Hi,

The name, "Spanish Lady" is found in several variants:

1) Scottish (Grieg-Duncan) and Irish traditional versions presented above from the late 1800s and early 1900s. These versions suggest an intermediary antecedent rewritten from the bawdy print version of the late 1700s.
2) Campbell's poem and subsequent versions based on Campbell's poem.
3) Some versions of "Oh No John."
4) The Mary Wakefield version of "No Sir" as well as subsequent version based on it.
5) Traditional versions of "No Sir."
6) Versions of "Madam" with Spanish Lady replacing "Lovely Creature" (see for example, Cox's "Spanish Lady" in Folk Songs from the South, dated 1916 but years earlier).

Although we don't know when Spanish Lady replaced the "pretty maid" of the bawdy songs, it must have happened by the early 1800s to have been distributed to remote areas of America, Ireland and Scotland.

Richie