"The Cruel Brother" (
Child
A child ( : children) is a human being between the stages of birth and puberty, or between the developmental period of infancy and puberty. The legal definition of ''child'' generally refers to a minor, otherwise known as a person younger ...
11,
Roud
The Roud Folk Song Index is a database of around 250,000 references to nearly 25,000 songs collected from oral tradition in the English language from all over the world. It is compiled by Steve Roud (born 1949), a former librarian in the London ...
26) is a
folk song
Folk music is a music genre that includes #Traditional folk music, traditional folk music and the Contemporary folk music, contemporary genre that evolved from the former during the 20th-century folk revival. Some types of folk music may be c ...
.
Synopsis
A knight (or lord) courts a lady. She tells him he must win the consent of her kin. He neglects that of her brother John. John mortally stabs her on her wedding day. She lives long enough to make various bequests, such as clothing to her mother, a fan to her sister; John invariably receives "a gallows to hang him on" and his wife may receive grief for her entire life and his children that they would have to beg, though the wife may get a widow's weeds and a quiet life, or his son the grace of God to be a man.
Motifs
The bride's bequests are highly typical of ballads, and similar bequests are found in ballads throughout Europe.
Field Recordings
Only four field recordings of the song by traditional singers are known to have been made:
* Bell Duncan of
Ythenwells,
Aberdeenshire
Aberdeenshire ( sco, Aiberdeenshire; gd, Siorrachd Obar Dheathain) is one of the 32 Subdivisions of Scotland#council areas of Scotland, council areas of Scotland.
It takes its name from the County of Aberdeen which has substantially differe ...
,
Scotland
Scotland (, ) is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a border with England to the southeast and is otherwise surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean to the ...
(1929–35, recorded by
James Madison Carpenter
James Madison Carpenter, born in 1888 in Blacklands, Mississippi, near Booneville, in Prentiss County, was a Methodist minister and scholar of American and British folklore. He received his Bachelor of Arts and Master of Arts degrees from the U ...
)
* Polly Johnson of
Wise,
Virginia
Virginia, officially the Commonwealth of Virginia, is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Southeastern regions of the United States, between the Atlantic Coast and the Appalachian Mountains. The geography and climate of the Commonwealth ar ...
,
USA
The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country Continental United States, primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 U.S. state, states, a Washington, D.C., ...
(1939, recorded by
Herbert Halpert
Herbert Halpert (August 23, 1911 – December 29, 2000) was an American anthropologist and folklorist, specialised in the collection and study of both folk song and narrative.
Biography
Herbert Norman Halpert's interest in folklore emerg ...
)
*
Edith Ballinger Price
Edith Ballinger Price (1897–1997) was a prolific writer and illustrator of children's books, best known for the imaginative stories and illustrations she created for 37 different books and stories. The granddaughter of landscape painter Willia ...
of
New Jersey
New Jersey is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Northeastern regions of the United States. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York; on the east, southeast, and south by the Atlantic Ocean; on the west by the Delaware ...
,
USA
The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country Continental United States, primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 U.S. state, states, a Washington, D.C., ...
(1945, recorded by
Helen Hartness Flanders
Helen Hartness Flanders (May 19, 1890 – May 23, 1972), a native of the U.S. state of Vermont, was an internationally recognized ballad collector and an authority on the folk music found in New England and the British Isles. At the initiati ...
)
* Rose McCartin of
Annalong
Annalong () is a seaside village in County Down, Northern Ireland at the foot of the Mourne Mountains. It is situated in the Civil parishes in Ireland, civil parish of Kilkeel and the historic Barony (geographic), barony of Mourne (barony), Mou ...
,
Co. Down,
Northern Ireland
Northern Ireland ( ga, Tuaisceart Éireann ; sco, label= Ulster-Scots, Norlin Airlann) is a part of the United Kingdom, situated in the north-east of the island of Ireland, that is variously described as a country, province or region. Nort ...
(1970, recorded by
Hugh Shields
Dr Hugh Shields (8 September 1929 – 16 July 2008) was an authority on Irish traditional music and a founder member of the Folk Music Society of Ireland and the Irish Traditional Music Archive. He was also a senior lecturer in French at Trinit ...
)
See also
*
List of the Child Ballads
The Child Ballads is the colloquial name given to a collection of 305 ballads collected in the 19th century by Francis James Child
Francis James Child (February 1, 1825 – September 11, 1896) was an American scholar, educator, and folklorist, ...
References
External links
''Brother's Revenge''
Child Ballads
Year of song unknown
Murder ballads
Sororicide in fiction
Songwriter unknown
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