Danu (Dan-u)- Edith Walker (NC) pre1937 Brown D
44. The Wife Wrapt in Wether's Skin (Child 277)
Not old — Child's earliest recorded text is from the late eighteenth century — this ballad is a general favorite among ballad-singing folk on both sides of the water. See BSM 92, and add to the references there given Tennessee (BTFLS viii 74), Florida (FSF 322), Missouri (OFS I 187-8), and Indiana (BSI 151-4). Robert Leslie Mason has recently (SFLQ xi 134-5) reported from Tennessee a text that is a curious combination of this ballad and 'The Farmer's Curst Wife.' All of the North Carolina texts use the "Dandoo" refrain, most of them combining with it some form of the "clish-ma-clingo" refrain. There is little variation in the story content.
D. 'The Wife Wrapped in a Wether Skin.' From Miss Edith Walker of Boone, Watauga county. An abbreviated text, three stanzas, with an elaborate refrain :
There was an old man lived in the West
Dan-u dan-u.
There was an old man lived in the West
Umphy-doddle-u-dan-u.
There was an old man lived in the West.
He had him a wife, she was none of the best.
To my harem-garem-girem-larem
Umphy-doddle-u-dan-u
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Music from Volume 4:
D. 'The Wife Wrapped in a Wether Skin.' Sung by Miss Edith Walker. Recorded at Boone, no date given. For some unknown reason, the singer repeats the first two lines before proceeding with the song as printed. In the next stanza, the singer exchanges measures 7-8 for that given in the variations below; then these eight measures are repeated. There seems to be 'method in the madness.'
Measure 12 of variation continues the same as measure 12 in stanza. Scale: Mode III, plagal. Tonal Center: f. Structure: ababacaaic (2,2,2,2,2, 2,2,2,4) = aa1 (8,12).