A scandalous Ballad

Or reason # 235 why Sarah ended up QUITE warped.

When I was reading Tess D’Ubervilles, there was some line to the effect that the working poor are rocked to sleep with stories of disgrace and misfortune.  If that’s the case I’m not sure what being rocked to sleep with medieval ballads makes one.  I do know I was a sickly child, and my parents went through everything they knew from music hall songs to medieval ballads, to keep me from crying.

I thought it might be interesting to translate these.  This one should probably be "the mower"  since scyther doesn’t really exist in the dictionary.  Indulge me however.  The last thing I want to imagine is that this is about garden machinery.

This exists in many versions — at least I’ve seen two printed that do not accord with the one I learned from family.  And I’m not going to lie and say it was transmitted orally in my family from the beginning.  Chances are slim.  we are a literate family and as such our knowledge comes from books as well as from speech.  However it came to me, here it is.  And to quote Pratchett you know the moment you’re dealing with a bastard daughter and St. John’s (The summer solstice) you’re in for some… interesting stuff.

A further note — I didn’t really try to rhyme, because that goes beyond my abilities in English.  I’m none too hot with meter in English, for that matter.  I just tried to get the flavor and sense of it.  And the story, of course.

 

Oh the great ruler of Rome

He had a bastard daughter

Whom indulged so much

That she had grown quite improper

Noblemen, dukes and earls

Men of the cloak and of the sword

All came begging for her hand

And all she denied with a word

 

One was a child, the other old

One too timid and one too bold

This one couldn’t grow beard

The other, the sword he feared

And even then her father chided

In smiling prophecy

"Fate often her time she bides

Some lowly pig herder’s son

I expect yet at your side."

In the morning of St. John

Sweet early breaking dawn

At her marbled balcony

The princess there came to be

And looking away at the meadows

Saw three scythers mowing wheat

The smallest of the three

Was of all fastest and bold

The ribbon set on his hat

Embroidered in silk and gold

Fast and sure flashed his scythe

Silver and quick flashing bright

All his body, all his movement

Held the princess full intent

The scyther bravely mowed

Well did he know what he scythed

And there was her discrete maid

The one in whom she confided

"Do you see maid, that scyther

Who is mowing in that field?

Counts, Dukes, Chevalliers

The scyther them all eclipses

Go to him for me, in secret

Careful, go, that no one lists."

"Good scyther comes with me

My lady would you now see."

"Your lady I do not know

Nor the maid who comes to call."

"Scyther thank your lucky stars

Your sights you keep too low

Raise your eyes and there shall fall

A star upon your brow."

"I see the sun as it dawns

The dawn star already palls."

"Star or sun, will you come?"

"I will for p’wer thus summons."

They went in through the window

As the door was yet locked

In the bower of the princess

The bold scyther he mocked

"Lady what do you with me?

For I come to hear your word."

"I want to know if you dare

To scythe my mowing sward?"

"Dare do I dare it all

I answer my calling’s call.

Tell me, lady, if you know

Which field am I to mow?"

"It is neither valley nor mount

In the commons or the farms

Nor in holdings I could count

Scyther, it is in my arms."

All that day went by in scything

And more of the night passed

How well the scyther scythed

Well knew he what he was mowing

Long after the midnight hour

Of the scyther she would know

"Tell me then, oh my bold scyther

By whom I might be embarrassed."

"I am the son of pig herders

Pig herders my forbears were."

"Oh sad me, oh desolate"

The princess cried stunned

"I had counts, I had dukes

I had men of cloak and sword

And now look how low I’ve come

Of a pig herder despoiled."

"Enough, enough oh my scyther

Go before my father comes."

Words barely said

And there her father arrived

"With whom do you speak daughter

So early, and dawn not lighten’d

"I speak with this my maid

Whose work is badly done

This bed is so ill made

That sleep I have not found."

"Strong is your maid, oh daughter

With beard so thick and black

Tell the maiden there to dress

For before the sun is well up

By the blade of the executioner

I want her shaved — and hacked."

Calmly the scyther rose

Calmly his sentence heard

With one hand he dressed himself

With the other his shoes he tied

He leapt up into the house

Bold and sure and none afeared

"Let the executioner come

With this well sharpened sword

For the Duke of Lombardy

We’ll see who shaves, my Lord."

The Emperor then rejoiced

Very fast had he them wed

She spurned counts and dukes

Lords of the cloak and of the sword

She wanted only the scyther

Who was a-mowing in her sward

It might have been a pig farmer

Who left her  ever embarrassed

But she got a reigning Duke

Lord of fame and fortune vast

For all is luck in the world

And her fate it was well cast.