"GUEST,Volgadon
I still hold that traditional songs are those which were collected, be the author known or long-forgotten.
So a song doesn't become traditional until it's been collected? What were they before? "

Unknown. I'm sure many, many other songs were sung in the 'tradition' (I hate that term, can't think of a more convenient one) but if they weren't collected, or mentioned anywhere, how can we know about them?