Lord Bateman- Morton (VT) 1937 Flanders J
[From Flanders; Ancient Ballads, 1966. Notes by Coffin follow. This is patterned after the broadside versions published in the New England area.
R. Matteson 2014]
Young Beichan
(Child 53)
This ballad has an extensive Anglo-American tradition and still is well known on both sides of the Atlantic. The American songs all trace back to early broadsides[1] and song books and quite generally refer to the hero as Lord Bateman or Bakeman. These texts vary somewhat in minor detail, but follow the Child L pattern as to plot outline, significant facts, and length. Nevertheless, a good many scholars have devoted a good bit of time to the minor variations of the American versions and more particularly to identifying the printed sources of the ballad in the New World. George L. Kittredge JAF, XXX, 295-97) used "the hole bored in the hero's shoulder" as a means of distinguishing texts closely akin to Child L from those related to the Coverly broadside in the Isaiah Thomas Collection, Worcester, Massachusetts, and Phillips Barry, British Ballads from Maine, 106 f., continues the probings and points out the "hole in the shoulder" stanza is characteristic of the South. There is also a good bit of information along similar lines in Jane Zielonko's Master's thesis, "Some American Variants of Child Ballads" (Columbia University, 1945), 83 f.
The Flanders versions below have been divided according to the findings of these researchers. Texts A-J seem to be similar to the Coverly broadside or to the version printed in the J. S. Locke of Boston Forget-Me-Not Songster (See A particularly) that goes back to an earlier broadside Coverly may have used. K-S are close to the text printed by Lucy E. Broadwood and J. A. F. Maitland in English Country Songs (London, 1893) and cited by Barry, op. cit., 116. This is a form of the song still known in Britain that evidently found its way into print in New England. In this series (see K-O) the hero's shoulder is not bored through as in many Child texts, but Bateman is tied to a tree[2]. T, it will be noted, contains further modifications and a compression
of the narrative. But, all in all, the Flanders texts are pretty typical of the northern findings for this ballad. Child, I,455 f., discusses the affinities of this song and the legend associated with Gilbert a Becket in the Middle Ages. However, analogous stories are known about Henry of Brunswick, Alexander von Metz, and a host of other heroes in Scandinavian and southern European balladry. A start on a bibliography can be had in Coffin, 63-65 (American); Dean-Smith, 5 (English) ; Greig and Keith, 40-43 (Scottish) ; and the notes in Child. Kittredge's JAF article contains a number of references, not easily available elsewhere, to printed American texts of "Lord Bateman" and its relative "The Turkish Lady." The latter, listed by Laws as O 26 and possibly derived from "Lord Bateman," is also immensely popular in America. Laws, AEBB,238, and Coffin, 65, give a
good many references for it.
The eight tunes for Child 53 are all related, and all correspond to tune group A in BC1. Two subfamilies appear: 1) the Davis, Kennison, Pierce, and Burke tunes, characterized by a triad at the beginning, this group corresponds to BCI group Aa. The other tunes together fit in with BCI group Ab, the Morton tune being relatively divergent from the others, however.
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1. In my opinion, this statement is simply inaccurate, "the American songs all trace back to early broadsides." Consider, for example, the Hick/Harmon version (Susan Price/Young Behan) which was collected from three different family members which they brought from Virginia (circa late 1600s) to the Carolina mountains probably around 1770 and has been passed strictly through oral tradition since then. [R. Matteson 2014]
2. It's likely that the "tied to a tree" reference is, in fact, derived from the "hole in the shoulder" texts, via faulty oral transmission. After all, there aren't many prisoners tied to a tree in a jail cell. [R. Matteson 2014]
J. Lord Bateman. As sung by Mrs. W. B. Morton of Groton, Vermont. H. H. F., Collector; October 19, 1937. Structure: A1 B A2 B (2,2,2,2); Rhythm E; Contour: each line an arc; Scale: hexatonic; t.c. D. Note the small range (major sixth), For mel. rel. see RO l, 83, 86; BES, 119; Bruno Nettl, in Acta Musicologica (1955), 83, first song.
Lord Bateman
In India lived a noble lord,
His riches were beyond compare,
He was the darling of his parents
And of their estate an only heir.
He had gold and he had silver;
He had houses of high degree'
But he could not be contented
Until a voyage he went to sea.
He sailed east and he sailed west,
He sailed till he came to an Indian shore
where he was taken and put in prison
Where he could neither see nor hear.
For seven long months he lay lamenting,
He laid lamenting in iron bands,
There happening to see a brisk young lady
Who set him free from his iron chains.
The jailer had one only daughter,
A brisk young lady, gay was she;
As she was walking across the floor,
She chanced Lord Bateman for to see.
She stole the keys of her father's prison
And said Lord Bateman she would set free.
She went unto the prison door
And opened it without delay.
"Have you got gold or have you got silver?
Have you got houses of high degree?
What will you give to the fair young lady
If she from bondage will set you free?"
"Yes, I've got gold, and I've got silver,
And I've got houses of high degree.
I'll give them all to the fair young lady,
If she from bondage set me free."
"It's not your silver nor your gold,
Nor yet your houses of high degree;
All that I want to make me happy
And all I crave is your fair body."