Katharine Jaffray is
Child ballad
The Child Ballads are 305 traditional ballads from England and Scotland, and their American variants, anthologized by Francis James Child during the second half of the 19th century. Their lyrics and Child's studies of them were published as '' ...
221 (
Roud 93). It exists in several variants. The poem first appears in ''
Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border
''Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border'' is an anthology of Border ballads, together with some from north-east Scotland and a few modern literary ballads, edited by Walter Scott. It was first published in 1802, but was expanded in several later ...
'' (Kelso: James Ballantyne, 1802), 1.216–19, under the title "The Laird of Laminton". The editor of this collection states
:''There are two copies of this ballad in Mr Herd’s MS. in one of which the bride’s name is Katherine Jaffrey, and the unlucky bridegroom is called the Laird of Lochinton, ‘out frae the English border.’—The Editor has been unable to discover whether the story is founded in fact''
Synopsis
A woman is wooed by a man who asks her family for leave. Another man comes and wins the consent of her family but does not bother to tell her until the wedding day. Her original lover comes to the wedding and carries her off. Sometimes there is a bloody fight.
Some variants end with a warning that Englishmen should not seek Scottish brides.
Adaptations
This is similar to the
Lochinvar
Lochinvar (or Lan Var) is a loch in the civil parish of Dalry in the historic county of Kirkcudbrightshire, Dumfries and Galloway Scotland. It is located in the Galloway Hills, around north-east of St. John's Town of Dalry. The loch formerly h ...
tale included in Sir
Walter Scott
Sir Walter Scott, 1st Baronet (15 August 1771 – 21 September 1832), was a Scottish novelist, poet, playwright and historian. Many of his works remain classics of European and Scottish literature, notably the novels ''Ivanhoe'', ''Rob Roy (n ...
's ''
Marmion''; indeed, in one variant, the hero is named Lochinvar.
See also
*
David Herd (anthologist), Scottish anthologist
*
Francis James Child
Francis James Child (February 1, 1825 – September 11, 1896) was an American scholar, educator, and folklorist, best known today for his collection of English and Scottish ballads now known as the Child Ballads. Child was Boylston professor of r ...
(1825–1896), American educator and folklorist
External links
''Katharine Jaffray''"The Laird of Laminton" in ''Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border'' (1802)
* Child Ballads
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