The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #3439 Message #4068648
Posted By: Thompson
17-Aug-20 - 01:14 PM
Thread Name: Origin: Red Haired Man's Wife (more info needed)
Subject: RE: Origin: Red Haired Man's Wife (more info needed)
Just came across a reference to this, with a tune, in Poets and Poetry of Munster by James Clarence Mangan. After the tune it says:
==
The Red-Haired Man's Wife
The following is the first stanza of Bean an Fhir Ruadh (The Red-Haired Man's Wife), which is quite common among the Munster peasantry:
Do thugas naoi mĂ a b-priosĂșn ceangailte cruaidh,
Bulta air mo chom 's mile glas as sud suas!
Do thugas sigh mar do thabharfadh ar aladh cois cuain
D'fhonn a bheith sinte sios le Bean an Fhir Ruadh.
I spent nine months in prison fettered and bound,
My body chained and secured with locks,
Bounded as the swan on the wave
In hopes to sit down beside the Red-Haired Man's Wife.
==
He's being a little tactful with the translation there, it's really in hopes to lie down beside her.