Turning to a conundrum that emerges from the MUSTRAD material on the origins of Pardon's songs: he thought his grandfather got the tunes from the broadsheets whereas these often did not include an indication of tune. So people think Pardon cannot be right about the source of the tunes. I know that often ballad sellers sang the songs (certainly in Ireland and also this applied to people selling sheet music with blues on in the US, often at the tent shows where the songs were sung). I think Munnelly says they would sing them over and over. If the same applies to the ballad sellers in Norfolk, this might explain where Pardon's grandfather got the tunes when these were roughly the same as those traditionally used for those songs?

Maybe this is something Steve Gardham might have a view on?