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13 Dec 10 - 08:22 PM (#3052881) Subject: Origins: The Rambling Siuler From: Lighter Planxty recorded this on "After the Break." Where did it come from? |
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14 Dec 10 - 05:08 AM (#3053105) Subject: RE: Origins: The Rambling Siuler From: GUEST,Graham Bradshaw There's a great version on the Shrewsbury FF website - www.shrewsburyfolkfestival.co.uk - video of Andy Irvine singing with Dervish. Check it out |
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14 Dec 10 - 08:20 AM (#3053201) Subject: RE: Origins: The Rambling Siuler From: GUEST,John Moulden Andy Irvine adapted the song from the version in Sam Henry's 'Songs of the People' collection. He got it from the original columns in the Coleraine (Northern Ireland) newspaper, The Northern Constitution. The columns have since been edited in a book by Gale Huntington and Lani Herrmann - this is still available (print on demand) from University of Georgia Press. The Rambling Suiler was also published in short versions in at least two Dublin printed 8-page song books in the early nineteenth-century. |
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14 Dec 10 - 08:45 AM (#3053223) Subject: RE: Origins: The Rambling Siuler From: Lighter Thanks, John. It sounded "recent" - but not "revival" recent. |
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14 Dec 10 - 11:05 AM (#3053325) Subject: RE: Origins: The Rambling Siuler From: alex s This was done very well by the Mathews Brothers, but I don't think they recorded it. |
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14 Dec 10 - 02:23 PM (#3053481) Subject: RE: Origins: The Rambling Siuler From: Steve Gardham Jonathan, 'The Rambling Suiler' Roud 7972, only seems to be known from the Sam Henry version which was adapted by Andy Irvine. See Songs of the People, Huntington, p268 Aiming for the Heart, Irvine, p32. Without checking closely the note I have written down with my song notes is 'Similar story to 'The Gaberlunzie Man', said to be the original of 'The Rambling Soldier' which in turn gave rise to 'The Rambling Sailor' and various other 'Ramblings'. |
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14 Jul 14 - 10:11 AM (#3642026) Subject: RE: Origins: The Rambling Siuler From: GUEST,John Owen - Hungry Horse Folk Club, Ellesmer The Mighty Doonan Family Band do a super up tempo version of this song on their latest CD. |
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14 Jul 14 - 11:19 AM (#3642054) Subject: RE: Origins: The Rambling Siuler From: MGM·Lion Hate to seem ignorant. But what is a 'siuler', here, please? Seems to be a sort of beggar in the DT version, as whom the machinating seducer disguises himself; but cannot find the word in this connotation elsewhere. Can find nothing by googling except this song; nor in my Chambers. All I can find in the full OED is that it is an obsolete form of a word meaning a sieve-maker. Why should one of those ramble in guise of a beggar, or attract the attention of the opposite sex, particularly? Mystified. ~M~ |
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14 Jul 14 - 01:13 PM (#3642087) Subject: RE: Origins: The Rambling Siuler From: Big Al Whittle I guess its the song Polly on the Shore. it always seemed a great pity Davy Graham never got together with a good traditional singer - john Kelly springs to mind - he does a great version accompanied by a harmonium. DG called it rambling soldier. |
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14 Jul 14 - 01:37 PM (#3642095) Subject: RE: Origins: The Rambling Siuler From: MGM·Lion Certainly related to all those rambling soldiers & sailors -- tho iirc it is a matter of some dispute as to which of those preceded which -- but sfaics appears to predate those. Also related to those kings, dukes, squires & such who go off disguised as beggars or tinkers, screwing young women all over the place, as in The Barley Straw, some variants of the Beggar/Gaberlunzie Man, &c. But where you find much connection with Polly On The Shore, though, Al -- which is about a pressed seaman dying in battle who seems to me to have little in common with these seductive rambling servicemen? My question still stands -- what has a sieve-maker to do with the discourse anyhow? ~M~ |
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14 Jul 14 - 02:46 PM (#3642120) Subject: RE: Origins: The Rambling Siuler From: Fergie I suggest that is the Irish word Siúlóir which means a walker or rambler Fergus |
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14 Jul 14 - 03:02 PM (#3642125) Subject: RE: Origins: The Rambling Siuler From: Fergie Siúl = walk(as in Siúil, siúil, siúil, a rúin = walk, walk, walk my love). Siúlóir = walker |
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14 Jul 14 - 03:07 PM (#3642127) Subject: RE: Origins: The Rambling Siuler From: MGM·Lion Ah -- thank you Fergie. That does make sense. But I wonder how it got into this English song; and why no annotation that I can find anywhere -- in Roud or wherever -- even attempts to define this word, which is certainly obscure to English ears. ~M~ |
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14 Jul 14 - 03:58 PM (#3642137) Subject: RE: Origins: The Rambling Siuler From: Big Al Whittle I dunno - the tune just sounds a bit the same. john Kelly calls it the valiant sailor. |
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14 Jul 14 - 04:03 PM (#3642140) Subject: RE: Origins: The Rambling Siuler From: MartinRyan The usual English slang dictionaries (old and new) have "shooler" as "beggar, vagabond" etc. Which is not to say that Fergie's Irish derivation is wrong - but just to show that it has been in English for a long time. Partridge (Penguin) quotes an example from the 19C. Irish author Carleton - which is certainly consistent with a possible Irish origin. Regards |
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14 Jul 14 - 05:12 PM (#3642147) Subject: RE: Origins: The Rambling Siuler From: MGM·Lion Thank you, Martin. Indeed it is in Partridge -- also rendered as 'shuler', which is even nearer: tho oddly enough I couldn't find this usage on google, which wouldn't believe I didn't mean something to do with "school". But, even then, why is the spelling altered for the song; which, I repeat, alters it to a word defined only, in OED but nowhere else I could find, as "sieve-maker"? Still a bit mystified; but less so, thanks to Martin's & Fergie's helpful suggestions. ~M~ |
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14 Jul 14 - 05:15 PM (#3642148) Subject: RE: Origins: The Rambling Siuler From: MartinRyan Well, the examples push it back to days when spelling wasn't all that standard... Let me have another look at some sources. Regards p.s. substitution of "sailor" and "soldier" is obvious enough, I suppose, as people try to make sense of it. |
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14 Jul 14 - 05:21 PM (#3642149) Subject: RE: Origins: The Rambling Siuler From: MartinRyan My 1897 Slang Dictionary (no author listed) has "shool: to saunter idly, to become a vagabond, to beg rather than work" and gives a reference to a book by the Scottish author Smollett, published 1747. Regards |
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14 Jul 14 - 05:28 PM (#3642151) Subject: RE: Origins: The Rambling Siuler From: MartinRyan OK. The Irish etymologist Diarmuid O Muirithe (who, coincidentally, died a few days ago) discusses the word in one of his books. He quotes several English/Scottish references from OED - with the earliest from 1736. He says that Oxford mentions the possible connection to Irish "siúl" - but that it remains unconvinced. He, on the other hand, is quite happy that it is indeed of Irish origin. And he's usually right ... Regards |
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14 Jul 14 - 05:31 PM (#3642153) Subject: RE: Origins: The Rambling Siuler From: MGM·Lion Many thanks, Martin! |