No. 80: Old Robin of Portingale
[There are no known traditional US or Canadian versions of this ballad.]
CONTENTS:
1. Child's Narrative
2. Footnote (Moved to the end of Child's Narrative)
3. Brief (Kittredge)
4. Child's Ballad Texts A.
5. Additions and Corrections
ATTACHED PAGES (see left hand column):
1. Recordings & Info: Old Robin of Portingale
A. Roud number 3970; Old Robin of Portingale (2 Listings)
2. English and Other Versions (Including Child versions A with additional notes)]
3. Sheet Music: Old Robin of Portingale (Bronson does not supply music)
Child's Narrative
A. Percy Manuscript, p. 90; Hales and Furnivall, I, 235.
This fine ballad was printed in the Reliques of Ancient English Poetry, III, 48, ed. of 1765, "with considerable corrections." The information given by a page, the reward promised and the alternative punishment threatened him, the savage vengeance taken on the lady and the immediate remorse, are repeated in 'Little Musgrave,' No 81. So the "Sleep you, wake you" of 42, a frequent formula for such occasions,[1] which we find in 'Earl Brand,' No 7, D 1, 'King Arthur and King Cornwall,' No 30, st. 493; 'Clerk Saunders,' No 69, F 4; 'Willie and Lady Maisry,' No 70, B 2, 11; 'The Bent Sae Brown,' No 71, st. 5; 'Lord Thomas and Fair Annet,' No 73, E 5; 'Sweet William's Ghost,' No 77, B 2; 'Jellon Grame,' A 4; 'The Drowned Lovers,' Buchan, I, 140, st. 11; 'Jock o the Side,' Caw's Museum, st. 16; 'Kinmont Willie,' Scott, st. 35; 'The Baron of Brackley,' Scarce Ancient Ballads, st. 2; the song or ballad in 'King Lear,' in, 6, 40; Ravenscroft's Pammelia, 1609, No 30; the interlude of 'The Four Elements' (Steevens); Íslenzk Fornkvæði, II, 115, st. 26, 27; 'Der todte Freier,' Erk's Liederhort, p. 75, No 24a, Deutsches Museum, 1852, II, 167 = Mittler No 545, Wunderhorn, IV, 73, etc., and Deutsches Museum, 1862, II, 803, No 10; Ampère, Instructions, p. 36; Coussemaker, No 48, st. 5; Kolberg, Pieśni ludu Polskiego, No 7e, st. 8; etc.
Old Robin, instead of attaching a cross of red cloth to the right shoulder of his coat or cloak, shapes the cross in his shoulder "of white flesh and of red," st. 32; that is, burns the cross in with a hot iron, as was done sometimes by the unusually devout or superstitious, or for a pious fraud: Mabillon, Annales, ad annum 1095, cited by Michaud, Histoire des Croisades, I, 110, note, ed. 1825.
Translated by Bodmer, I, 153; by Knortz, Lieder und Romanzen Alt-Englands, No 66.
Footnote:
1. As Sir Frederick Madder has observed, who cites some of the instances given.
Brief Description by George Lyman Kittredge
The information given by a page, the reward promised and the alternative punishment threatened him. the savage vengeance taken on the lady, and the immediate remorse are repeated in No. 81.
Child's Text
Old Robin of Portingale- Version A; Child 80
Percy Manuscript, p. 90; Hales and Furnivall, I, 235.
1 God let neuer soe old a man
Marry soe yonge a wiffe
As did Old Robin of Portingale;
He may rue all the dayes of his liffe.
2 Ffor the maiors daughter of Lin, God wott,
He chose her to his wife,
And thought to haue liued in quiettnesse
With her all the dayes of his liffe.
3 They had not in their wed-bed laid,
Scarcly were both on sleepe,
But vpp shee rose, and forth shee goes
To Sir Gyles, and fast can weepe.
4 Saies, Sleepe you, wake you, faire Sir Gyles?
Or be not you within?
. . . . .
. . . . .
5 'But I am waking, sweete,' he said,
'Lady, what is your will?'
'I haue vnbethought me of a wile,
How my wed lord we shall spill.
6 'Four and twenty knights,' she sayes,
'That dwells about this towne,
Eene four and twenty of my next cozens,
Will helpe to dinge him downe.'
7 With that beheard his litle foote-page,
As he was watering his masters steed;
Soe s . . . . .
His verry heart did bleed.
8 He mourned, sikt, and wept full sore;
I sweare by the holy roode,
That teares he for his master wept
Were blend water and bloude.
9 With that beheard his deare master,
As [he] in his garden sate;
Says, Euer alacke, my litle page,
What causes thee to weepe?
10 'Hath any one done to thee wronge,
Any of thy fellowes here?
Or is any of thy good friends dead,
Which makes thee shed such teares?
11 'Or if it be my head-kookes-man,
Greiued againe he shalbe,
Nor noe man within my howse
Shall doe wrong vnto thee.'
12 'But it is not your head-kookes-man,
Nor none of his degree;
But [f]or to morrow, ere it be noone,
You are deemed to die.
13 'And of that thanke your head-steward,
And after, your gay ladie:'
'If it be true, my litle foote-page,
Ile make thee heyre of all my land.'
14 'If it be not true, my deare master,
God let me neuer thye:'
'If it be not true, thou litle foot-page,
A dead corse shalt thou be.'
15 He called downe his head-kookes-man,
Cooke in kitchen super to dresse:
'All and anon, my deare master,
Anon att your request.'
16 . . . . .
. . . . .
'And call you downe my faire lady,
This night to supp with mee.'
17 And downe then came that fayre lady,
Was cladd all in purple and palle;
The rings that were vpon her fingers
Cast light thorrow the hall.
18 'What is your will, my owne wed lord,
What is your will with mee?'
'I am sicke, fayre lady,
Sore sicke, and like to dye.'
19 'But and you be sicke, my owne wed lord,
Soe sore it greiueth mee;
But my fiue maydens and my selfe
Will goe and make your bedd.
20 'And at the wakening of your first sleepe
You shall haue a hott drinke made,
And at the wakening of your next sleepe
Your sorrowes will haue a slake.'
21 He put a silke cote on his backe,
Was thirteen inches folde,
And put a steele cap vpon his head,
Was gilded with good red gold.
22 And he layd a bright browne sword by his side,
And another att his feete,
And full well knew Old Robin then
Whether he shold wake or sleepe.
23 And about the middle time of the night
Came twenty four good knights in;
Sir Gyles he was the formost man,
Soe well he knew that ginne.
24 Old Robin, with a bright browne sword,
Sir Gyles head he did winne;
Soe did he all those twenty four,
Neuer a one went quicke out [agen].
25 None but one litle foot-page,
Crept forth at a window of stone,
And he had two armes when he came in,
And [when he went out he had none].
26 Vpp then came that ladie light,
With torches burning bright;
Shee thought to haue brought Sir Gyles a drinke,
But shee found her owne wedd knight.
27 And the first thinge that this ladye stumbled vpon
Was of Sir Gyles his foote;
Sayes, Euer alacke, and woe is me,
Here lyes my sweete hart-roote!
28 And the second thing that this ladie stumbled on
Was of Sir Gyles his head;
Sayes, Euer alacke, and woe is me,
Heere lyes my true-loue deade!
29 Hee cutt the papps beside he[r] brest,
And bad her wish her will;
And he cutt the eares beside her heade,
And bade her wish on still.
30 'Mickle is the mans blood I haue spent,
To doe thee and me some good;'
Sayes, Euer alacke, my fayre lady,
I think that I was woode!
31 He calld then vp his litle foote-page,
And made him heyre of all his land,
. . . . .
. . . . .
32 And he shope the crosse in his right sholder,
Of the white flesh and the redd,
And he went him into the holy land,
Wheras Christ was quicke and dead.
End-Notes
61,3, 232, 243. 24.
81. sist.
111, 121. bookes man: cf. 151.
142. never dye.
152. Cooke seems to be wrongly repeated.
193. 5.
203. first sleep.
212. 13.
253. 2.
254. So Hales and Fumivall.
261. ladie bright. Qy fayre?
262. burning light.
281. 2d. 302. thee & and.
323. sent him.
And always for &.
Additions and Corrections
P. 240 a. Add: 'Willie's Fatal Visit,' Buchan, II, 259 f, stanza 5; 'Wallace and his Leman,' p. 226, stanza 2.
240 b, second paragraph, fourth line. Say: burns or cuts.
And with a knyfe son gerte he schare
A crose appone his schuldir bare.
Sir Isumbras, Thornton Romances, ed. Halliwell, p. 94, v. 185 f.
King Richard, in Richard Coer de Lion, v. 1726, Weber, II, 68, says: "Upon my flesch I bare the croys." Certain young men who had refused to take the cross, having got worsted in a fight with robbers, condignly, three days afterwards, crucem quem antea spreverant in carne sibi invicem ultronei affixerunt. Giraldus Cambrensis, Itinerarium Cambriæ, ii, 7, Opera, ed. Dimock, VI, 126. G. L. K.
P. 240 a. 'Sleep you, wake you.' Add: 'Young Beichan,' No 53, B 5; Duran, Romancero, I, 488, Nos 742, 743.
240 a, II, 513 a.
The very wicked knight Owen, after coming out of St. Patrick's Purgatory, lay in his orisons fifteen days and nights before the high altar,
"And suþþe in is bare flech þe holi crois he nom,
And wende to þe holi lond, and holi mon bicom."
Horstmann, Altengl. Legenden, 1875, p. 174, vv. 611-612; also p. 208, v. 697, and p. 209, v. 658. In a mediæval traveller's tale the Abyssinians are said to burn the cross in their children's foreheads. "Vort wonent da andere snoide kirsten in deme lande ind die heischent Ysini; wan man yr kinder douft ind kirsten macht, dan broet der priester yn eyn cruce vor dat houft." Ein niederrheinischer Bericht über den Orient, ed. Röhricht u. Meier, in Zacher's Zeitschrift, XIX, 15. (G.L.K.)
To be Corrected in the Print.
513 a, seventh line from bottom. Read quam.
The following are mostly trivial variations from the spelling of the text.
240 a, note. Read Madden.
P. 240, 513 a, III, 514. Mabillon cites Balderic's history of the first crusade, whose words are: "Multi etiam de gente plebeia crucem sibi divinitus innatam jactando ostentabant, quod et idem quædam ex mulierculis præsumpserunt; hoc enim falsum deprehensum est omnino. Multi vero ferrum callidum instar crucis sibi adhibuerunt, vel peste jactantiæ, vel bonæ suæ voluntatis ostentatione." Migne, Patrologiæ Curs. Compl., torn, clxvi, col. 1070.
A man who is looking forward to a pilgrimage to the Holy Land wishes to have the cross burned into his right shoulder, since then, though he should be stript of his clothes, the cross would remain: Miracula S. Thomæ, Auctore Benedicto, Robertson, Materials for the History of Thomas Becket, II, 175. The branding of the cross in the flesh must have become common, since it was forbidden by the canon law. In some editions of the Sarum Missal, a warning is inserted in the Servitium Peregrinorum: "Combustio crucis in carne peregrinis euntibus Hierusalem prohibitum est in lege, secundum jura canonica, sub poena excommunicationis majoris." Sarum Missal, Burntisland, 1867, col. 856 *. (Cited by Cutts, Scenes and Characters of the Middle Ages, p. 167.)
P. 240. 'Sleep you, wake you.' So, 'Soldatenlohn,' Zeitschrift für Volkskunde, II, 426, sts. 6,7; Hruschka u. Toischer, Deutsche Volkslieder aus Böhmen, p. 183, No 147 a, 45, b 35, p. 195, No 171, 21, No 172, 4.
240, 513 a, III, 514, IV, 476. Two religious persons from India display to the Pope a cross burned on the breast in token of Christian faith, and also a baptismal mark on the right ear, "non flumine sed flamine:" Chronicon Adae de Usk ad ann. 1404, ed. E.M. Thompson, p. 90. See also the reference to York's Marco Polo, 1875, II, 421, in Mr. Thompson's note, p. 219. (G. L. K.)
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[P. 240. Dr. Axel Olrik thinks that this ballad is related to the Danish ballad 'Utro Fæstemø vil forgive sin Fæstemand,' No 345 in the Grundtvig-Olrik collection (Ridderviser, I, 167, note *), which he refers for its origin to the story of the Lombard queen Rosemunda (see note on 'Lord Randal,' No 12, p. 286, above). The drink promised to Old Robin by his wife Dr. Olrik thinks may indicate that the English ballad was once more similar to the Danish than it is in the version which we possess.]