Being bitten by a rattlesnake isn't murder, just death by failure to pay attention to nature. Murder ballads are "Frankie & Johnny" and "Banks of the Ohio" and "Tom Dooley" and the like..... y'know, where somebody gets murdered!

I recall a thread several years ago wherein Joe Offer mentioned a song from the Middle Ages about Jesus, as a boy, causing another little boy to die because he'd made fun of Jesus. That gets my vote as "saddest" but I'm not sure whether it was a true ballad. Joe, are you there to shed some light on this? (Pardon the pun about "light" [of the world, and all that].)