question on Outlandish Knight

Subject: Lyr Add: OUTLANDISH KNIGHT
From: GUEST,Roberto
Date: 28 Sep 02 - 04:09 PM

The Penguin Book version is quite near to what Norma Waterson sings, but it isn't the very same. Where I can't get the exact words, the Penguin Book version doesn't help me. The only thing to do would be to listen to the record and try to write down the words. I still hope somebody who has the CD will do that. Another version very similar to the Penguin Book's is the one by A.L.Lloyd:

An outlandish knight from the north land came
And he came wooing of me
And he told me he'd take me to that northern land
And there he would marry me

Well, she mounted on her lily-white horse
And he upon the grey
And away they did ride to the fair riverside
Three hours before it was day

He says, unlight, unlight my little Polly
Unlight, unlight, cries he
For six pretty maids I've drowned before
And the seventh thou art to be

She says, go get a sickle to crop the thistle
That grows beside the brim
That it may not mingle with me curly locks
Nor harm my lily-white skin

So he got a sickle to crop the thistle
That grow beside the brim
And she catched him around the middle so small
And tumbled him into the stream

Then she mounted on her lily-white horse
And she did ride away
And she arrived at her father's door
Three hours before it was day

Now the parrot being in the windy so high
A-hearing the lady, he did say
I'm afraid that some ruffians have led you astray
That you've tarried so long away

Don't prittle, don't prattle, my pretty Polly
Nor tell no tales of me
And your cage shall be of the glittering gold
And your perch of the best ivory

Now the master being in the bedroom so high
A-hearing the parrot, he did say
What's the matter with you, my pretty Polly
You're prattling so long before day

There came an old cat on the top of me cage
To take me sweet life away
I was just calling on my young mistress
To drive that old pussy away

Subject: RE: question on Outlandish Knight
From: Malcolm Douglas
Date: 28 Sep 02 - 11:43 PM

The texts you quote are nearly identical. Hardly surprising; as Lloyd, too, recorded the version published in the Penguin Book (of which he was an editor). Doubtless there are a few differences of wording in some places due to deliberate or inadvertent modification in both his and Norma's arrangements of the song, but they do seem to be very minor ones. At present I don't have either recording, so I'm afraid I can't be more specific about the fine detail. As it happens, the "Penguin" version from which both derive wasn't exactly what it was made out to be; but that's another story.

Subject: Lyr Add: OUTLANDISH KNIGHT (from Norma Waterson)
From: Abby Sale
Date: 06 Oct 02 - 05:54 PM

Roberto: Sorry for the delay - had to get around to it.  I tend to agree with the others that it doesn't much matter but wotthehell - you wanted to know what the damn words were...

From Norma on the new Wart/Cart CD, Dark Light, best as I hear it.

Outlandish Knight

Well, an outlandish knight from the northern lands came
He came wooing of me
He told me he'd take me up to the north lands
There he would marry me

Go fetch me some of your father's gold
Some of your mother's fee
And two of the best of your father's horses
There stands thirty and three

She's fetched him some of her father's gold
Some of her mother's fee
And two of the best of her father's horses
There stands thirty and three

Then she's mounted on her milk-white steed
He's rode the dapple grey
They rode till they came to the broad riverside
Three hours before it was day

Light down, light down my pretty fair maid
Light down, light down, cried he
Six pretty maidens I've drowned here
And the seventh one you shall be

Pull off, pull off your silken gown
Deliver it over to me
For it is too fine and much too fair
To rot in salt water sea

Go get me a sickle to crop off the thistle
That grows beneath the brim
It will not mingle with my curly locks
Or mangle my glittering skin

  Child "F"  'Go fetch the sickle, to crop the nettle
                      That grows so near the brim,
                      For fear it should tangle my golden locks,
                      Or freckle my milk-white skin.'

He's got the sickle to crop off the thistle
That grows beneath the brim
She's caught him round by his middle so small
Tumbled him into the stream

Sometimes he sank, sometimes he swam
Down to the bank came he
Oh help me, oh help me, my pretty fair maid
Or drowned I shall be

Lie there, lie there, you false-hearted man
Lie there instead of me
Six pretty maidens you've drowned here
But the seventh one has drowned thee

She's mounted on her milk-white steed
And led the dapple grey
She rode till she came to her father's door
An hour before it was day

But the parrot was up in his window so high
On hearing the lady, he did say
I was afraid that some ruffians had done you harm
You've tarried so long before day

Don't prittle, don't prattle, my pretty Polly
Don't tell no tales of me
Your cage shall be made of the glistening gold
And your perch of the best ivory

But her father was up in the bedroom so high
Hearing the parrot, did say
What is the matter, my pretty Polly
You've cried so long before day?

Oh, there came an old cat in my window high
To take my life away
And I was just calling my young mistress
To scare that old pussy away
 

Subject: RE: question on Outlandish Knight
From: Abby Sale
Date: 06 Oct 02 - 06:05 PM

Malcolm:

As it happens, the "Penguin" version from which both derive wasn't exactly what it was made out to be; but that's another story.

Ok. What's the story? Overall, versions are much the same but I guess it could easily be a collated text. Say beginning with the "sickle" verse - it only occurs in "F."

Got some good folk-gossip for us?

Subject: RE: question on Outlandish Knight
From: Malcolm Douglas
Date: 06 Oct 02 - 07:27 PM

Ralph Vaughan Williams didn't actually note a text from Mr. Hilton at all, so far as can be told; just the tune. The Penguin text is mainly that noted by C. S. Parsonson from a Mr. Lugg of Launceston, Cornwall, in 1905, with additional verses from other, unspecified, sources (probably broadsides). Mr. Lugg's set was published in The Journal of the Folk Song Society vol.IV (issue 15) 1910; pp.116-117.

RVW was inclined to go for tunes only; "Hey, we can always get the words off a broadside". He missed a lot of good stuff that way, and occasionally -though not often enough- regretted it. While it's perfectly true that most sets of this song collected in the early 20th century are clearly derived from broadsides, it's disappointing that we don't have the details.

Subject: RE: question on Outlandish Knight
From: robinia
Date: 07 Oct 02 - 05:53 AM

I'm fond of an Appalachian version of the ballad and particularly like the climactic line (from Jean Ritchie's singing of "False Sir John"), "she made a dash with her tender little arms and pushed him into the sea" -- so feminine!!

Subject: RE: question on Outlandish Knight
From: GUEST,roberto
Date: 07 Oct 02 - 01:47 PM

Thanks to Abby Sale. That is what I was looking for, trying to get the text as sung by Norma Waterson. Thank you. Roberto

Subject: RE: question on Outlandish Knight
From: Nerd
Date: 07 Oct 02 - 04:31 PM

This is a great song, and an indication that the modern fascination with serial killers goes back many years (just saw Red Dragon this weekend)!

For those who care, JF Dutertre's version of Tueur Des Femmes (inserted above by Malcolm) is also on his CD Ballades Francaises, which is available on the Musique Du Monde label. This means it actually turns up at US record shops like Tower and HMV. Dutertre does sometimes record multiple versions of the same song, so this may not be the exact text Malcolm contributed, but it's a great CD, as is the sequel Ballades Francaises Volume 2. I'm not sure if the Epinette des Vosges album is out on CD, but I think it was and is now deleted.

Nic Jones recorded two different versions of this song, one on each of his first two albums. The first was a standard one beginning "An Outlandish Knight from the Northlands came, and he came courting of me), while the second plunged you into the action with "He's followed her up, and he's followed her down, and it's into the room where she lay." I always liked the second, with its brisk tune. Frankie Armstrong's strong unaccompanied version of this is always stirring as well.

When I get home, I'll give a listen to Carthy's and see if I can figure out what the chorus is...

Subject: RE: question on Outlandish Knight
From: Amos
Date: 07 Oct 02 - 08:14 PM

I don't see mentioned here Richard Dyer-Bennett's recording of "The Cruel Youth" (IIRC), the same story in short but featuring a cruel youth, and a damsel who persuades him to turn around while she takes off her gown, and throws him into the sea the moment he does so. The rest of the tale is a very close parallel to the Outlandish Knight.

A

Subject: RE: question on Outlandish Knight
From: Abby Sale
Date: 08 Oct 02 - 10:40 PM

Amos: I have a feeling you're thinking of "Eggs and Marrowbone." Also a good song but the woman's the baddy there. I don't think RDB ever recorded any "Outlandish" version. But if he did, it must have been early on. I'd like to hear it.

Subject: RE: question on Outlandish Knight
From: GUEST,Roberto
Date: 09 Oct 02 - 11:52 AM

I'm interested in the CD Ballades Francaises by JF Dutertre, but I can't find using Google who sells it. Can somebody tell me something about? Thank you. Roberto Campo

Subject: RE: question on Outlandish Knight
From: Uncle_DaveO
Date: 09 Oct 02 - 12:15 PM

Yes, Abby, Dyer-Bennett recorded a version of this. I'm too lazy to go dig out the LP at the moment, but the words were very close to The Lonely Willow Tree in the DT. See:

The Lonely Willow Tree
Dave Oesterreich

Subject: RE: question on Outlandish Knight
From: Nerd
Date: 09 Oct 02 - 03:00 PM

Roberto,

The CD features Dutertre singing and playing epinette des Vosges (a French relative of the mountain dulcimer) and hurdy-gurdy. He's joined by guest musicians like Jean-Loup Baly on bowed psaltery, Michel sikiotakis on guitar, flute and tin whistle, and Jean Francois Vrod on violin. So it's a disc of tasteful acoustic arrangements of French ballads. The songs are:

Les Tristes Noces
La Porcheronne
La Blanche Biche
Le Maure-Sarrasin
Le Prince Eugene
La Fille du Roi Loys
Jean Renaud
Les Anneaux de Marianson
Le Tueur Des Femmes
La Pernette.

Ballades Francaises Volume 2 features the same musicians plus Yvon Guilcher, meaning Dutertre's whole band Melusine is along for the ride. The Songs are:

L'Amante du Dauphin
Les Trois Princesses
Le Deuil D'Amour
Le Breuvage Empoisonne
La Belle Qui Fait La Morte
Le Chevalier a la Claire Epee
La Barbiere
La Mie Qui Meurt En Mal D'enfant
La Jolie Fille du Geolier
Le Flambeau D'Amour
Bella Louison
La Fille Parricide
Le Navire Merveilleux
Germine

The CDs are on the Musique Du Monde label, distributed by Buda Musique, and the discs have a website address:

www.budamusique.com

good luck, they're great!

Subject: RE: question on Outlandish Knight
From: Nerd
Date: 09 Oct 02 - 03:14 PM

I just went over to the Buda site, and you can indeed order the CDs directly from Buda. They have some cute Franglais descriptions there, like: "The stories of the pretty daughter of the jailer, of fairy crews, of parricides and of crossed love make us discover all the imaginary of Ancient France."

Subject: RE: question on Outlandish Knight
From: GUEST,what does the bit about the parrot mean?
Date: 08 Feb 04 - 08:10 PM

Subject: RE: question on Outlandish Knight
From: Uncle_DaveO
Date: 08 Feb 04 - 09:25 PM

Guest, 8:10 p.m>

A good thought: Succinct, and well phrased!

Subject: RE: question on Outlandish Knight
From: GUEST
Date: 09 Feb 04 - 06:02 PM

what does the parrot bit mean?

Subject: RE: question on Outlandish Knight
From: Uncle_DaveO
Date: 09 Feb 04 - 07:25 PM

What does the parrot bit mean? Nothing more than it says.   

Girl comes home, and the parrot asks her where she's been all night. She says to be quiet, and she'll give the parrot various goodies.

Daddy hears the parrot talking, and asks what's up, at that hour.

Parrot says, "There came an old cat on top of my cage, for to take my sweet life away. I was just callin' out to my young mistress, to drive that old cat away."

What's to mean? The parrot has been bribed to be part of the conspiracy to keep the girl's secret from her father.

Dave Oesterreich

Subject: RE: question on Outlandish Knight
From: Joybell
Date: 09 Feb 04 - 07:36 PM

Or is the bird a remnant from an earlier belief that souls of the dead were borne away by them? The bird would be able to tell all in this event. Joy

Subject: RE: question on Outlandish Knight
From: Malcolm Douglas
Date: 09 Feb 04 - 09:22 PM

Not in English-language forms, no; the song is a relatively late arrival in Britain and most of its supernatural elements were lost before it got here. In earlier forms (Netherlands and Scandinavia) there are occasionally talking birds, if I recall correctly; but these are of the distant, generic kind -common in folktales- that call veiled warnings to the heroine as she rides deeper into the wood where her lover has hung the bodies of his earlier victims.

It is most likely that the ballad came to Britain via France, where the drowning element came to the fore; there are, I think, no talking birds in French forms. Sad as it may seem, the whole motif is probably just a coincidence, or an element incorporated by analogy from other narratives where the dead do sometimes return in the form of birds; there is no internal evidence, though, that that is the case here.

That said, there are studies of the parrot business that I haven't had the chance to look at yet, and doubtless they go into all this in greater depth and may reach very different conclusions.

Subject: RE: question on Outlandish Knight
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 09 Feb 04 - 10:19 PM

Can you tell us more about the Scandinavian form, Malcolm?

SRS

Subject: RE: question on Outlandish Knight
From: Malcolm Douglas
Date: 10 Feb 04 - 12:17 AM

Not directly, at the moment; but a few general comments for now:

Child has plenty to say on the subject (his notes to Lady Isabel and the Elf Knight are detailed and extensive), but the best general study is probably still Holger Nygard's The Ballad of 'Heer Halewijn', Its Forms and Variations in Western Europe: A Study of the History and Nature of a Ballad Tradition (Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press, 1958) also published as F[olklore] Fellows] Communications, No. 169 (Helsinki: Suomalainen Tiedeakatemia/Academia Scientiarum Fennica, 1958). Nygard explores ballad forms of the story found throughout Western Europe, reaching the general conclusion that the oldest elements seem to belong to the Netherlands, which he is inclined to consider to be the centre from which it spread; roughly, through Germany into Poland, Hungary and Czechoslovakia, through Denmark into Scandinavia, and through France into Britain. The diagrams get quite complicated, and I certainly can get no more than the very roughest gist of some of the examples quoted, which are deconstructed and without music. Nevertheless, it's an enormously interesting book, but far too extensive for me to attempt any proper sort of summary here.

More recently (1967), Lajos Vargyas has suggested a line of descent reaching back to Central Asia, but that seems to have been based on iconography rather than any direct evidence. I haven't had the opportunity of reading that book so far, though, so I have only Bert Lloyd's comments to go on: he was quite keen on that sort of idea, but doesn't commit himself. There have been a good few further studies too, of course, taken from various different viewpoints but mainly concentrating on detail (such as the parrot episode) rather than distribution. Plenty I haven't read yet, so my comments shouldn't be taken as in any way definitive.

So far as Scandinavian forms are concerned, you can see some 28 Norwegian texts at the Norwegian Universities Documentation Project:

Kvinnemordaren, but you do need some knowledge of the language -more than I have, at any rate- to get a great deal from them.

Subject: RE: question on Outlandish Knight
From: GUEST,visitor (Kirsty)
Date: 10 Feb 04 - 12:35 AM

This is my first visit and I'm really enjoying reading the discussions. Please excuse me if these have already been suggested and I missed it:

1)"Ba-ba and a lily-ba"

Maybe it's (meaningless here, but) transferred over from something like Ewan MacColl's version of The Elfin Knight, "blaw, blaw, blaw winds blaw" ?

2)"Oh (ought oh ought)?? would give to me rest
And* that young knight lay here on my breast."

Possibly "aught" ("anything") ?

Subject: RE: question on Outlandish Knight
From: Malcolm Douglas
Date: 10 Feb 04 - 12:49 AM

This is quite an old thread now (just recently brought back from the mists of time by that parrot fellow) and I think that we may have gone further into that somewhere or other; can't recall at this time of night whether it was here or in another thread. Could well be worth revisiting some points and tying up some loose ends, though, and I at least know a fair bit more than I did four years ago when the question was first asked. Tomorrow, maybe.

Subject: RE: question on Outlandish Knight
From: Joybell
Date: 10 Feb 04 - 07:32 PM

The parrot bit does rather raise some questions. Of course ballads are seldom logical but - Why did she tell the parrot ANYTHING? Why didn't she say, "Mind your own business, you snoopy parrot!" and leave it at that. At least the bird in the ballad "Young Hunting/Henry Lee" witnessed the murder. You'd want to offer a nice golden cage to that bird. The whole thing makes more sense in that story.
Also why did Polly call her pet parrot after herself? Was Polly - the girl, named after the pet parrot?
I do so enjoy these discussions. Where are they leading us? Is this the path to true enlightenment? If it is - can I keep up? Joy

Subject: RE: question on Outlandish Knight
From: Malcolm Douglas
Date: 10 Feb 04 - 08:33 PM

The names seem to have become a bit mixed up in some forms of the song, but I wouldn't pay too much attention to that really. You don't tell a talking animal to mind its own business, though; you always have to bribe it, or else make it an offer it can't refuse; as in the Saki story about the talking cat that blackmailed everybody until they brought up the subject of vets.

Meanwhile, here's a link to a Heer Halewijn text with a translation into English. It seems pretty good on the whole, though there are some odd word-choices in one or two places. Best ignore the accompanying notes, though, as they make some rather dubious assumptions which need a good bit of salt to go with them.

Heer Halewijn

Subject: RE: question on Outlandish Knight
From: GUEST,padgett
Date: 11 Feb 04 - 09:10 AM

I reached the conclusion that the parrot was really her own conscience telling her not to have any qualms about her drowning the knight taking his money and his horses,

lovely alliteration in my version

don't prittle or prattle my pretty polly
don't tell any tales upon me
for your cage shall be built of the glitters in gold
and the door of the best ivory

Subject: RE: question on Outlandish Knight
From: Joybell
Date: 11 Feb 04 - 04:46 PM

Pagett, That's a lovely bit. Thanks. It's the alliteration that's missing from modern "tradition style" songs I've always thought. The story is taken to be more important than the telling.
I never tell a talking animal what to do actually. It's the deep love of these old ballads that makes me comment on their quirks. When I sing them I find myself caught up in the sadness and suddenly crying at the vivid imagery. The desperate bargain that Polly makes with her parrot doesn't seem at all strange when you sing the ballad.
                                                   Joybelle

Subject: RE: question on Outlandish Knight
From: Uncle_DaveO
Date: 12 Feb 04 - 11:34 AM

GUEST,padgett said, in part:

I reached the conclusion that the parrot was really her own conscience telling her not to have any qualms about her drowning the knight taking his money and his horses,

Padgett, I don't question your right to interpret a portion of this or any other song however you wish in your own mind. But when you suggest that the parrot was "really" the voice of her conscience, I wonder if you are suggesting that this was the meaning traditionally assigned in the singing and passing down of the song.

If we were talking about what I'll call "an authored song", then speculation as to the author's meaning is entirely proper (although your suggested meaning is rather unlikely in this particular case, in my opinion). But for a song which has come together through gradual accumulation and alteration, through the contributions of many singers over a long period of time, for one today to suggest that the surface meaning covers a hidden moralistic meaning is unwarranted.

And even if it were an authored song, there is nothing in the parrot incident that suggests the voice of her conscience salving her feelings.

The English and Scottish traditional ballads, in my opinion and understanding, are pretty up-front, telling a story of events and leaving the listener to his/her own interpretation. They don't tell you something like, "Oh, wasn't she terrible to kill that poor baby that she'd had out of wedlock?" And I don't think of any of the ballads that deal with a character's inner feelings, either.

Dave Oesterreich

Subject: Lyr Add: THE OUTLANDISH KNIGHT
From: Joe Offer
Date: 12 Feb 04 - 04:25 PM

There's also this version (click) posted by Hesperis:



Thread #24700   Message #284828

Posted By: hesperis

25-Aug-00 - 02:44 AM

Thread Name: Ballads with Plot Twists?

Subject: Lyr Add: THE OUTLANDISH KNIGHT

leenia - for you.

---

The Outlandish Knight

An outlandish knight came out of the North
To woo a maiden fair
He promised to take her to the North lands
Her father's only heir

"Come, fetch me some of your father's gold
And some of your mother's fee
And two of the best nags out of the stable
Where they stand thirty and three"

She fetched him some of her father's gold
And some of her mother's fee
And two of the best nags out of the stable
Where they stand thirty and three

She mounted her on her milk-white steed
He on the dapple grey
They rode till they came unto the sea-side
Three hours before it was day

"Light off, light off thy milk-white steed
And deliver it unto me
Six pretty maids have I drowned here
And thou the seventh shall be

Pull off, pull off thy silken gown
And deliver it unto me
Methinks it looks to rich and too gay
To rot in the salt sea

Pull off, pull off thy silken stays
And deliver them unto me
Methinks they are to fine and gay
To rot in the salt sea

Pull off, pull off thy Holland smock
And deliver it unto me
Methinks it looks to rich and gay
To rot in the salt sea"

"If I must pull off my Holland smock
Pray turn thy back unto me
For it is not fitting that such a ruffian
A woman unclad should see"

He turned his back towards her
And viewed the leaves so green
She caught him round the middle so small
And tumbled him into the stream

He dropped high, and he dropped low
Until he came to the tide ---
"Catch hold of my hand, my pretty maiden
And I will make you my bride"

"Lie there, lie there, you false-hearted man
Lie there instead of me
Six pretty maidens have you drowned here
And the seventh has drowned thee"

She mounted on her milk-white steed
And led the dapple grey
She rode till she came to her father's hall
Three hours before it was day

---

Is there a melody for this?
Where can I learn it?

One other thing, although this is one of my favorite childhood poems, it is not the one that named my cat.

~*sirepseh*~

Subject: RE: question on Outlandish Knight
From: LadyJean
Date: 13 Feb 04 - 12:35 AM

You will find "The Outlandish Knight" in my friend Sarah Zettel's book "Camelot's Shadow" which will be in the stores this May. Sarah did some of the research for this book on the mudcat, so I thought I'd give her book a shameless plug.
I've read a proof and it is good! It's calling itself a romance, but it is NOT a bodice ripper.

Subject: RE: question on Outlandish Knight
From: Joybell
Date: 13 Feb 04 - 05:11 PM

Pete Seeger recorded a good version of this ballad. He got the title wrong, calling it "The False Knight Upon the Road", however so you need to look for it under that title if you want to hear him sing it. I learned it from his recording and have been singing it for about 40 years. Can't be? Yes I believe it is!! Joy