The False-Hearted Knight- Harrington (VA) 1916 Davis R
[From Traditional Ballads of Virginia; Davis 1929. Davis' notes follow. The local titles Polly, Collee, Polly Ann, Colvin, Collean, Collenendee, Goldan, Goldin, are generic slang words for the Irish word, cailin, meaning "girl" "girlfriend" or "lover." (Barry 1909)
R. Matteson 2011]
LADY ISABEL AND THE ELF-KNIGHT
(CHILD, NO.4)
THIS ballad is one of the few most frequently found in Virginia, where variously known as "Pretty Polly," "The Seven King's Daughters," "King's Daughter," "The Pretty Gold Leaf," "The Salt Water Sea," "Miss Mary's Parrot," and under several other titles. Its polyonymity is almost equal to its ubiquity - twenty-eight variants under sixteen different titles. In Virginia it does not, however, when compared with" Barbara Allen," "The House Carpenter" and several others quite live up to its reputation of having obtained the widest circulation of all ballads. Child's remarkable introduction to this ballad discusses at some length its extraordinary currency in the southern as well as the northern nations of Europe. Space is also given to a consideration of the hypothesis that the ballad is a wild shoot from the story of Judith and Holofernes, with Holofernes the original of the Elf-Knight. Child concludes; "It is a supposition attended with less difficulty that an independent European tradition existed of a half-human, half-demonic being, who possessed an irresistible power of decoying away young maids, and was wont to kill them after he got them into his hands, but who at last found one who was more than his match, and lost his own life through her craft and courage. A modification of this story is afforded by the large class of Bluebeard tales."
All the Virginia texts correspond much more closely with the Child series C-G (and Sargent and Kittredge H) than to A and B. Warning might perhaps be given of the confusion of Pollies in most of the Virginia texts. The girl and the parrot have the same name and are not always immediately distinguishable.
For American findings of this ballad see Barry, No. 4; Belden, No. 1 (fragment); Brown, p. 9 (North Carolina); Bulletin, Nos. 2-4, 6-12; Campbell and Sharp, No. 2 (Massachusetts, North Carolina, Kentucky, Georgia); Child, III, 496 (Virginia, from The Folk-Lore Journal, VII, '28); Cox, No. I and p. 521 (fragment and melody); Hudson, No. I (Mississippi); Jones, p. 301 (fragment); Journal, XVIII, 132 (Barry, Massachusetts, text and melody); XIX, 232 (Belden, Missouri); XXII, 65 (Beatty, Wisconsin), 76 (Barry, New Jersey, melody only), 374 (Barry, Massachusetts, text and melody, Missouri), 344 (Barry, Massachusetts); XXVII, 90 (Gardner, Michigan); XXVIII, 148 (Perrow, North Carolina); XXXV, 338 (Tolman and Eddy, Ohio); Mackenzie, Ballads, No. I, and p. 391 (melody); Sandburg, P: 60 (R. W. Gordon Collection); Scarborough, p. 43 (Texas, text and melody); Shearin, p. 3; Shearin and Combs, p. 7; Reed Smith, No. I; Reed Smith, Ballads, No. I; Wyman and Brockway, p. 82. For additional references, see Cox, p. 3; Journal, XXIX,
The False-Hearted Knight- Sung by Mrs. Harrington, Roanoke, Va., December 17, 1916. Collected by Alfreda M. Peel.
"Now turn your back to me
And your face to the leaves on the tree;
Such a wicked man as thou'rt isn't fit
A naked woman to see."
And turning his back to her
And his face to the leaves on the tree,
She picked him up in her own strong arms
And threw him in the sea.
"Lie there, lie there, false-hearted knight,
Lie there instead of me;
Three king's [sic] daughters you have drowned,
But I the fourth shan't be."
And mounting on her own bay horse
And leading the dapple gray,
She then arrived at her father's house
One hour and a half before day.
Her father hearing her come in
Got up, and thus did say:
"Who enters here, who enters here,
When 'tis so near to day?"
The pretty parrot began to talk
And laugh so fitfully:
"The cat was before my little cage door
And about to have eaten me."
The girl came up and thus did say
To the pretty parrot blithe and gay:
"O mistress Polly, you keep still
And tell no tales on me;
Your cage shall be made of beaten gold,
And hang on a willow tree."
-----------------
X:19.
T:The False Hearted Knight
T:Lady Isabel and the Elf Knight
C:Trad
B:Bronson
O:Davis, "Traditional Ballads of Virginia", I929, p. ssr(R);
O:text, pp. 84-85. Sung by Mrs. Harrington, Roanoke, Va.,
O:December I7, 1916. Collected by Alfreda M. Peel.
N:The opening of this variant may be compared with the Kidson
N:(1891) and Sandburg (1927) variants, X:63 and 64.
M:6/8
L:1/8
K:G % Hexatonic ( -4) Lydian/Ionian
G | G2 B d2 f | g2 f g2 e/e/ |
w:Now turn your back to me__ And your
def gfd | d3 d2 B/A/ | G2 B/A/ G2 B/A/ |
w:face to the leaves on the tree; Such a wicked man as thou'rt
GED G2 B | d3 BAG | GED G2 |]
w:isn't fit A naked woman to see.
W:
W:"Now turn your back to me
W:And your face to the leaves on the tree;
W:Such a wicked man as thou'rt isn't fit
W:A naked woman to see."
W:
W:And turning his back to her
W:And his face to the leaves on the tree,
W:She picked him up in her own strong arms
W:And threw him in the sea.
W:
W:"Lie there, lie there, false-hearted knight,
W:Lie there instead of me;
W:Three king's [sic] daughters you have drowned,
W:But I the fourth shan't be."
W:
W:And mounting on her own bay horse
W:And leading the dapple gray,
W:She then arrived at her father's house
W:One hour and a half before day.
W:
W:Her father hearing her come in
W:Got up, and thus did say:
W:"Who enters here, who enters here,
W:When 'tis so near to day?"
W:
W:The pretty parrot began to talk
W:And laugh so fitfully:
W:"The cat was before my little cage door
W:And about to have eaten me."
W:
W:The girl came up and thus did say
W:To the pretty parrot blithe and gay:
W:"O mistress Polly, you keep still
W:And tell no tales on me;
W:Your cage shall be made of beaten gold,
W:And hang on a willow tree."