Hi Richie.

Just my own ideas based on experience and wide reading on the subject.

'Riddle my sport' doesn't have to have a meaning. Many phrases in far-travelled ballads have been sung by singer A who sings what he/she thought he/she heard. As the item is far from its origins, rather than sing nothing the singer picks a word, sometimes that doesn't make sense, just to complete the line. This is then passed on verbatim to other singers who don't get chance to question it, or who are given the reply 'well that's how I heard it. Can't tell you what it means.' Of course more inventive singers will alter the phrase so that it does make sense to him/her which is part of the oral process.

3) I would say (as a non-romantic) that the broadside takes precedence. The oral versions are much later. This view also accords with academic writers like David C Fowler. There is no evidence with most of these romantic Child Ballads in their oral versions that they are any earlier than the 18th century when most of them were either rewritten from the broadsides or made up from legends, stories etc.

The majority of the Child Ballads are no older than the 18th century though the romantics will tell you different. Can I prove it? No. can anybody disprove it? No.