Saint Stephen And King Herod

The Text is taken from the same manuscript as the last. This manuscript is ascribed, from the style of handwriting, to the reign of Henry VI. The ballad is there written without division into stanzas in twenty-four long lines.

The Story.--The miraculous resuscitation of a roast fowl (generally a cock, as here), in confirmation of an incredible prophecy, is a tale found in nearly all European countries. Originally, we find, the miracle is connected with the Passion, not the Nativity. See the Carnal and the Crane.

An interpolation in a late Greek MS. of the apocryphal Gospel of Nicodemus relates that Judas, having failed to induce the Jews to take back the thirty pieces of silver, went home to hang himself, and found his wife roasting a cock. On his demand for a rope to hang himself, she asked why he intended to do so; and he told her he had betrayed his master Jesus to evil men, who would kill him; yet he would rise again on the third day. His wife was incredulous, and said, 'Sooner shall this cock, roasting over the coals, crow again'; whereat the cock napped his wings and crew thrice. And Judas, confirmed in the truth, straightway made a noose in the rope, and hanged himself.

Thence the miracle-tale spread over Europe. In a Spanish version not only the cock crows, but his partner the hen lays an egg, in asseveration of the truth. The tale is generally connected with the legend of the Pilgrims of St. James; so in French, Spanish, Dutch, Wendish, and Breton ballads.

In 1701 there was printed in London a broadside sheet of carols, headed with a woodcut of the Nativity, by the side of which is printed: 'A religious man, inventing the conceits of both birds and beasts drawn in the picture of our Saviour's birth, doth thus express them:-- The cock croweth Christus natus est, Christ is born. The raven asked Quando? When? The crow replied Hac nocte, This night. The ox cryeth out Ubi? Ubi? Where? where? The sheep bleated out Bethlehem' (Hone's Every-day Book).

SAINT STEPHEN AND KING HEROD

1.
Seynt Stevene was a clerk
in kyng Herowdes halle,
And servyd him of bred and cloth,
as every kyng befalle.

2.
Stevyn out of kechoun cam
wyth boris hed on honde,
He saw a sterre was fayr and brycht
over Bedlem stonde.

3.
He kyst adoun the bores hed,
and went in to the halle;
'I forsak the, kyng Herowdes,
and thi werkes alle.

4.
'I forsak the, kyng Herowdes,
and thi werkes alle,
Ther is a chyld in Bedlem born
is beter than we alle.'

5.
'Quat eylyt the, Stevene?
quat is the befalle?
Lakkyt the eyther mete or drynk
in kyng Herodwes halle?'

6.
'Lakit me neyther mete ne drynk
in king Herowdes halle;
There is a chyld in Bedlem born,
is beter than we alle.'

7.
'Quat eylyt the, Stevyn? art thou wod?
or thou gynnyst to brede?
Lakkyt the eyther gold or fe,
or ony ryche wede?'

8.
'Lakyt me neyther gold ne fe,
ne non ryche wede;
Ther is a chyld in Bedlem born,
schal helpyn us at our nede.'

9.
'That is al so soth, Stevyn,
al so soth i-wys,
As this capoun crowe schal
that lyth here in myn dysh.'

10.
That word was not so sone seyd,
that word in that halle,
The capoun crew Cristus natus est!
among the lordes alle.

11.
'Rysyt up, myn turmentowres,
be to and al be on,
And ledit Stevyn out of this town
and stonit him with ston.'

12.
Tokyn he Stevene,
and stonyd hym in the way;
And therfore is his evyn
on Crystes owyn day.

Frank Sidgwick

Frank Sidgwick was an English writer, publisher, and scholarly editor. He was instrumental in popularizing ballad and folklore studies in the early 20th century. Sidgwick co-founded the publishing company Sidgwick & Jackson, which became known for its contributions to literature and scholarship. Though not primarily known as a poet, his editorial and publishing efforts significantly impacted the literary culture of his time, emphasizing the academic study of traditional songs and verses.

Frank Sidgwick

The Great Silkie Of Sule Skerrie

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Sir Hugh, Or The Jew's Daughter

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Bonny Bee Ho'M And The Lowlands Of Holland

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English

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The Carnal And The Crane

The Text is taken from Sandys' Christmas Carols, where it is printed from a broadside. The only alterations, in which I have followed Professor Child, are the obvious correction of 'east' for 'west' (8.1), and the insertion of one word in 16.2, where Child says 'perhaps a preposition has been dropped.'


The Story is compounded of popular legends connected with the life and miracles of Christ. For the miracle of the cock, see Saint Stephen and King Herod. The adoration of the beasts is derived from the Historia de Nativitate Mariæ, and is repeated in many legends of the infancy of Christ, but is not sufficiently remarkable in itself to be popular in carols. The origin of the miracle of the harvest is unknown, though in a Breton ballad it forms one of the class known as the miracles of the Virgin (cp.

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Judas

The Text is given from a thirteenth-century MS. in the library of Trinity College, Cambridge (B. 14, 39): it is thus the earliest text of any ballad that we possess. In the MS. it is written in long lines, four (or six, as in 4, 12, and 14) to the stanza.

As the language in which it is written is not easily intelligible, I have added a paraphrase on the opposite pages.

The Story is of great interest, as it adds to the various legends of Judas a 'swikele' sister. The treachery of Judas has long been popularly explained (from the Gospel of St. John, xii. 3-6) as follows:-- Judas, being accustomed as bearer of the bag to take a tithe of all moneys passing through his hands, considered that he had lost thirty pence on the ointment that might have been sold for three hundred pence, and so took his revenge.

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A Gest Of Robyn Hode - The Eighth Fytte (418-456)

Argument.--For a jest, the king disguises himself and his men once more, this time in Lincoln green, which he purchases off Robin Hood. The whole party proceeds to Nottingham, where the appearance of so many green mantles causes a general flight of the inhabitants. The king, however, reveals himself, and after a feast, pardons the knight.

Robin dwells in the king's court for fifteen months, at the end of which time he has spent much money, and has lost all his men except Little John and Scathlock. He therefore begs the king's leave to go on a pilgrimage to a shrine of St. Mary Magdalen in Barnsdale, and the king consents, but allows him only seven nights' absence. Robin comes to the greenwood, and shoots a great hart; and on blowing his horn, seven score yeomen come and welcome him back, and he dwells two-and-twenty years in th...

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Robin And Gandeleyn

The Text is modernised from the only known version, in Sloane MS. 2593, in the British Museum (c. 1450); the minstrel's song-book which contains the famous carols: 'I sing of a maiden,' and 'Adam lay i-bounden.' This ballad was first printed by Ritson in his Ancient Songs (1790); but he misunderstood the phrase 'Robyn lyth' in the burden for the name 'Robin Lyth,' and ingeniously found a cave on Flamborough Head called Robin Lyth's Hole.


The Story is similar to those told of Robin Hood and Little John; but there is no ground for identifying this Robin with Robin Hood. Wright, in printing the Sloane MS., notes that 'Gandeleyn' resembles Gamelyn, whose 'tale' belongs to the pseudo-Chaucerian literature. But we can only take this ballad to be, like so many others, an unrelated 'relique.'


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Johnny O' Cockley's Well

The Text is taken almost entirely from a copy which was sent in 1780 to Bishop Percy by a Miss Fisher of Carlisle; in the last half of the first stanza her version gives, unintelligibly:

    'But little knew he that his bloody hounds
        Were bound in iron bands':

and I have therefore substituted lines from a later text. The correction in 20.1 and 21.1 is also essential.


The Story will be familiar to many as Johnie of Breadislee, a title given by Sir Walter Scott to his version, the first that was published, in the Minstrelsy (1802). In the present version, however, Johnny certainly belongs to Cockley's Well, Bradyslee being only the name of his hunting-ground. In other variants, his name is Johnny Cock, Johnny Cox, Johnny o' Cockis, o' Cockerslee, of Cockielaw, of Cocklesmuir,...

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Old Robin Of Portingale

Text.-- The Percy Folio is the sole authority for this excellent ballad, and the text of the MS. is therefore given here literatim, in preference to the copy served up 'with considerable corrections' by Percy in the Reliques. I have, however, substituted a few obvious emendations suggested by Professor Child, giving the Folio reading in a footnote.

The Story is practically identical with that of Little Musgrave and Lady Barnard; but each is so good, though in a different vein, that neither could be excluded.

The last stanza narrates the practice of burning a cross on the flesh of the right shoulder when setting forth to the Holy Land--a practice which obtained only among the very devout or superstitious of the Crusaders. Usually a cross of red cloth attached to the right shoulder of the coat was ...

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