Origins: Herring the King

Subject: Origins: Herring the King
From: radriano
Date: 27 Mar 08 - 02:36 PM

I'm looking for information on an Irish song titled "Herring the King." All I have is the chorus:

Sing Thugamar fein an samhrad linn
The storm is o'er, 'tis calm again
And we have brought the Summer in
In holding chase with Herring the King

Subject: RE: Origins: Herring the King
From: Joe Offer
Date: 27 Mar 08 - 03:01 PM

where'd you hear it, Richard?
(and how the heck are you, old friend?)

-Joe-

Subject: RE: Origins: Herring the King
From: radriano
Date: 27 Mar 08 - 04:26 PM

Hi Joe,

Hey, I can't even remember what happened yesterday, Joe!

Oh, okay, okay, I'm fishing for information (pardon the pun).

The song appears in James N. Healy's book, Irish Songs of the Sea but with no useful information. The description of the song is:

"The life of the fisherman and the families who wait for the sight of his boat returning over rough seas has been sung by poets from countries other than Ireland. John M. Synge has probably set the Irish scene with his "Riders to the Sea" - but when the boat returns filled to the gunwhales with fish it is a time to rejoice. So, the fisherman sings of "Herring the King".

Also, the tune given for this song is the air "An Bruach 'na Carraige Baine" in the hedious key of C#m (four sharps) but the setting of the tune is quite bizarre.



I'm okay, Joe, thanks for asking. Peter and I are putting the finishing touches on our third shanty album!

Subject: RE: Origins: Herring the King
From: Anglogeezer
Date: 28 Mar 08 - 02:01 PM

The website "The Fiddler's Companion" has the following :-
********************************************************************
WE BROUGHT THE SUMMER WITH US (Thugamar fein an Samhradh linn). AKA and see "Samhradh, Samhradh." Irish, Slow Air (6/8 or 3/4 time). E Major/Mixolydian (Stanford/Petrie): D Mixolydian (Ó Canainn). Standard. One part (Ó Canainn): AB (Stanford/Petrie). The melody, which is still very much a part of the living tradition, appears earliest in Neales' Collection of the Most Celebrated Irish Tunes (Dublin, 1726), which Ó Canainn (1978) believes to be the first real collection of exclusively Irish folk music. It also appears in Burke Thumoth's collection of c. 1750 and Cooke's Selection of Twenty-one Favourite Original Irish Airs arranged for Pianoforte, Violin or Flute (Dublin, 1793). Breandan Breathnach, in Folk Music and Dances of Ireland, notes that the air is an example of the rare airs in Lah (Aeolian) mode.
**
Of all the fish that's in the sea,
The Herring is king, the herring is king.
Sing thugamur fein an samhra linn
Tis we have brought the summer in.
**
Ó Canainn (Traditional Slow Airs of Ireland), 1995; No. 97, pg. 83 (appears as "Thugamar Féin an Samhradh Linn"). Stanford/Petrie (Complete Collection), 1905; No. 502, pg. 127. Tubridy (Irish Traditional Music, Vol. 1), 1999; pg. 2 (appears as "Thugamar Féin an Samhradh Linn").
***********************************************************************
It may give you some leads

regards
Jake

Subject: RE: Origins: Herring the King
From: radriano
Date: 28 Mar 08 - 04:57 PM

Thank you, Jake!

Subject: RE: Origins: Herring the King
From: GUEST,Steve Gardham
Date: 28 Mar 08 - 05:38 PM

Jake's posting would seem to suggest it is related to the UK east/south coast catalogue song 'The Red Herring/Herring's Head' which is pretty well-known in those areas and even has an inland equivalent called 'The Old Sow/Dead Pig'

Subject: RE: Origins: Herring the King
From: Thompson
Date: 28 Mar 08 - 05:57 PM

Thugamar féin an samhraidh linn is an old song sung at the time of booleying - that joyous time when the cows were brought to the high mountain pastures to fatten in early summer by the young maidens - and which was sung to greet Queen Elizabeth I of England by Irish children at some stage - did the old rip visit Ireland?

My memory of the song is vague, but I remember it as involving heifers rather than herrings:

Samhradh! Samhradh! Bainne na gamhna!
Thugamar féin an samhraidh linn!

Subject: RE: Origins: Herring the King
From: Bob the Postman
Date: 28 Mar 08 - 09:11 PM

A Newfoundland variant of "Herring's Head" here on GEST's site. I have heard a recording of a Newfoundland choir singing this song with a refrain not unlike those cited above:

Of all the fish that's in the sea
The herring that's the fish for me
Sing whack fol a toora right fol a toora
Fol de rol day

Subject: RE: Origins: Herring the King
From: Malcolm Douglas
Date: 28 Mar 08 - 10:14 PM

The phrase appears in a number of quite different songs. See the earlier discussions

Thugamar fein an samhradh linn

'S óró londubh buí

The Herring Song

Subject: RE: Origins: Herring the King
From: radriano
Date: 01 Apr 08 - 11:28 AM

Thugamar féin an samhraidh linn is a line that appears in "Herring the King" but the song "Thugamar féin an samhraidh linn" is a different one and I don't think Herring the King is related to the "Herring's Head" song.

Like I said earlier in the thread, Healy's book says nothing useful about the song with relation to its history.

Subject: RE: Origins: Herring the King
From: MartinRyan
Date: 01 Apr 08 - 06:31 PM

Richard

I agree - this one is surely unrelated to the "Herring's Head" family. If anything, it has a rather literary and in some ways, carol-like feel to it. My guess is a 19C. drinking song or something like that. I'll be in Dublin next week and may have a chance to hunt in the Tradiaitonal Music Archive.

Regards

Subject: RE: Origins: Herring the King
From: pavane
Date: 02 Apr 08 - 04:43 AM

Here is a link to a book containing a version, but unfortunately only small snippets can be viewed. Maybe you can find the book in a library?

A Treasury of Irish Poetry in the English Tongue By Stopford Augustus Brooke, Th
Published 1900
Smith, Elder

Subject: RE: Origins: Herring the King
From: pavane
Date: 02 Apr 08 - 04:46 AM

It should be available, as a facsimile was printed in 2007
Published 2007
Lightning Source Inc

624 pages
ISBN:1432684140
Add to my library
Write review
Barnes&Noble.com - $45.95

This scarce antiquarian book is included in our special Legacy Reprint Series. In the interest of creating a more extensive selection of rare historical book reprints, we have chosen to reproduce this title even though it may possibly have occasional imperfections such as missing and blurred pages, missing text, poor pictures, markings, dark backgrounds and other reproduction issues beyond our control. Because this work is culturally important, we have made it available as a part of our commitment to protecting, preserving and promoting the world's literature.

Subject: RE: Origins: Herring the King
From: pavane
Date: 02 Apr 08 - 04:57 AM

From examination of the snippets of text, the lines:

Sing thugamur fein an samhra linn
Tis we have brought the summer in.

seem to be used as a chorus in this song.

(You can get a little more text displayed by changing the search keys. Try Shawn Eagle to see part of another vrse)

Subject: RE: Origins: Herring the King
From: nutty
Date: 02 Apr 08 - 06:38 AM

The poetry book is readily available on line from abe books. Copies are much cheaper in the States than in the UK.

Subject: RE: Origins: Herring the King
From: GUEST,Martin Ryan
Date: 02 Apr 08 - 06:54 AM

It's very likely that the Traditional Music Archive in Dublin will have a copy. I'll check.

Regards

Subject: RE: Origins: Herring the King
From: radriano
Date: 02 Apr 08 - 01:41 PM

Okay, I found what may be the original source of "Herring the King."

Alfred Percival Graves apparently wrote a song called Herring the King. The website I found this on does not give a date - the url is: http://www.sundown.pair.com/Sharp/Lyra%20Celtica/modern_irish_2.htm.

It's kind of an odd song. Seems like a fishing song written by someone who's never fished. There is also no melody given so it may be just a poem. It's my guess that this poem might have gone through the folk process that eventually resulted in the other version of Herring the King.

Here's the song:

HERRING IS KING

Let all the fish that swim the sea
Salmon and turbot, cod and ling
Bow down the head and bend the knee
To herring, their king! to Herring, their king!

Chorus:
Sing, Hugamar fein an sowra lin',
'Tis we have brought the summer in

The sun sank down so round and red
Upon the bay, upon the bay
The sails shook Idly overhead
Becalmed we lay, becalmed we lay

Till Shawn the eagle dropped on deck
The bright-eyed boy, the bright-eyed boy
'Tis he had spied your silver track
Herring, our joy, herring, our joy

It is in with the sails and away to shore
With the rise and swing, the rise and swing
Of two stout lads at each smoking oar
After herring, our king! herring, our king!

The Manx and Cornish raised the shout
And joined the chase, and joined the chase
But their fleets they fouled as they went about
And we won the race, we won the race

For we turned adn faced you full to land
Down the goleen long, the goleen long
And after you slipped from strand to strand
Our nets so strong, our nets so strong

Then we called to our sweethearts and our wives
Come welcome us home, welcome us home
Till they ran to meet us for their lives
Into the foam, into the foam

O kissing of hands and waving of caps
From girl and boy, from girl and boy
While you leapt by scores in the lasses' laps
Herring our joy, herring our joy!

Subject: RE: Origins: Herring the King
From: Malcolm Douglas
Date: 02 Apr 08 - 02:43 PM

The reverse is the case. A P Graves (1846-1931) wrote a lot of songs incorporating or based upon traditional and/or older material, and this is one of them.

An earlier example of 'Herring the King', beginning 'Of all the fish that roam the sea', was published in Horncastle, Music of Ireland, I, 1844. It has a rather literary flavour, and was probably itself worked up from older material. It is re-printed in Alfred Moffat, Minstrelsy of Ireland, 1897, 168-9. Moffat notes:

'... As "The Brink of the White Rocks" the tune was published four years earlier in Bunting's third collection; Bunting states that he obtained it from a blind man in Westport in 1802. An ancient air called Thugamar fein a samhra lin; or, "We have brought the Summer with us," is printed in Bunting's Collection of 1796. An earlier and probably more genuine setting of it is to be found in Burk Thumoth's Twelve Scotch and Twelve Irish Airs, London, c.1745, entitled Hugar mu Fean, and another as Hugar mon fona souraling, in Mulhollan's Irish Tunes, 1804. The air adopted here has all the appearance of antiquity. Dr Petrie gives four settings of it in The Ancient Music of Ireland ...'

The set in Healy seems to have been copied from Horncastle or, perhaps more likely, from Moffat, not from tradition as he implies. The words are identical and the tune is even in the same key. Note, however, that much of the material in Healy was copied without acknowledgement from Father Joseph Ranson's Songs of the Wexford Coast, so that too may have been involved.

Subject: RE: Origins: Herring the King
From: radriano
Date: 02 Apr 08 - 06:18 PM

Well, blow me down!

Thanks, Malcolm. I have a copy of "The Ancient Music of Ireland" and I looked at it but for the longer title!

Subject: RE: Origins: Herring the King
From: radriano
Date: 03 Apr 08 - 12:50 PM

Malcolm,

I have the Bunting 1976 collection and "The Brink of the White Rocks" is there and in a much more friendly key. I'm hoping the Music Library at UC Berkeley might have a reference copy of some of the collections you mentioned.

Subject: RE: Origins: Herring the King
From: radriano
Date: 03 Apr 08 - 06:48 PM

The University of California, Los Angeles has a copy of Burk Thumoth's Twelve Scotch and Twelve Irish Airs, London, c.1745. I may be able to get them to photocopy or scan Hugar mu Fean for me.

Subject: RE: Origins: Herring the King
From: pavane
Date: 04 Apr 08 - 03:16 AM

I have a slight historical interest in this one, too. My ancestors came over from Amsterdam around 1803 to found the Dutch Herring Fishery in Billingsgate, London.

Subject: RE: Origins: Herring the King
From: radriano
Date: 07 Apr 08 - 12:26 PM

Refresh, please.

Subject: ADD: Herring the King
From: radriano
Date: 08 Apr 08 - 11:53 AM

Well, I've learned a lot about the air to this song but not much about the song itself. Here's the rest of the lyrics:

Herring the King
Words: Traditional (so the book states)
Air: An Bruach na Carraige Baine (The Brink of the White Rocks)
Source: James N. Healy, "Irish Songs of the Sea"


Of all the fish that roam the sea
The Herring alone our King shall be
So fill your cup, ye fishers strong
And drink his health full, deep and strong

Sing Thugamar fein an samhrad linn
The storm is o'er, 'tis calm again
And we have brought the summer in
In holding chase with Herring our King

I think with me you'll all agree
We to our King should thankful be
He clothes us, feeds us, pays the rent
And cheers us in the time of Lent

Oh! who would not a fisher be,
And lead a life so wild and free?
Grim care we leave upon the shore
To wait until our voyage is o'er

Then once more hearken unto me
The Herring alone our King shall be
So fill your cups, ye fishers strong
And drink his health full, deep and strong

The Hargrove Music Library at UC Berkeley had a copy of Alfred Moffat's book "Minstrelsy of Ireland, 1897" and the lyrics are identical to those in Healy's book, and again with no useful information about the song itself. As a sea song the lyrics don't seem very traditional. The line in the third verse that says, "grim care we leave upon the shore to wait until our voyage is o'er" was not written by anyone who has lived as a fisherman.

Subject: RE: Origins: Herring the King
From: MartinRyan
Date: 10 Apr 08 - 11:38 AM

Had a look in the Irish Traditional Music Archive today.

- they have the Moffat book alright.
- no copy of Horncastle's book, though there is one, apparently, in the National Library of Ireland. That said, it appears, so far, that Moffat's text is taken from it.
- Nothing in Ransome.
- BUT it shows in several of Walton's publications over the years, often under the title "Of all the fish that's in the sea". This is a very likely source for Healy's set, methinks.


The water is muddied in several cases where it is unclear whether authors are talking about the song set or the air.

Regards
p.s. For the Choice Aeons among us - there's a copy of the relevant pages from Moffat in Ruth Bauerle's "The James Joyce Songbook"

Subject: RE: Origins: Herring the King
From: radriano
Date: 10 Apr 08 - 02:53 PM

Hi Martin,

Thanks for looking.

As I mentioned in an earlier post here, the Hargrove Music Library at UC Berkeley has a copy of the Moffat book. No useful information about the song there either.

My thanks to all who have added to this thread!

Subject: RE: Origins: Herring the King
From: Malcolm Douglas
Date: 10 Apr 08 - 07:15 PM

I have a copy of the Moffat book myself, which is how I contrived to quote from it. The example he prints was, as I said, taken from Horncastle; if we are to take his word for it, which we have no reason not to. Healy could have plagiarised his material from several possible sources, but I'd think Moffat most likely, as he also uses the same title.

Subject: RE: Origins: Herring the King
From: MartinRyan
Date: 11 Apr 08 - 05:12 AM

Malcolm

Agreed.

A curious coincidence: as I was searching the shelves for the Horncastle book (having misunderstood the index!), Nicholas Carolan, Director of the archive, asked what I was looking for. "Book by a man called Horncastle.." said I. "Must be Horncastle Week", said Nicholas "That's the second enquiry we've had this week for him!". The other turned out to be from a local history society in England doing some genealogical research.