The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #69073   Message #3794488
Posted By: keberoxu
08-Jun-16 - 05:49 PM
Thread Name: Maire Ni Scolai (1909 - 1985) traditional singer
Subject: RE: Maire Ni Scolai (1909 - 1985) traditional singer
There is of course an "Úna Bhán" thread on the forum already, and conveniently, the verses sung on the recording match what is posted to the thread. I have cross-referenced several other songs recorded on the album that way, and it is not always the case -- frequently Máire Ní Scolaí sings verses very different than the ones posted here.... and then, of course, she has a time limit. So some of these songs have many verses, and she can manage somewhere between two verses and six verses, depending on the song. Mudcat's "Úna Bhán" thread has eleven verses, with Douglas Hyde's translation into English. Máire Ní Scolaí sings three of those eleven verses: by my reckoning they are verses 2, 5, and 6.

For the thread, I will submit Douglas Hyde's English rendering of just those three verses, to match the Gael-Linn album version.

O fair Úna, o blossom of the amber locks,
After your death because of bad advice;
Look, my love, which of the two counsels was better,
O bird in a cage, when I was in the Ford of the Donogue?

O fair Úna, you were like a rose in a garden,
And you were a golden candlestick on the queen's table;
You were a melody, and musical, when you walked the road before me,
'Tis my sorrowful loss of the morning that you were not married to me.

O fair Úna, it is you who deranged my senses;
O Úna, it is you who came firmly between me and God;
O Úna, o fragrant branch, o curly ringlet of hair,
Wouldn't it have been better for me to be without eyes, never seeing you?