The idea for this thread came out of avoiding creeping into the one aspect of certain regularites in ballads (in particular the 2 brothers ballads of which there are about a zillion versions). I remember reading somewhere something about one of the murder ballads I know, about how there are several versions of this song but you can always recognize it as a variant if it contains the specific lie about being bloody not because of having just bludgeoned your sweetheart to avoid marrying her, but because of a nosebleed. Apparently there is only one murderer of song who thought of that particular story. I can think of another one (only one) where one son goes through all kinds of lies to Mom before admitting to fratricide. But in many many MANY ghost/murder ballads, the dead person rises from the grave after a year, or a year and a day, either because of someone mourning or performing certain rituals. I particularly liked the one who "put on small hoppers and hopped both far and near, till she hopped the small birds right off the briars and her true love out of his grave" - what in tarnation are hoppers? High-heeled shoes? (That is from one version of 2 brothers not mentioned in the 2 brothers thread.)

Anyway, I was wondering about other regularities; for instance, I know several murder ballads where boy kills girl to avoid marrying her (as in, they HAD to get married now). In several of these, but not all, the father has already told the son that "money will set you free if ever you murder that dear little girl" but in others, it wasn't set up by the father. Can you think of which had the foresighted near-papa-in-law? In many, the woman's name is mentioned, and in fewer, the man's name too. Why do you think that is? We know Little Sadie was blown down, but who knows that the killer's name was Lee? What about Polly Von? Laurie Foster we know was Tom Dooley, but what about Poor Ellen Smith, and so on?

Anyway, this is really a BS thread, I have no real questions, I was just wondering what regularities y'all had noticed or researched...