The Teind to Hell in Tam Lin- E. B. Lyle
The Teind to Hell in "Tam Lin"
by E. B. Lyle
Folklore, Vol. 81, No. 3 (Autumn, 1970), pp. 177-181
The Teind to Hell in Tam Lin
by E. B. LYLE
THE teind or tithe to hell as it occurs in the ballad Tam Lin (Child No. 39) can best be seen against the background of the
belief in changelings, which is described in the following terms by MacEdward Leach:
Many fairy stories and legends have to do with changelings. Newborn infants are often snatched away and fairy babies left in their places. Several explanations are given: one that the fairy folk want their children suckled by mortal women, another that they are seeking mortal children to sacrifice to the lords of hell. (Such stories are probably nothing other than explanatory stories to account for the abnormal appearance or abnormal behavior of the human child by saying that it was a changeling.) [1]
As Leach implies, there are two suggested stages of explanation, for the first reply gives rise to a further question which may be variously answered, as in a catechism of this kind:
Question: Why are these people sickly or abnormal?
Answer: The real people have been taken by the fairies, and these are substitutes left in their place.
Question: Why do the fairies make this exchange?
Answer: The fairies e.g. (a) want their children suckled by mortal women, or (b) are seeking mortals to sacrifice to the lords of hell, or (c) think it will aid their salvation at the Day of Judgment to have good Christians amongst them, [2] or (d) desire beautiful children to improve the fairy stock. [3]
Walter Gregor recorded explanation (b) from Keith in Banffshire towards the end of the last century. Every seven years the fairies had to 'pay the teind to hell':-
And never would I tire, Janet,
In fairy-land to dwell;
But aye, at every seven years,
They pay the teind to hell;
And I'm sae fat and fair of flesh,
I fear twill be mysell
Ballad of Tamlane
What they tried to do was to carry off unbaptised infants so that they might pay the tiend with them and not with one of their own. [4] This explanation of the fairies' custom of taking mortals is closely associated in Scotland with the ballad Tam Lin, but it
does seem to have existed independently. An early record from Fife, with a yearly payment of the teind, is included in the indictment of Alesoun Peirsoun for witchcraft in 1588, which reports her as saying that:
[Mr Williame Sympsoun] will appeir to hir selff allane before the Court [of Elfane] cum; and that he before tauld hir how he wes careit away with thame out of middil-eird: And quhene we heir the quhirllwind blaw in the sey, thay wilbe commounelie with itt, or cumand sone thaireftir; than Mr Williame will cum before and tell hir, and bid hir keip hir and sane hir, that scho be nocht tane away with thame agane; for the teynd of thame gais ewerie 3eir to hell. [5]
The phrasing 'the teynd of thame' makes it clear that 'teynd' is used in the sense of a proportion; a tenth of the fairy population
goes to hell. This idea is fully explicit in Tam Lin in the eighteenthcentury variant in the Mansfield manuscript:
The fairy Lands a pleasant Land & pleasant for to Dwell
But aye at every 7 years end
The Ioth part goes down to Hell [6]
However, a number of variants, like Scott's 1803 Minstrelsy version which was quoted by Gregor, imply that there will be
only a single victim:
But aye at every seven years,
They pay the teind to hell;
And I am sae fat and fair of flesh,
I fear 'twill be mysell. [7]
There is no suggestion of a tenth part in the word 'kane' which occurs instead of 'teind' in some variants, and which is defined in
the Scottish National Dictionary (n. I) as 'a payment in kind, especially of poultry, made by a tenant of land as part of his rent'.
John Leyden comments correctly that in the line 'They pay their kane to hell' the fairies 'are represented as the Feudal subjects of Lucifer' [8] for 'the word "kain" or "canum" was used in ancient charters to signify the tribute or duty payable to the superior by his vassal'. [9] A similar idea is present in the stanza of the fourteenth-century romance-prophecy Thomas of Erceldoune which refers to the payment to hell:
To Morne, of helle Pe foulle fende,
Amange this folke will feche his fee;
And pou arte mekill mane and hende,
I trowe full wele he wolde chese the. [10]
The word 'fee' appears to be used in the sense of 'something given as offering or tribute to a superior'.[11] This stanza of Thomas of Erceldoune has been discussed previously along with Tam Lin in the context of the traditional belief in the payment to the devil, [12] but I do not think that enough stress has been laid on the point that the payment has a particular function in Thomas of Erceldoune and Tam Lin which has no parallel in tradition. It seems advisable to distinguish the belief in the taking of human beings by the fairies for the purpose of meeting the devil's demand for tribute, from the narrative where this belief is employed as a motive for the return to earth of a mortal who has lived for some time in the otherworld. It is possible that both Thomas of Erceldoune and Tam Lin drew on a tale where the payment to hell and the return to earth were already linked, but, in the absence of other evidence for the story, it is perhaps more likely that the two narratives are directly related. The stanzaic treatment of the material in both cases lends some support to this view.
When the comparable stanzas in the two pieces are considered together, an interesting side-light is thrown on the date of the
payment to the devil. The deduction made here is only a tentative one, however, and any conclusion on the basis of this evidence would apply solely to the narrative, not to the belief. The lady of the otherworld in Thomas of Erceldoune warns Thomas that he must return to earth immediately for she is convinced that he will be selected when the devil comes to fetch his 'fee' the next day ('to Morne'). The idea that the payment is due the next day is not stated in Tam Lin but it may be implicit in some variants in the stanza that follows the one on the teind to hell, as, for example, in the Mansfield manuscript variant:
The night it is Hallow E'en
The morn it is Hallow tide
And they that wad their true love won
At Bells port they maun bide
The rescue of Tam Lin has to be attempted 'the night' (tonight), which is Halloween (31 October). Possibly the reason behind the mention of 'the morn' (tomorrow) which is Hallowtide, Hallowday or Hallowmas (1 November) is that payment to the devil is to be made on that date. Hallowmas was one of the ancient quarter days of Scotland, and half-yearly rents were payable at Beltane and Hallowmas, so perhaps the devil might be imagined to demand his tribute on a date when human rents fell due.
The narrative of Tam Lin appears to unite two separate traditional beliefs at this point. Firstly, there is the belief that a mortal
taken by the fairies can be recovered when they ride out on Halloween, [13] and secondly, there is the belief discussed here that the fairies pay mortals as tribute to the devil. Comparison with the Thomas of Erceldoune stanza suggests that the two beliefs may have come together with the custom of making payments at Hallowmas, and that, if Tam Lin had not been rescued at Halloween, he would have been in imminent danger of being paid to the devil on the following day.
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Footnotes:
1 Maria Leach, ed., Funk & Wagnalls Standard Dictionary of Folklore, Mythology and Legend (New York, 1949), I. 365.
2 Leland L. Duncan, 'Fairy Beliefs and Other Folklore Notes from County Leitrim', Folklore 7 (1896), p. 163, n. i.
3 K. M. Briggs, The Fairies in Tradition and Literature (London, 1967), p. I 15.
4 Written on two slips of paper among some of Gregor's MSS. in the of Mr S. F. custody Sanderson of the Institute of Dialect and Folk Life Studies at the University of Leeds. I am much obliged to Miss Robin Eaden for supplying this record.
5 Robert Pitcairn, Criminal Trials in Scotland (Bannatyne Club No. 42, Edinburgh, 1833), Vol. I, Part 2, p. 164.
6. Frank Miller, 'The Mansfield Manuscript', Transactions and Journal of Proceedings of the Dumfriesshire and Galloway Natural History & Antiquarian Society (3rd series, Vol. 19, 1933-35), p. 82.
7. Walter Scott, Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border (2nd edition, Edinburgh, 1803), II. 252.
8. Letter of John Leyden to Alexander Campbell, 27th October, 1797 (Edinburg h University Library, La. II. 333/1).
9. Encyclopaedia of the Laws of Scotland (Edinburgh, 1929), VIII. 629.
10 Lines 289-92 of the Thornton MS. text in Thomas of Erceldoune, ed.
11. James A. H. Murray (E.E.T.S., O.S. 61, London, 1875). " Middle English Dictionary, ed. Hans Kurath and Sherman M. Kuhn,
fe n. (2), 6. (b).
12. Lowry Charles Wimberly, Folklore in the English & Scottish Ballads (Chicago, 1928, reprinted New York, 1965), PP. 323-5, and Lewis Spence, The Fairy Tradition in Britain (London, 1948), pp. 251-4.
13 For examples of tales embodying this belief, see my article 'The Ballad
Tam Lin and Traditional Tales of Recovery from the Fairy Troop', Studies in
Scottish Literature 6 (1969). pp. i75-85.