Doug, Iam trying to discuss something steve gardham said here
quote steve gardham, below
What I have always said is that approx. 90% of the canon of English traditional songs have their earliest extant version on printed street literature or similar. that's a FACT. My OPINION, after 50 years of studying the relationship between print and oral tradition and hundreds of individual songs, is that 95% of them originated in this way. "


my opinion, is that this is inaccurate, steve has yet to provide evidence for what he calls facts