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Help with meaning of C--an--Y

23 Oct 01 - 07:55 AM (#577958)
Subject: Help with meaning of C--an--Y
From: GUEST,pavane

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)

23 Oct 01 - 07:58 AM (#577959)
Subject: RE: Help with meaning of C--an--Y
From: GUEST,pavane

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!!!!

23 Oct 01 - 08:26 AM (#577972)
Subject: RE: Help with meaning of C--an--Y
From: nutty

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

23 Oct 01 - 10:46 AM (#578065)
Subject: RE: Help with meaning of C--an--Y
From: Uncle_DaveO

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

Dave Oesterreich

23 Oct 01 - 10:54 AM (#578070)
Subject: RE: Help with meaning of C--an--Y
From: GUEST,Roger the skiffler

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

23 Oct 01 - 11:52 AM (#578107)
Subject: RE: Help with meaning of C--an--Y
From: Megan L

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

23 Oct 01 - 11:58 AM (#578114)
Subject: RE: Help with meaning of C--an--Y
From: MMario

looks like Megan has it.

23 Oct 01 - 02:03 PM (#578193)
Subject: RE: Help with meaning of C--an--Y
From: GUEST,Roger the skiffler

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

23 Oct 01 - 02:15 PM (#578213)
Subject: RE: Help with meaning of C--an--Y
From: Allan C.

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.

23 Oct 01 - 02:20 PM (#578216)
Subject: RE: Help with meaning of C--an--Y
From: Allan C.

That should read: place of origin.

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

23 Oct 01 - 03:33 PM (#578266)
Subject: RE: Help with meaning of C--an--Y
From: John MacKenzie

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

23 Oct 01 - 06:12 PM (#578318)
Subject: RE: Help with meaning of C--an--Y
From: Scabby Douglas

think it originates from Shantung china/porcelain

Cheers

Steven

24 Oct 01 - 01:18 AM (#578543)
Subject: RE: Help with meaning of C--an--Y
From: GUEST,Boab

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".

24 Oct 01 - 03:11 AM (#578566)
Subject: RE: Help with meaning of C--an--Y
From: GUEST,Pavane

Thanks everyone

24 Oct 01 - 08:00 AM (#578622)
Subject: RE: Help with meaning of C--an--Y
From: Allan C.

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

24 Oct 01 - 08:41 AM (#578635)
Subject: RE: Help with meaning of C--an--Y
From: GUEST,Dita (at work)

"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.

24 Oct 01 - 09:05 AM (#578641)
Subject: RE: Help with meaning of C--an--Y
From: Charley Noble

"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!

24 Oct 01 - 09:47 AM (#578669)
Subject: RE: Help with meaning of C--an--Y
From: Scabby Douglas

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

24 Oct 01 - 02:10 PM (#578872)
Subject: RE: Help with meaning of C--an--Y
From: John MacKenzie

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

24 Oct 01 - 04:07 PM (#578939)
Subject: RE: Help with meaning of C--an--Y
From: CraigS

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

25 Oct 01 - 04:05 AM (#579235)
Subject: RE: Help with meaning of C--an--Y
From: GUEST,Boab

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".

25 Oct 01 - 12:37 PM (#579523)
Subject: RE: Help with meaning of C--an--Y
From: Megan L

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.