I've often thought it would be fun to teach a course on traditional songs as social history. They suggest a lot about how people lived. For example:(1) In mediaevel/early modern Scotland, it was more acceptable than elsewhere for a nobleman to marry "beneath himself" than elsewhere. Note "Laird of the Dainty Doon Bye" and "The Laird o' Drum." But noblewomen had best not do it. (Muckin' o' Geordie's Byre.) And a farmerdaughter decidedly had better not. (Bogie's Bonny Belle)(which for some reaon is not on the DT.)2. Consider these lines from "Lamkin":Oh pay me oh Lord Weary, oh pay me my fee! How can I pay Lamkin, I maun gone across the sea.Oh pay me, oh pay me, oh pay me oot of hand!How can I pay thee Lamkin unless I sell my land?Q. Did Lord Weary seal the fate of his wife and child by addressing a self-respecting craftsman as "thee"? In England by Elizabeth's time, this was a term of address for dogs and small children. How about Scotland.Q. "I maun gone across the sea." Suggests a mission so important, and so expensive, as to outweigh paying a mere craftsman for building a castle. Any ideas?