Origins: Just what is a Cutty Wren?

Subject: Origins: Just what is a Cutty Wren?
From: Walking Eagle
Date: 05 Jan 04 - 03:52 PM

Well?

Just what is a Cutty Wren in the English ballad/carol The Cutty Wren?

W.E.

Subject: RE: Origins: Just what is a Cutty Wren?
From: the lemonade lady
Date: 05 Jan 04 - 04:02 PM

it's to do with wren hunting which used to be done at this time of year. Old Christmas is passed and all that...

Joy, health, love and peace,be all here in this place etc...

http://www.old-glory.co.uk/cutty.html

Sal

Subject: RE: Origins: Just what is a Cutty Wren?
From: PoppaGator
Date: 05 Jan 04 - 04:06 PM

Any relations to the wrens inIreland whose funerals are paid for by alms begged on Boxing/St. Steven's Day, or whatever that old custom is?

Subject: RE: Origins: Just what is a Cutty Wren?
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 05 Jan 04 - 04:25 PM

Go to the Oxford Dictionary and find that cutty-wren is, simply, the name of the bird- cutty-wren, cutty-quean. "A familiar local appellation of some animals." The name also has been applied to the black guillemot, and to the hare.

Subject: RE: Origins: Just what is a Cutty Wren?
From: Malcolm Douglas
Date: 05 Jan 04 - 04:48 PM

Now that the term has been explained (dictionaries are such useful things), please all make any further comments in the DTStudy: Cutty Wren thread. That way we can avoid unnecessary repetition.

Subject: RE: Origins: Just what is a Cutty Wren?
From: Amos
Date: 05 Jan 04 - 04:51 PM

A peculiar little bird that dresses up in witch's underwear?


A

Subject: RE: Origins: Just what is a Cutty Wren?
From: GUEST,weerover
Date: 06 Jan 04 - 03:21 AM

"Cutty" is a scots word which means small. As the wren is a tiny bird in any case, this may be a tautology: not entirely sure, but I've generally considered that a tautology is accidental and unconscious, when deliberate and conscious it becomes a pleonasm. Any enlightenment?

wr

Subject: RE: Origins: Just what is a Cutty Wren?
From: GUEST,JTT
Date: 06 Jan 04 - 03:31 AM

Really? I always thought it was a boat! Like the Cutty Sark! Ah, the mondegreen is alive and well and living in JTT!

Subject: RE: Origins: Just what is a Cutty Wren?
From: GUEST,The Benn Agency
Date: 06 Jan 04 - 04:15 AM

Cutty Sark = Small Chemise or Shirt.

Subject: RE: Origins: Just what is a Cutty Wren?
From: Sooz
Date: 06 Jan 04 - 04:24 AM

A very nice Folk Club in the North East!

Subject: RE: Origins: Just what is a Cutty Wren?
From: Dave Bryant
Date: 06 Jan 04 - 04:39 AM

The Cutty Sark clipper ship was named after the short shirt that the queen of the witches wears in Burn's poem Tam-o-Shanter. The figurehead shows her chasing after Tam as he rode away on his mare after the witches caught him spying on them. The queen managed to grab hold of the horse's tail and pulled it right off - that is what she is holding in her outstretched hand. I believe that it was actually a bunch of seaweed and that when the clipper had managed a particularly fast run, it would be replaced to signify that she had almost caught him that time.

Subject: RE: Origins: Just what is a Cutty Wren?
From: An Pluiméir Ceolmhar
Date: 06 Jan 04 - 04:46 AM

To anyone who speaks Dutch, cutty quean sounds like another pleonasm.

As I understand it, a tautology is a logical loop, a definition which is expressed in terms which replicate the concept being defined, whereas a pleonasm is the redundant use of an adjective to qualify a noun which already contains the notion inherent in the adjective. In other words, most of the expressions like "a round circle" which are commonly regarded as tautologies are really pleonasms.

Subject: RE: Origins: Just what is a Cutty Wren?
From: Gurney
Date: 07 Jan 04 - 12:27 AM

Cutty means/meant both 'small' and 'a wren' depending on which part of Britain you are from, so it is only tautology where cutty means 'a wren' and not where it means 'small.' There, doesn't that feel better!

Subject: RE: Origins: Just what is a Cutty Wren?
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 07 Jan 04 - 01:03 AM

Provided the wren hasn't tanked up on steroids!

Subject: RE: Origins: Just what is a Cutty Wren?
From: Dave Bryant
Date: 07 Jan 04 - 05:56 AM

The UK species of wren Troglodytes troglodytes is smaller than most of the American species, measuring just over 3 inches in length compared to it's transatlanlic cousins which are at least an inch longer. It is thus the smallest native UK bird.

Subject: RE: Origins: Just what is a Cutty Wren?
From: GUEST,Jim Knowledge
Date: 07 Jan 04 - 06:50 AM

I `ad that Peter Scott in my cab once. `e told me the Goldcrest was the smallest native bird in Britain and was to be found, all year round, in the Wash area.

Subject: RE: Origins: Just what is a Cutty Wren?
From: Steve Parkes
Date: 07 Jan 04 - 07:15 AM

It's a seabird then, Jim?

Surely it's not really tautologous to say "little wren", is it?

Steve (picky as ever -- another NY res gone west!)

Subject: RE: Origins: Just what is a Cutty Wren?
From: GUEST,Jim Knowledge
Date: 07 Jan 04 - 07:43 AM

Steve,
      Sea birds?? Nah, not any longer. Rumour `as it that, many years ago, soon as Kings Lynn council organized "cheep" `ousing they all came ashore. They`d bin `aving problems wiv rising damp in their little nests aht there anyway.

Subject: RE: Origins: Just what is a Cutty Wren?
From: GUEST,pavane
Date: 07 Jan 04 - 10:15 AM

I think I read (maybe in another thread) that it was really the Goldcrest which was intended in the song 'The King', because its golden crest resembles a crown.

Subject: RE: Origins: Just what is a Cutty Wren?
From: GUEST,Jim Knowledge
Date: 07 Jan 04 - 10:39 AM

Funny, you know Pavane, this `ere Goldcrest, the birdithologists gave
gave it the `andle REGULUS REGULUS. Now, if you checks up yer Latin you`ll find that Regulus meant "little king" so I reckons you`re onto something. Anyroads, Regulus Regulus sounds like a `alf decent poker `and.
I `ad that Arafat in my cab once. `e don`t do anything for Gillete razors.

Subject: RE: Origins: Just what is a Cutty Wren?
From: GUEST,saff
Date: 07 Jan 04 - 03:13 PM

Ihad a date once with a smutty WREN,I could'nt handle the foul language
never saw her again.

Subject: RE: Origins: Just what is a Cutty Wren?
From: Steve Parkes
Date: 08 Jan 04 - 03:56 AM

Al the nice girls love a sailor, but it's the smutty WRNS the sailors go for.

Subject: RE: Origins: Just what is a Cutty Wren?
From: GUEST,weerover
Date: 08 Jan 04 - 04:36 AM

Again, my understanding is that a tautology is expression of the same concept twice as an error in style, whereas a pleonasm is a linguistic/rhetorical device deliberately used to emphasise some aspect of what is being described, as in "a tiny little baby".

wr

Subject: RE: Origins: Just what is a Cutty Wren?
From: Steve Parkes
Date: 08 Jan 04 - 08:27 AM

That's a good word, weerover, and I'll be sure to make use of it in future! Here are some definitons off the 'net. There seems to be a curious difference of mood behind them: the first is unsentimental, but essentially approving; while the others have a definite soupçon of disapprobation -- although the second is rather whimsical.

I've just been thinking of the words to TCW, which I'd disregarded in all this fun. It's ironical in its suggestions that the wren will require ever-bigger weapons and utilities to handle it. In the circumstances, I think "cutty wren" is perfectly justified: ironic, without going over the top. Any thought, folks?

Steve

Subject: RE: Origins: Just what is a Cutty Wren?
From: GUEST
Date: 24 Aug 07 - 08:26 AM

as a heathen i can tell you that the bird is a euphamism for something people of remote villages in the fouteenth century (prior to the peasants revolt, when the song was written, were not aloud to sing about. yes a cutty wren is a bird, but not this one...
why would the whole village need to carry a bird that small and divvy her up with cleavers?
think about it people...
what were the heathens covering up?

anonymous heathen.

Subject: RE: Origins: Just what is a Cutty Wren?
From: Darowyn
Date: 25 Aug 07 - 03:49 AM

Amidst all this talk of pleonasm, I'd like to propose a possible fixed epithet.
Back in the Bronze age ("Aye, we 'ad proper Heathens i' them days an' all!") Homer always wrote of the "Wine-Dark Sea" or "Noisy Dogs".
Whatever the context, the description was fixed to the noun. It is a sort of poetic ornamentation to the language.
Something very similar happens in Folk songs.
When you are walking out on a fine May morning, what sort of birds are singing?
Small birds, always.
It anything ever just White? Lily White or Snow White.
Does anyone ever turn pale?
No, they grow pale and wan.
I think that the Cutty Wren is always cutty because the epithet has become fixed as part of the name of the bird.
Cheers
Dave

Subject: RE: Origins: Just what is a Cutty Wren?
From: GUEST,Miskin Man
Date: 25 Aug 07 - 03:57 AM

I have always understood that the Cutty Wren was the only bird that the peasants were allowed to hunt for food. As it was so small this was of course regarded as an insult, hence the various songs about Hunting the Wren"

Andy (Ex Cutty Wren Folk Club Hythe Hampshire)

Subject: RE: Origins: Just what is a Cutty Wren?
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 25 Aug 07 - 04:37 AM

I know Johnny the Red Nose personally and he denies all wrongdoing in this matter. His solictors are aware of these allegations, and will take a dim vew all slurs and personal remarks made against Mr Rednose.

Subject: RE: Origins: Just what is a Cutty Wren?
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 25 Aug 07 - 05:33 AM

wouldn't have thought so Andy. more I would guess, to do with magic and ritual - a bit like Nottanum Town.

Theres a famous Pre Raphaelite painting called the scapegoat (by Leigh Hunt I think) - a picture of a goat in extremis - it has been driven from the village, taking on the sins of the village. A sacrifice to make the crops grow, ward off misfortune and all that sort of thing. A symbolic sacrifice.

The incantatory nature of the song implies this. I seem to remember WH Auden used this facet of it for a parody. Though nearly all my books are in the attic -we are trying to sell our house - so I can't check up.

Arnold Wesker uses the actual song in the play Chips with Everything. Its all about some national service men in the RAF in the 1950s. Of course the officers are all upper crust and they look down on the national servicemen.

One night the officers come into the national servicemen's mess. Of course when officers walk in - everything is upposed to stop - everybody jump to attention. But the guys are are singing this song and they just continue, locked into its magic. the officers are just freaked out - wait til its finished and shuffle off with a flea in their ear. Its a magic piece of theatre.

Subject: RE: Origins: Just what is a Cutty Wren?
From: SharonA
Date: 25 Aug 07 - 05:37 AM

"A flea in their ear"??? Please explain to us Mairkins.

Subject: RE: Origins: Just what is a Cutty Wren?
From: GUEST
Date: 25 Aug 07 - 07:37 AM

Mike O'Leary-Johns
The reason Wesker used the song was to set the mood of rebellion.Throughout the scene where they were "Liberating" the coal from the Officers mess for use by the "squadies"
The song has its origins in the Peasant revolt.After the event it was forbidden to talk about it.The song is used to celebrate the memory of the Peasant Revolt.The verses meaning much more than they appear................Mike
It was described on one occasion (I think by Paul Robson) as the finest "Rebel Song" in the English language.Mike.

Subject: RE: Origins: Just what is a Cutty Wren?
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 25 Aug 07 - 08:45 AM

a flea in the ear means one feels one has been discomforted

interesting Mike!
Nice to hear from someone on the same sort of wavelength. this is me:-
http://bigalwhittle.co.uk/

drop me an e-mail

Subject: RE: Origins: Just what is a Cutty Wren?
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 25 Aug 07 - 01:12 PM

'liberating' in the UK forces means stealing.

Subject: RE: Origins: Just what is a Cutty Wren?
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 25 Aug 07 - 02:22 PM

In WW2 we GIs (American soldiers) spoke of stealing from the commissary or officers' mess supplies as 'liberating.'

Put a 'flea in his ear' often heard in the U. S.- no wonder since the expression has been noted in print since the 15th-16th centuries (Oxford English Dictionary).
A good expression gets distributed to all English-speaking countries, regardless of its origin.

Cutty has several meanings, but it was a name for the wren (Uria grylle- don't know its current name in birders' books) or black guillemot (Also applied to the common hare). Cutty wren is redundant, since the wren was called a cutty (also means short or small). Examples in the OED from Scottish song, and use in Sussex and Hampshire.

Miskin Man, your comment interesting; since the hare was also called a cutty, the word easily could have obtained the meaning you give.

Subject: RE: Origins: Just what is a Cutty Wren?
From: Malcolm Douglas
Date: 25 Aug 07 - 10:37 PM

Bert Lloyd is largely to blame for the bizarre notion so many people have that this song has some connection with the Peasant's Revolt.

It doesn't. That is mere anachronistic and romantic nonsense, though it has been repeated so often by people who didn't know what they were talking about that all the other people who don't know what they are talking about believe it; without having any idea why.

Subject: RE: Origins: Just what is a Cutty Wren?
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 26 Aug 07 - 06:00 AM

So what do you think Malcolm?

Subject: RE: Origins: Just what is a Cutty Wren?
From: Malcolm Douglas
Date: 26 Aug 07 - 09:57 PM

What I think is that anybody wanting to know more about the documented (as opposed to imaginary) background should see thread   DTStudy: Cutty Wren.

IanC's comments there are particularly informative, though it should be borne in mind that the relative antiquity of the custom is no guarantee that this particular song about it is of a similar age. There seems to be no evidence prior to the 17th century, so a jump back a further three centuries to the Peasants' Revolt is a pretty big assumption; and Lloyd himself later backtracked rather on his earlier speculation.

Unfortunately, as I've already said, a lot of people seem to have missed that; and have clung, irrationally, to the modern myth. This seems to be a characteristic of both the 'Neo-Pagan' and 'Neo-Fascist' schools, both of which tend to rely upon very dubious assumptions based upon old and discredited theories regarding the 'antiquity' of folk song.

Subject: RE: Origins: Just what is a Cutty Wren?
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 27 Aug 07 - 05:17 AM

Thankyou Malcolm. Very informative.

Subject: RE: Origins: Just what is a Cutty Wren?
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 28 Aug 07 - 09:53 PM

In North America, Edith Fowke and Joe Glazer were among those who spread the myth that the song dated back to the Peasants' Revolt of 1381. "Apparently, the 'King Wren' became a symbol of baronial property, and this song was probably sung at secret meetings when the peasants were planning to seize and redistribute the land among the poor." They also quote A. L. Lloyd. "Songs of Work and Freedom," p. 177.

Subject: RE: Origins: Just what is a Cutty Wren?
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 29 Aug 07 - 05:50 AM

Right that's settled. In future I will only use this song for ceremonial magic purposes and not to undermine the elected government of the day.

The problem of its misuse and falling into the wrong hands has given me sleepless afternoons.