The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #50640 Message #2185350
Posted By: Richard Bridge
02-Nov-07 - 08:09 PM
Thread Name: Wild Boar: History, Lyrics & Discussion-Child #18
Subject: RE: Wild Boar: History, Lyrics & Discussion
Whether it is catchy depends, I suppose, on the version you sing.
I do an aptation of the Jon Loomes version (it makes a cracking guitar chord sequence when I get it right), and I think the lyric is very catchy - it got into my brain on about two listens, and it's at least in part why I took it up - that and the repeated vocal lines (incantation, if you like, but in that version it is "(diddly-dit -dee-dee) a noble hunter" which seems not to suggest any necromantic aspect)
On the other hand, could it be simply a personification of the battle of good against evil? These are hardly unknown. The pig seems across many versions to be associated with the witch or witch-wife (which begs the question of who the husband might be) - so is the boar the familiar?
There again - we all know what "long pig" is.
But again, we have a hint at the "False Knight" type riddles with the "3 things" the witchwife demands.
On balance then it seems likely that there is intended to be some occult or spiritual meaning - not my ball park in that I abandoned organised religion a very ling time ago having formed the view that organised religion was often a denial of true spiritualism and mostly a control mechanism.
Or to put it another way - it rocks so I sing it whatever it means.