Help with meaning of C--an--Y

Subject: Help with meaning of C--an--Y
From: GUEST,pavane
Date: 23 Oct 01 - 07:55 AM

I came across this song in the Bodleian Ballad library - does anyone know what it means? Bawdy or just meant to sound it?
The tune is given as Go-ahead is a good Motto, Look ahead is another

The image is here: My aunty's china C-an-y

The text starts

There is a mourning noo ay ilk anes door
My faith tis come our turn noo
We hae got a shock might draw a tear
A sad mishap to mourn noo;
But kind folks, dinna smirk, I pray
For it happened to my Aunty
I gaed to clean her house the day
But I broke her China C-an-y

Chorus
For O it was a bonnie dish
To lay aside a jokin
And yet sae silly it was done
Im sure tis just provokin

The floor in haste I soopit in
My faith I made a sweepstake
I think twill break her tender heart
Because it was a keepsake
By why should I stand blatherin here
To keep you laughing canty
I should be hame to soothe her care
For the breakin o her C-an-y

It was nicely flowered on the outside
As weel as round the border
She washd it weel - twas her pride
To keep it in good order
We had but ane aboot the hoose
Ye ken theyre rather scanty
Where will she brew her drappi noo
Sin I hae broke her c--an-y

(There are two more verses in similar vein)

Subject: RE: Help with meaning of C--an--Y
From: GUEST,pavane
Date: 23 Oct 01 - 07:58 AM

I forgot to say that cats and kittens appear in the last verse, and by a strange coincidence, the sheet was printed for the Booksellers, Cat's Head, Mew Lane, London!!!!

Subject: RE: Help with meaning of C--an--Y
From: nutty
Date: 23 Oct 01 - 08:26 AM

Sorry .. - can't help Pavane but isn't The Bodleian a fascinating site and such a great resource when you have the time to delve ....I'm totally hooked

Subject: RE: Help with meaning of C--an--Y
From: Uncle_DaveO
Date: 23 Oct 01 - 10:46 AM

Pretty clear it's a chamber pot, but what the "C-an-Y" reference means I don't have a clue.

Dave Oesterreich

Subject: RE: Help with meaning of C--an--Y
From: GUEST,Roger the skiffler
Date: 23 Oct 01 - 10:54 AM

When I were a nipper wi' now't but an outside khazi, we called the indoor facilities chamberpots, jerries or guzundas ('cos they guzunda the bed!). Can't think what the missing letters are or why it should need censoring!
RtS

Subject: RE: Help with meaning of C--an--Y
From: Megan L
Date: 23 Oct 01 - 11:52 AM

Couldnt be as simple as a chanty could it, thats what we called them.

Subject: RE: Help with meaning of C--an--Y
From: MMario
Date: 23 Oct 01 - 11:58 AM

looks like Megan has it.

Subject: RE: Help with meaning of C--an--Y
From: GUEST,Roger the skiffler
Date: 23 Oct 01 - 02:03 PM

...could be. And a sea chantey is always emptied downwind!
RtS

Subject: RE: Help with meaning of C--an--Y
From: Allan C.
Date: 23 Oct 01 - 02:15 PM

Seems to me the main clue is in the definition of "drappi" which seems to have been brewed in this thing. Sounds to me like a nickname for a particular sort of teapot - perhaps referring to its place or origin. Just guessing, though.

Subject: RE: Help with meaning of C--an--Y
From: Allan C.
Date: 23 Oct 01 - 02:20 PM

That should read: place of origin.

It could also refer to a (then) commonly known manufacturer of China.

Subject: RE: Help with meaning of C--an--Y
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 23 Oct 01 - 03:33 PM

Yep as a child around the Glasgow area a chamber pot was called a chantey or a chantey po, or just a po, it was also known as a gozunda 'cos it "goes under" the bed.

Jock

Subject: RE: Help with meaning of C--an--Y
From: Scabby Douglas
Date: 23 Oct 01 - 06:12 PM

think it originates from Shantung china/porcelain

Cheers

Steven

Subject: RE: Help with meaning of C--an--Y
From: GUEST,Boab
Date: 24 Oct 01 - 01:18 AM

Aye---to quote the concluding phrase of a naughty wee verse--"Cocky-bendie had a wife, she wis verra cantie, she went in ablow the bed, an' tumml't ow'r the chantie".

Subject: RE: Help with meaning of C--an--Y
From: GUEST,Pavane
Date: 24 Oct 01 - 03:11 AM

Thanks everyone

Subject: RE: Help with meaning of C--an--Y
From: Allan C.
Date: 24 Oct 01 - 08:00 AM

Yeah...but isn't somebody going to tell me what the heck "drappi" means?

Subject: RE: Help with meaning of C--an--Y
From: GUEST,Dita (at work)
Date: 24 Oct 01 - 08:41 AM

"Drappi" is strong drink, as in "a wee drappie o' it", "a drap o' the best". A wee (small) drappie. A measure of spirits. In the above song the word for the measure replaces the word for drink. A similar use, in Scots, is of the term hauf (half), which again is used to represent whisky.
love, john.

Subject: RE: Help with meaning of C--an--Y
From: Charley Noble
Date: 24 Oct 01 - 09:05 AM

"Chantey" should be spelt "Shanty." So there!

Given that the crockery was made in (or was imported from) "Shantung," this statement might even make sense if the Chinese of the time had used our alphabet. Oh well...

Great research!

Subject: RE: Help with meaning of C--an--Y
From: Scabby Douglas
Date: 24 Oct 01 - 09:47 AM

Charley - I don't understand your last point...

Why would the orthography used inside China have any bearing on what a piece of merchandise sold in Great Britain was known as....?

A commonly used medicinal compound was (and still may be) "Kaolin and morphine" - which I always beleieved was pronounced "Kayleen" - but I learned fairly recently that the Kaolin region in China produced a very fine clay which was used amongst other things for porcelain and was used in this mixture as a sort of suspension.

I have no idea how Kaolin is written in Mandarin or Cantonese... but it was adopted and adapted as part of the name of a standard product sold in the UK...

Happens a lot.. shampoo, bungalow, karaoke, algebra, slogan - all other-language (non-English) words adapted into English - sometimes with the meaning intact, somteimes not.

Cheers

Steven

Subject: RE: Help with meaning of C--an--Y
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 24 Oct 01 - 02:10 PM

Kaolin is also known as "china clay" it had many medicinal uses including being used as a poultice for boils and carbuncles etc. It used to come in a tin with a pop off lid and my Mother used to immerse the said tin in hot water to warm and soften the kaolin, before putting in on the offending gathering. Oh what happy memories of childhood. ( not )

Jock

Subject: RE: Help with meaning of C--an--Y
From: CraigS
Date: 24 Oct 01 - 04:07 PM

Kaolin, aka china clay, is dug out of big holes in the ground (aka quarries) in Cornwall. Drappie is often used to mean drink, but is merely a Scottish form of drop. The Scots have a fondness for such corruptions - probably the worst is Demi-Tassie, which is the posh Glesca term for half a cup. See also The Barley Bree by Robert Burns

Subject: RE: Help with meaning of C--an--Y
From: GUEST,Boab
Date: 25 Oct 01 - 04:05 AM

On the subject of adopted words in Scotland--many a Scots kid honed his football skills on a "cahouchie ba' ". Amazonian jungle natives have a word for the rubber which is tapped from the trees---"caouchouc". Another is the Boer word "stiever" --a coin in use in S.A. at the time. How many of us have heard the Scottish expression "Ah haenae got a stiever!"? The urdu [hindu?] word "Brahma" has also become usage in Scotland and Northern English counties describing some thing which in the eye of the beholder is worthy of high praise. Usually comes across as "brammer".

Subject: RE: Help with meaning of C--an--Y
From: Megan L
Date: 25 Oct 01 - 12:37 PM

Ah Jock whit memories, when I started learning first aid in Milton Street we had to do home nursing and hid tae learn tae pit oan a Kaolin poultice, mind you it wisnae jist fur boils, and we wir aye telt tae use red flannal.

That tin could go aff wi a fair bang if you forgot tae slacken the lid.