Origins: Slap Bum Taylor

Subject: Origins: Slap Bum Taylor
From: GUEST,David J
Date: 03 May 03 - 01:07 PM

You came good with my request for info' about 'Billy don't you weep for me', so here's a new challenge! Does anyone know anything about the song 'The Slap Bum Taylor'? All I know is that it is on an album called 'The Wide Midlands'on the Topic label (I would guess it was made in the early 1970's). I have the words but would like to know more about its origins. Thanks for any help.

Subject: RE: Origins: Slap Bum Taylor
From: Joe Offer
Date: 03 May 03 - 01:27 PM

Hi, David - looks like the words haven't been posted here. Could you post them for us?
Thanks.
-Joe Offer-

Subject: RE: Origins: Slap Bum Taylor
From: masato sakurai
Date: 03 May 03 - 01:31 PM

Not much info is given at folktrax:

SLAP BUM TAILOR, THE - who was consigned to Limbo prison for correcting a woman who insulted him - BS: Theophilus, Birmingham -- Roy PALMER (& ch): TOPIC 12-TS-210 1971

~Masato

Subject: RE: Origins: Slap Bum Taylor
From: GUEST,lighter
Date: 03 May 03 - 01:50 PM

Broadside text and (more or less arbitrarily selected) tune in Roy Palmer, Everyman's Book of British Ballads (1980).

Subject: RE: Origins: Slap Bum Taylor
From: Malcolm Douglas
Date: 03 May 03 - 01:53 PM

The Slap-bum Tailor appeared in Roy Palmer's Everyman's Book of British Ballads (1980; re-issued as A Book of British Ballads, Llanerch Press, 1998). The text was taken from a broadside issued by T. Bloomer of Birmingham, and slightly adapted by Palmer, who also set it to a tune of his own making, based on Old Farmer Buck. Bloomer seems to have been active between c.1816-1827 or so. I don't know anything about a Birmingham printer called Theophilus; I'd tend to take Palmer's information in preference to Kennedy's.

Subject: ADD: Slap Bum Tailor^^
From: Joe Offer
Date: 03 May 03 - 02:46 PM

Thanks, Malcolm. Here are the lyrics.

THE SLAP-BUM TAILOR

I'll sing you a song, it'll please you full well
Of a slap-bum tailor in London did dwell
One day with his neighbour fell in a sad rage,
And for slapping her bum she was put in a rage.

CHORUS
Oh, the poor tailor, pity the tailor
For slapping her bum he was put in limbo.
Oh, the poor tailor, pity the tailor.

This woman was a dealer in second-hand clothes;
One day in the street with a carpet she goes.
She began for to shake and to toss in the wind:
'Good lord,' says the tailor, 'Your dust will me blind.'

'I value thee not, at my door I will stand,
For a tailor is but the ninth part of a man.'
So as he was sewing and taking long stitches
The dust flew about him and spoiled his new breeches.

One day in a passion he called her a whore,
Then he jumped off his board and he run out of door;
He fell on his knee, crying, 'Come, madam, come,'
Then he turned up her clothes and he well slapped her bum.

The streets and the lanes was all of an uproar;
He banged her so hard till her buttocks was sore.
Some they did laugh and some did cry shame;
They raised such a mob till the constables came.

Then straight to the justice they took him with speed,
And told how he'd served this poor woman indeed;
They told he had beat her and slapped her bum,
When before the justice the tailor did come.

'For slapping her bum,' the justice replied,
'Seven days in the jail the tailor shall lie;
The poor woman's so ill she can't get out of bed,
So on bread and water the rogue shall be fed.'

So now the poor tailor in limbo do lie;
He'll remember the carpet when the dust it do fly.
The lads make their game, crying, 'Run, tailor, run,
She's a—shaking the carpet, run and slap her bum.'^^


ninth part of a man: Nine tailors make a man,' says the adage (though it is probably a corruption of 'Nine tellers make a man: a church bell tolled nine times indicates the death of a man)

Although he apparently has a legitimate grievance against a woman who insults him and spoils his work, the tailor's rough justice earns him seven days in limbo (prison).

Source: A Book of British Ballads, Roy Palmer, 1980

---

Click to play

^^

Subject: RE: Origins: Slap Bum Taylor
From: GUEST,David J
Date: 04 May 03 - 02:52 PM

Thanks everyone. You came good again! I have a feeling the last line in the first verse may actually be (in spite of Roy Palmer's recording)'And for slapping her bum he was put in a cage'. Cheers.

Subject: RE: Origins: Slap Bum Taylor
From: Joe Offer
Date: 04 May 03 - 10:50 PM

I'd agree, David - I added your comment to the lyrics I submitted to the Digital Tradition.
Anybody have access to the broadside?
Thanks.
-Joe Offer-

Subject: RE: Origins: Slap Bum Taylor
From: GUEST,MICK
Date: 12 Mar 09 - 04:26 PM

i googled "The Slap Bum Tailor" after hearing the TOPIC West Midlands LP (12-TS-210)this evening

only 31 hits from Google, so it was good to come straight here and read the info, and find the lyrics

Thanks

Subject: RE: Origins: Slap Bum Taylor
From: GUEST
Date: 13 Mar 09 - 12:03 PM

lyrics from the Topic LP,one verse missing, and others slightly altered, but the majority remains unchanged:

THE SLAP-BUM TAILOR

I'll sing you a song, it'll please you full well
Of a slap-bum tailor in London did dwell
One day with a neighbour he fell in a sad rage,
And for slapping her bum she was put in a rage.

CHORUS
Oh, the poor tailor, pity the tailor
For slapping her bum he was put in limbo.
Oh, the poor tailor, pity the tailor.

This woman was a dealer in second-hand clothes;
One day in the street with a carpet she goes.
She began for to shake and to toss in the wind:
'Good lord,' says the tailor, 'Your dust does me blind.'

'I value thee not, at my door I will stand,
For a tailor is but the ninth part of a man.'
and as he was sewing and taking long stitches
The dust flew about him and spoiled his new breeches.

so he flew in a passion he called her a whore,
Then he jumped off his board and he run out of door;
He fell on one knee, crying, 'Come, madam, come,'
Then he turned up her clothes and he well slapped her bum.

The streets and the lanes was all of an uproar;
He banged her so hard till her buttocks was sore.
Some they did laugh and some did cry shame;
They raised such a mob till the constables came.


'For slapping her bum,' the justice replied,
'Seven days in the jail the tailor shall lie;
He beat her so hard, she can't get out of bed,
So on bread and water the rogue shall be fed.'

So now the poor tailor in limbo do lie;
He'll remember the carpet till the day he die
The lads make their game, crying, 'Run, tailor, run,
She's a—shaking the carpet, run and slap her bum.'^^