Jovial Hunter- Oseman (Hartlebury) c.1850; Child D
[Child D also Child C and F are found in On the Ancient British, Roman, and Saxon antiquities of Worcestershire p. 114 by Jabez Allies- 1852. The entire article is below with footnotes moved to the end.]
Jovial Hunter- Oseman (Hartlebury) c.1850; Child D
Allies: Antiquities and Folk-Lore of Worcestershire, p. 118. From the recitation of Oseman, Hartlebury.
1 As I went up one brook, one brook,
Well wind the horn, good hunter
I saw a fair maiden sit on a tree top.
As thou art the jovial hunter
2 I said, 'Fair maiden, what brings you here?'
Well wind the horn, good hunter
'It is the wild boar that has drove me here.'
As thou art the jovial hunter
3 'I wish I could that wild boar see;'
Well wind the horn, good hunter,
And the wild boar soon will come to thee.'
As thou art the jovial hunter
4 Then he put his horn unto his mouth,
Well wind the horn, good hunter,
And he blowd both east, west, north and south.
As he was the jovial hunter
5 The wild boar hearing it into his den,
Well wind the horn, good hunter,
[Then he made the best of his speed unto him].
As he was the jovial hunter
6 He whetted his tusks for to make them strong,
Well wind the horn, good hunter,
And he cut down the oak and the ash as he came along.
For to meet with the jovial hunter
7 They fought five hours one long summer's day,
Well wind the horn, good hunter,
Till the wild boar he yelld, and he'd fain run away.
And away from the jovial hunter
8 O then he cut his head clean off,
Well wind the horn, good hunter,
. . . . .
As he was the jovial hunter
9 Then there came an old lady running out of the wood,
Well wind the horn, good hunter,
Saying, 'You have killed my pretty, my pretty spotted pig.'
As thou art the jovial hunter
10 Then at him this old lady she did go,
Well wind the horn, good hunter,
And he clove her from the top of her head to her toe.
As he was the jovial hunter
11 In Bromsgrove churchyard this old lady lies,
Well wind the horn, good hunter,
And the face of the boar's head there is drawn by,
That was killed by the jovial hunter
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[From: On the Ancient British, Roman, and Saxon antiquities of Worcestershire p.114
by Jabez Allies - 1852 ]
BROMSGROVE
The following notice of "The Jovial Hunter of Bromsgrove" is mainly extracted from a pamphlet published by me in the year 1845, under the title of "The Jovial Hunter of Bromsgrove, Horne the Hunter, and Robin Hood."
In the introduction to " The First Sketch of Shakespeare's Merry Wives of Windsor," edited by J. 0. Halliwell, Esq., Mr. Halliwell remarks:—
"It is a singular fact, that no allusion to the legend of Home the Hunter, as he is called in the following sketch, has ever been discovered in any other writer. We are entirely ignorant of the date of the legend. In a manuscript, however, of the time of Henry VIII., in the British Museum, I find 'Rycharde Horne, yeoman,' among ' the names of the hunters whiche be examyned and have confessed' for hunting in his Majesty's forests. Is it improbable to suppose that this was the person to whom the tale related by Mistress Page alludes? She speaks of him as no very ancient personage:—' Oft have you heard since Horne the Hunter died.' Connected as the 'Merry Wives of Windsor' certainly is with the historical plays, the manners and language throughout are those of the time of Queen Elizabeth; and it is only convicting our great dramatist of an additional anachronism to those already well known of a similar character, in attributing to him the introduction of a tale of the time of Henry VIII. into a play supposed to belong to the commencement of the ftfteenth century."
Upon perusing the above-mentioned work, I wrote to Mr. Halliwell, stating that I recollected hearing a ballad in my juvenile days, which might possibly have reference to the legend of Horne the Hunter, but that I could only remember the concluding verse of it,—
"In Bromsgrove Church his corpse doth lie—
Why winded his horn the hunter?
Because there was a wild hoar nigh,
And as he was a jovial hunter."
This led me, at Mr. Halliwell's request, to make considerable search after the ballad; and at length I ascertained, from a carpenter, of the name of John Cole, that he used to hear an old man sing it about fifty years ago; and that the burden of the song was, that the district about Bromsgrove, in the days of yore, was principally covered with wood, and much infested by a wild boar, who was the terror of the neighbourhood. That the Jovial Hunter, upon a wild lady, or witch, appearing to him, determined to destroy the boar. That he proceeded to the attack by first winding three blasts, east, west, north, and south, with his horn[1], which, the boar hearing, prepared for the encounter by whetting his tusks between his fore feet. That after a long and desperate battle the boar fell dead, and thereupon the wild lady again appeared to the Jovial Hunter, in great auger, and charged him with having killed her pretty spotted pig. The only lines Cole could recollect are as follows :—
"Oh! huly, oh! lady, what bring'st thou here—
Wind went his horn, as a hunter;
"Thee blow another blast, and he'll soon come to thee,
As thou art a jovial hunter.
"He whetted his tusks as he came along—
Wind went bis horn, as a hunter;"
And Cole concluded his narrative by saying that Bromsgrove was, from the above-mentioned circumstance, formerly called Boar's Grove. This name, however, appears to have been a fiction to suit the legend, as it is called Bremesgrefa and Bremesgraefa in Anglo-Saxon Charters, and Bremesgrave in " Domesday Book." There is a place by Shepley Heath, near Bromsgrove town, called Burcot [2], which is vulgarly supposed to be a corruption of Boarcot [3]; and an old story has been handed down in the district, that the devil kept a pack of hounds at Hales Owen, (vulgo, Hell's Own,) and that he and his huntsman, "Harry-ca-nab [4]," used to ride on wild bulls, and hunt the wild boars on Bromsgrove Lickey.
Shortly after obtaining the information from Cole, a gentleman, whom I had requested to make some inquiries after the ballad, brought me the following lines, which he said he took down in writing from a man of the name of Benjamin Brown, of Upper Wick:— [Child C]
I. "Sir Robert Bolton had three sons—
Wind well thy horn, good hunter;
And one of them was called Sir Ryalas,
For he was a jovial hunter.
II. "He rang'd all round, down by the wood side—
Wind well thy horn, good hunter;
Till up in the top of a tree a gay lady he spy'd,
For he was a jovial hunter.
III. "Oh! what dost thou mean, fair lady, said he—
Wind well thy horn, good hunter;
Oh! the wild boar has killed my Lord and his men thirty,
As thou be'st [5], a jovial hunter.
IV. "Oh! what shall I do, this wild boar to see—
Wind well thy horn, good hunter;
Oh! thee blow a blast, and he'll come unto thee,
As thou be'st a jovial hunter.
V. "Then he blow'd a blast full north, east, west, and south,
For he was a jovial hunter;
And the wild boar heard him full into his den,
As he was a jovial hunter.
VI. "Then be made the best of his speed auto him,
Wind went his born, as a hunter;
And he whetted bis tusks as he came along
To Sir Ryalas, the jovial hunter[6].
VII. "Theu the wild boar, being so stout and so strong—
Wind well thy horn, good hunter;
He thrash'd down the trees as he came along,
To Sir Ryalas, the jovial hunter.
VIII. Oh! what dost thou want of me, the wild boar, said be—
Wind well thy horn, good hunter;
Oh! I think in my heart I can do enough for thee,
For I am a jovial hunter.
IX. "Then they fought four hours in a long summer's day—
Wind well thy horn, good hunter;
Till the wild boar fain would have gotten away
From Sir Ryalas, the jovial hunter.
X. "Then Sir Ryalas draw'd his broad sword with might—
Wind well thy horn, good hunter;
And he fairly cut his head off quite,
For he was a jovial hunter.
XI. "Then out of the wood the wild woman flew—
Wind well thy horn, good hunter;
Oh! thou hast killed my pretty spotted pig,
As thou be'st a jovial hunter.
XII. "There are three things I do demand of thee—
Wind well thy horn, good hunter;
It's thy horn, and thy hound, and thy gay lady,
As thou be'st a jovial hunter.
XIII. "If these three things thou dost demand of me—
Wind well thy horn, good hunter;
It's just as my sword and thy neck can agree,
For I am a jovial hunter.
XIV. "Then into his locks the wild woman flew—
Wind well thy horn, good hunter;
Till she thought in her heart she had torn him through,
As he was a jovial hunter.
XV. "Then Sir Ryalas draw'd his broad sword again—
Wind well thy horn, good hunter;
And he fairly split her head in twain,
For he was a jovial hunter.
XVI. "In Bromsgrove Church they both do lie—
Wind well thy horn, good hunter;
There the wild boar's head is pictur'd by
Sir Ryalas, the jovial hunter."
Brown afterwards sang, and also repeated the ballad to me: and I found the copy to be quite correct. He said he could neither read nor write, and that he learned the ballad by frequently hearing a countryman sing it about thirty-five years ago. He also said that Bromsgrove was formerly called Boar's Grove.
Some time after this, Cole brought me another version of the ballad [Child D], which he said he wrote down from the mouth of a person of the name of Oseman, of Hartlebury, as follows:— [Stanzas 5 and 7 are irregular]
[Jovial Hunter]
I. "As I went up one brook one brook—
Well wind the horn, good hunter;
I saw a fair maiden sit on a tree top,
As thou art the jovial hunter.
II. "I said, fair maiden, what brings you here?—
Well wind the horn, good hunter;
It is the wild boar that has drove me here,
As thou art the jovial hunter.
III. "I wish I could that wild boar see—
Well wind the horn, good hunter,
And the wild boar soon will come to thee,
As thou art the jovial hunter.
IV. "Then he put his horn unto his mouth—
Well wind the horn, good hunter;
And he blow'd both east, west, north, and south,
As he was a jovial hunter.
V. "The wild boar hearing it into his den—
Well wind the horn, good hunter;
He whetted his tusks, for to make them strong,
And he cut down the oak and the ash as he came along,
For to meet with the jovial hunter.
VI. "They fought five hours one long summer's day—
Well wind the horn, good hunter;
Till the wild boar he yell'd, and he'd fain run away,
And away from the jovial hunter.
VII. "Oh! then he cut his head clean off!—
Well wind the horn, good hunter;
Then there came an old lady running out of the wood,
Saying, you have killed my pretty, my pretty spotted pig,
As thou art the jovial hunter.
VIII. "Then at him, this old lady, she did go—
Well wind the horn, good hunter;
And he clove her from the top of her head to her toe,
As he was the jovial hunter.
IX. "In Bromsgrove churchyard this old lady lies—
Well wind the horn, good hunter;
And the face of the boar's head there is drawn by,
That was killed by the jovial hunter."
The only further evidence I obtained relative to the ballad, was from Mr. Maund [Child F] , of Bromsgrove, (the author of "The Botanic Garden,") who stated that he had met with a person who once knew the ballad, but could only recollect the following lines;—
"Sir Rackabello had three sons—
Wind well your horn, brave hunter;
Sir Byalash was one of these,
And he was a jovial hunter."
It appears pretty evident, from the variations in the different extracts and accounts I have given, that there must have been several versions of this legend [7].
Upon an examination of these ballads, a question was raised, whether the Windsor legend and the Bromsgrove legend at all referred to the same person, or at least to persons of the same family; and what led me at first to suppose that they did, is the constant reiteration of the words Horn, and Hunter in the ballad; but as the Bromsgrove legend makes no allusion to the story of the stag's horned ghost, the evidence is not sufficiently strong to found an argument upon.
Brown, in his account of the ballad, says he understood that the picture of the boar's head was still to be seen in Bromsgrove Church. Now this, most probably, referred to the crest of the Stafford family in that church; for Dr. Nash, in his account of Bromsgrove, vol. i., page 156, has given the pedigree of this family from the time of Edward I. to Henry VIII., and also a quotation from Habingdon, relative to an alabaster monument then in the chancel, but now in the body of Bromsgrove Church, of Sir Humphrey Stafford, of Grafton, Knight, and Eleanor [8], his wife, with the family arms, and a boar's head for a crest, upon a helmet; and states that he was slain by Jack Cade, 28 Henry VI., 1450 [9], and that his son and heir, Sir Humphrey Stafford, of Grafton, Knight, was attainted and executed, 1 Henry VII., 1485, at Tyburn, and adds, " a report prevailed that Humphrey Stafford was drawn upon a hurdle from the Forgate, or North Gate of Worcester, to the Cross, and there put to death; but this was without foundation [10] ."
The Doctor mentions the coats of arms of several other families who were buried in Bromsgrove Church; but the coat in question is the only one which contains either a boar's head or a boar.
The Stafford monument, which I visited in August 1844, is in the north-east corner of the northern aisle of the church [11], behind the tomb of Sir John Talbot, Knight [12] , and his two wives. It is a fine piece of sculpture, remarkable for the net-work head-dress of Eleanor. Under the head of Sir Humphrey is the figure of a boar's head, and the sexton then assured me that there was no other representation of a boar's head or boar either in the church or churchyard.
It becomes a question, therefore, whether the Jovial Hunter was one of the Stafford family. It seems possible that the family may have taken the boar's head as a crest from somo great feat done by one of them in killing a wild boar; or the legend about the boar may have been an old story engrafted upon the crest of that family. A circumstance of the latter kind did actually occur with respect to the tomb of Sir Ralph Wysham, in Woodmanton Chapel, in Clifton-upon-Teme Church [13].
With respect to the point, whether the story was merely engrafted upon the crest of the Stafford family, it will be observed that Oseman's ballad, which begins "As I went up one brook," says nothing about the Boltons; and as that ballad is much more simple in its construction than the other, it is probably the most ancient; and if so, the engrafting must have taken place, for both ballads are based upon the same adventure.
In fact, it does not appear unlikely that Sir Humphrey Stafford (the 2nd), whose tomb is in Bromsgrove Church, as before stated, either was or was at least represented to have been the Jovial Hunter. Sir Ralph Stafford, of Grafton, Knight, had three sons by his wife Maud; their eldest son Sir Humphrey (the 1st) had three sons by his wife Elizabeth; and their son Sir Humphrey (the 2nd) had three sons by his wife Eleanor; therefore, so far, either of them exactly agrees with the ballad; Sir Ralph was married 49th Edward III., 1374, and Sir Humphrey (the 1st), who would answer to Sir Robert Bolton or Sir Raccabello, died 7th Henry V., 1418; Sir Humphrey (the 2nd), who would answer to Sir Ryalas, Sir Ryalash, or the Jovial Hunter, was killed in 1450; and Sir Humphrey (the 3rd) was executed at Tyburn in 1485, as before stated.
Notwithstanding all this, it is not impossible that the original or real Jovial Hunter was a person of the name of Breme (which, in Anglo-Saxon, means renowned or famous) and that he having been buried at the place in question, it was therefore called Bremesgrefa, Bremesgrafa [14], or Bremesgrave [15]. There was a person of the name of Breme, of Suffolk, killed at the battle of Hastings; he is entered in " Domesday Book" as one of the persons holding lands in the time of Edward the Confessor; and an ancestor of his, or some other Anglo-Saxon of the same name, may have been the Jovial Hunter. The above-mentioned person is thus noticed in the Index to Sir Henry Ellis's "General Introduction to Domesday Book":— "Breme liber homo Regis E. qui fuit occisus in bello Hastingensi Suff. 409 b[16]."
With respect to the name Harry-ca-nab [17], it is stated in the "Athencoum" for Saturday, October 10th, 1846 [18], that it is another version of the wild huntsman, and that "the name Harry-ca-nab is an addition to the Satanic nomenclature. It is, perhaps, related to the epithet 'Old Harry,' alias 'Old Hairy;' or possibly to the 'Domina Hera quae volat per aera,' mentioned by Grimm in his 'Mythologie.'"
There also is an account of the Wish or Wisked, or Spectre Hounds of Dartmoor, and of the famous spectre hunt of Odin, "the Wild Jager of the German Forests," in the "Athenaeum" for March 27, 1847, p. 334, No. 1013. Also see Kemble's "Saxons in England," Vol. i., pp. 346, 349; and the chapter in this work, on "Folk Lore."
There was, according to tradition, another mighty hunter, of the name of Callow; and we have Upper and Lower Callow's Field, in the parish of Bromsgrove; Callow's Leap [19], near the Bridge's Stone, in Alfrick; Callow's Grave, near to Tenbury; Callow-end, near the Old Hills, in Powick; Hither and Further Callow Field, and Callow's Piece, in Martley; Callow Lane, in Stoke Prior [20]. And in the Anglo-Saxon boundaries of Oddingley there was a place called Callow Hill; and Callew Hill, or Callow Hill, on the Anglo-Saxon boundaries of Bredicot [21].
Footnotes:
1. This brought to my remembrance the two following lines of the ballad;—
"He blew a blast, east, west, north, and south,
For as be was a jovial hunter."
2. The name of this place is spelled Bericote in " Domesday Book." There were, in Anglo-Saxon times, places called Burcot, in Hants and Somerset. (Sen " Codex Dip.," No. 336, H16.) "Bur" means a bower in Anglo-Saxon.
3. There is a place called Borcley, or Borley, in the neighbouring parish of Ombersley.
4. This word "nab" may come from the Swedish word "nappa," which means to catch unexpectedly, to come upon unawares, to seize without warning; but vide the sequel.
5. Or beest.
6. Brown's ballad did not contain the second and third lines of this verse; but they are supplied from the lines which Cole recollected, as stated in p. 115.
7. I have no means of knowing what the title to the Bromsgrove ballad was. Cole said he thought it was the "Jovial Hunter," and I have assumed it to be so.
8. The Doctor, in his narrative and pedigree, has described her as "Eleanor;" but under his picture of the monument she is called Elizabeth. Now, this Sir Humphrey's mother was Elizabeth, and hence, perhaps, the mistake arose.
9. At Seven Oaks.
10. "Appendix to Hales."
11. It was said at the time of my visit, that on account of some contemplated alterations this tomb was to be removed to the tower of the church.
12. He died 10th Sept., 1550.
13 See Clifton.
14. See these names in the Anglo-Saxon Charters, in the " Codex Dip.," Nos. 183 and 186, dated respectively 804 and 821—823. The word grefa, grcefa, means a hole, trench, or vallum ; and graf means a grove. See " Codex Dip.," Vol. iii., Preface, pp. 26, 27. Also see hereafter, as to "Hoar Grave," &c., in the account of Hoar Stones.
15. See "Domesday Book."
16. There were, in Anglo-Saxon times, places called Bremela, and Bremelham; also Bremerleah (Bremerley, Worcestershire). See " Codex Dip.," Nos. 817 and 570. "Domesday Book" notices a place called Breme in W ills. In Heming's "Cartulary," Bromsgrove is spelled Bremer gref, Bremergraf, Bremesgraf, Bremesgrafe, Bremesgrfe, and Bremesgraefan.
17. See p. 116.
18. Page 1043, No. 989.
19. It is a very deep precipice, with a brook running at the bottom. See Alfrick and Folk Lore.
20. There also is Callow-brain Orchard, in Upper Sapey, Herefordshire.
21. See Heming's " Cartulary," pp. 355, 357; and Nash's " History," Vol. ii., Appendix, pp. 51, 53.