Recordings & Info 98. Brown Adam
[There are no traditional US or Canadian versions of Brown Robin]
CONTENTS:
1) Alternative Titles
2) Traditional Ballad Index
3) Child Collection Index
4) Wiki
5) Mainly Norfolk
ATTACHED PAGES: (see left hand column)
1) Roud No. 482: Brown Adam (14 Listings)
Alternative Titles
Broun Edom
Traditional Ballad Index: Brown Adam [Child 98]
DESCRIPTION: Brown Adam is a smith, banished from his kin. He builds a bower where he lives with his love. He goes hunting, returns to overhear a knight attempting to woo his love, finally threatening her life. He rescues his love, defeating the knight.
AUTHOR: unknown
EARLIEST_DATE: 1783/1799 (GordonBrown/Rieuwerts)
KEYWORDS: knight love separation home hunting courting rejection
FOUND_IN: Britain(Scotland(Aber))
REFERENCES: (8 citations)
Child 98, "Brown Adam" (3 texts, 1 tune) {Bronson's #2}
Bronson 98, "Brown Adam" (2 versions)
GordonBrown/Rieuwerts, pp. 128-131, "Brown Adam" (2 parallel texts plus a photo of the badly-transcribed tune; also a reconstructed tune on p. 269)
Greig #88, p. 1, "Brown Edom" (1 text)
GreigDuncan5 994, "Brown Edom" (1 text)
OBB 48, "Brown Adam" (1 text)
DT, BRNADAM*
ADDITIONAL: Katherine Briggs, _A Dictionary of British Folk-Tales in the English Language_, Part A: Folk Narratives, 1970 (I use the 1971 Routledge paperback that combines volumes A.1 and A.2), volume A.2, pp. 385-386, "Brown Adam" (a short prose summary, noteworthy mostly because Briggs compares Brown Adam to Robin Hood and the characters of "Adam Bell....")
Roud #482
Child Ballad 098: Brown Adam
Child #--- Artist--- Title--- Album--- Year--- Length--- Have
098 Alistair Hulett Brown Adam In Sleepy Scotland 2001 4:58 Yes
098 Brian Dewhurst & Tom Tiddler's Ground Brown Adam The Hunter and the Hunted 1975 4:35 Yes
098 Danny Spooner Brown Adam Brave Bold Boys 2008 No
098 Ewan MacColl Brown Adam Blood and Roses - Vol. 5 1986 4:25 Yes
098 Graham & Eileen Pratt Brown Adam Borders of the Ocean 1997 3:58 Yes
098 John Spiers & Jon Boden Brown Adam Bellow 2003 6:03 Yes
098 Jon Boden Brown Adam A Folk Song a Day - August 2010 4:29 Yes
098 Katherine Campbell Broun Edom The Songs of Amelia and Jane Harris - Scots Songs and Ballads from Perthshire Tradition 2004 3:07 Yes
098 Martin Carthy Brown Adam Landfall 1971 6:23 Yes
098 Spiers & Boden Brown Adam The Works 2011 6:05 Yes
Brown Adam From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Brown Adam is Child ballad 98.[1]
Synopsis
Brown Adam, a smith, is exiled from his family. He builds a house in the woods for himself and his lady. One day, he goes hunting. He returns home to find his lady with a knight—or king's son—trying to persuade her to leave Brown Adam. She refuses many rich bribes; she will stay with Brown Adam. When he starts to threaten her, Brown Adam makes himself known and maims him, cutting off his hand.
References
1.^ Francis James Child, English and Scottish Popular Ballads, "Brown Adam"
External links: Brown Adam
Mainly Norfolk: Brown Adam
[Roud 482; Child 98; Ballad Index C098; words trad., music Martin Carthy]
Martin Carthy sang this Child ballad on his 1971 album Landfall. He commented in the record's sleeve notes:
The tunes for The Broomfield Hill and Brown Adam were written by myself, the former based on a Hebridean tune, which itself is a variant of the tune taken by Marjorie Kennedy Fraser to make the song known around the clubs as Kishmul's Gallery and the latter, as far as I know, not being based on any other tune, but for a song that I wanted to do for years.
Jnhn Spiers and Jon Boden sang Brown Adam to Martin Carthy's melody in 2003 on their duo CD Bellow and again in 2010/11 on their CD The Works. Jon also sang it as the August 5, 2010 entry of his project A Folk Song a Day. He commented in the former CD's liner notes:
The cult of the smith was strong in pre-Christian Britain. Weland could generally be found living apart from others, concerning himself with forging magical rings to bring back his swan-maiden lover. There is something of a family resemblance in Brown Adam methinks.
Martin Carthy sings Brown Adam
Oh who would wish for the wind to blow
Or the green leaves fall therewith,
And who would wish for a finer love
Than Brown Adam the smith.
Oh his hammer is of a beaten gold
And his anvil's all of steel.
Oh his fingers white they are my delight
And he blows at his bellows well.
But they have banished him, young Brown Adam,
From father and from mother.
And they have banished him, young Brown Adam,
From sister and from brother.
And they have banished him, young Brown Adam,
From the flower of all his kin.
And he's built him a bower in the gay greenwood
All between his lady and him.
And as it fell out all on one day,
Brown Adam he thought long.
And he is away to the gay greenwood
For to hunt him venison.
And he's taken his bow all in his hand
And his arrows one by one,
And he is away to the gay greenwood
As fast as he could run.
And he shot up and he shot down
The bird all on the briar.
And he sent it all to his gay lady,
Told her be all of good cheer.
And he shot up and he shot down
The flower all on the thorn.
And he sent it all to his gay lady,
Told her he would be home in the morn.
Brown Adam, he come to his own bower door
And he stood there a little way away.
And it was there that he spied a full false knight
Come a-tempting his lady gay.
Oh the knight drew out a gay gold ring
That had cost him many's the pound.
“Oh grant me love, oh love, lady,
And this shall all be thine.”
“Oh I love Brown Adam well,” she says,
“And I know that he loves me.
And I would not give Brown Adam's love
For any false knight that I see.”
So the knight drew out a purse of gold
That was filled right up to the string.
“Oh grant me love, oh love, lady,
And this shall all be thine.”
“Oh I love Brown Adam well,” she says,
“And I know that he loves me
And I would not give Brown Adam's love
For any false knight such as thee.”
So the knight drew out his noble sword
And it flashed there all in her eye.
“Oh grant me love, oh love, lady,
Or through you this shall go.”
Then a-sighing says the lady gay,
“Brown Adam tarries long.”
Then up there jumped him Brown Adam,
He says, “Lady, I'm here at your hand.”
And he's made him leave his bow and his bow
And he's made him leave his brand.
And he's made him leave a far better thing,
Four fingers of his right hand.