawt on me.
To dawt on me, &c.

His gear may buy him kye and yowes,    money, cows, ewes
His gear may buy him glens and knowes;    valleys, knolls
But me he shall not buy nor fee,
For an auld man shall never dawt on me.
To dawt on me, &c.

He hirples twa-fauld as he daw,    limps, two-fold, can
Wi' his teethless gab and his auld beld pow,    bald head
And the rain rains down frae his red bleared e'e;    dim
That auld man shall never dawt on me.
To dawt on me, &c.

* Hitherto the title of this song in every edition of Burns appears as To Daunton Me. Every Scotchman knows that the word Daunton, which simply means to daunt or frighten, conveys an entirely false meaning here. The girl obviously means that no old man shall pet or fondle her, or, as it is expressed in Scotch, dawt on her. That this was the expression Burns meant to use we confidently believe (daunton being either a miswrite or a misprint), so we have changed the Title of the song accordingly. In writing the pithy lyric Burns had the refrain of an old Jacobite song ringing in his ears:—

"To daunton me, to daunton me,
D'ye ken the things wad daunton me?
Eighty-eight and eighty-nine
And a' the dreary years sin syne
With cess and press and Presbytry
Gude faith, these were like to have dauntoned me.

But to wanton me, but to wanton me,
D'ye ken the things that wad wanton me," &c.—J. H.

** In early times home-brewed ale was the national Scottish beverage, as oatmeal was the "staff of life." "Rowth o' meal and maut" is an old phrase, still used, to express abundance to eat and drink.—J. H.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: To Daunton Me / To Dawt on Me (R Burns)
From: maeve
Date: 22 Jan 11 - 04:42 AM

I learned this song years ago from Janet Russell. The meaning as explained by Janet (and clearly supported by the lyric)fits with the footnote you point to, Jim.

Here's a sample of my favorite recording of this song, from Janet Russell

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: To Daunton Me / To Dawt on Me (R Burns)
From: Jack Campin
Date: 22 Jan 11 - 05:04 AM

I don't believe that footnote.

It's "daunton" in several sources dating from before Burns was born.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: To Daunton Me / To Dawt on Me (R Burns)
From: GUEST,John MacKenzie
Date: 22 Jan 11 - 06:33 AM

For dawt,read dote, surely

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: To Daunton Me / To Dawt on Me (R Burns)
From: randjgc
Date: 23 Jan 11 - 05:43 AM

sometimes it's good to look in a dictionary. The Dictionary of the Scots Language gives -

DAUNTON, Daunten, Danton, Dantan, v. To frighten, to subdue (Gall. 1824 MacTaggart Gallov. Encycl. 160, danton); to discourage; ``to cast down (in spirits)'' (Edb.3 1929); known to Slg.3, Lnk.3 1940, daunten; to challenge, defy. Also found in n.Cy. dial. (E.D.D.).
    *Sc. a.1776 D. Herd Sc. Songs (2nd ed.) II. 20:
    Yet a' this shall never danton me, Sae lang's I keep my fancy free.
    *Sc. 1887 R. L. Stevenson Merry Men ii.:
    It's for the like o' them . . . folk daunton God to His face and burn in muckle hell.
    *m.Sc. 1922 ``O. Douglas'' Ann and her Mother 20:
    She never damped your enthusiasms. ``Never daunton young folk,'' was one of her favourite sayings.
    *Edb. 1773 R. Fergusson Poems (1925) 3:
    Sooner at Yule-day shall the birk be drest, . . . Before a tonguey woman's noisy plea Shou'd ever be a cause to dantan me.
    *Kcb. 1911 G. M. Gordon Auld Clay Biggin' 43:
    Gentle as she was, naething i' this warld nor the next cud hae dauntened her.
    [Derivative of Eng. daunt, v., which occurs from c.1300. O.Sc. has dantoun, danton, daunton, from 1535, as above, from dant, reg. O.Sc. form of Eng. daunt (D.O.S.T.).]

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: To Daunton Me / To Dawt on Me (R Burns)
From: GUEST
Date: 18 Apr 15 - 12:47 PM

I've always known this song as "To DAWT on me" or as we Irish and Scotland say "To DOTE on me" .... I think we all know what a DOTE
(pet) is .... eh ....???    Used extensively in Irish and Scotland.
Hope this adds to the discussion on this sight.
Actually, as a singer and user of Irish Gaelic, I fing some of the
interpretations absolutely hillarious and OFF THE WALL !!!
Best one yet ... some bright spark listening to Pecker Dunne's song "O'Sullivan John", queried the line ... "far along the road
to ROAM" (it's about a Traveller/Tinker) ...by asking what was meant by "far along the road to ROME" ....   Cripes !!!!!!!

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: To Daunton Me / To Dawt on Me (R Burns)
From: Jack Campin
Date: 18 Apr 15 - 02:48 PM

I presume "we Irish and Scotland" means "an American with somebody called Mac-something in the family tree who has never been east of Chicago".

Oswald published the tune as "To daunton me" in 1740. Stenhouse quotes a Jacobite pastiche of the words from 1750. Burns refers to the song as "To daunton me" in his letters to Johnson. There is no room at all for argument about what the words are.

It's surprising nobody from your side of the pond has brought Downton Abbey into it yet.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: To Daunton Me / To Dawt on Me (R Burns)
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 18 Apr 15 - 04:05 PM

You mean "Downtown Abbey"? (As I heard an announcer pronounce it once.)