Take Off These Very Fine Clothes- Ezell (AL) 1947 Arnold B
[Fragment from An Alabama Songbook, from songs collected by Byron Arnold; edited Halli, version B. Taken from Byron Arnold's published collection of 153 songs entitled Folksongs of Alabama (University of Alabama Press- 1950).
R. Matteson 2014]
(Child 4, Lady Isabel and the Elf-Knight)
Among the most widespread of traditional songs is this ballad about a young woman who disposes of a villain as he would have disposed of her. In the United States, however, the mysterious, supernatural elf-knight of British and European variants has been rationalized into a greedy human suitor. Mrs. Hill's sixth and seventh stanzas are particularly interesting because they contain the heroine's request, unique in America, that the man turn away to ponder the moral consequences of murder. His doing so, of course, provides her the opportunity to kill him in self-defense. Most frequently, she asks him to avert his eyes from her nakedness, as in Mrs. Ezell's version, which is otherwise less complete and interesting than the A text.
B. Take Off These Clothes- Sung by Mrs. Grace Hicks Ezell, Birmingham, June 26, 1941.
"Take off take off these very fine clothes,
And hand them all to me.
They are too costly and too fine
To rot in the foam of the sea, sea, sea,
To rot in the foam of the sea."
"Turn your head around and around
And look upon the willow tree.
While I remove my wedding gown.
I will no man for to see, see, see,
I will no man for to see."