The Lady of York- Netherly (TN) 1934 Niles B
[From the Ballad Book of John Jacob Niles. His notes follow.
R. Matteson 2014]
The Cruel Mother
( Child No. 20 )
OF THE 13 texts of "The Cruel Mother" offered by Child, less than half are complete. The ballad has been encountered many times in America, and very seldom is the story told fully. Until 1870 it had not been encountered in Denmark. That year, however, a folklore collector, working in Jutland, reported the ballad twice, and the similarity between the versions from Scotland and Jutland is surprising. One of these Danish texts runs to 18 verses and tells the story in its entirety. Although Child refers to the German and Wendish versions as "probable variations" of the English, Scottish, and Irish texts, we must admit that these "probable variations" are widespread and might be of equal antiquity.
With a few local changes, the story is almost the same wherever it is encountered. An unmarried girl of some importance produces issue - sometimes as many as three children. She destroys them, and although their feet are tied to prevent their walking as ghosts, they appear, denounce their mother, and make some dire prophecies concerning her future here and hereafter. In some of the Teutonic texts the devil himself appears and takes the hapless mother off
with him. In America it is, as one of my informants said, "the tale of a child-killing female who tried to palm herself off as an honest person."
The Lady of York
(Niles No. 14 B)
IN June 1934, at a place about five miles from Trade, Tenn., I encountered a lacemaker named Aunt Didie Netherly, who was nearing 90 and was still working regularly, turning out enough handmade lace to support herself and several menfolk quite adequately. The menfolk never appeared. I was under the impression that Aunt Didie gave the orders in the Netherly cabin. I
also observed that she spoke disparagingly of all males. She had the delightful habit of offering advice and gratuitous information without any advance notice. Once she said to me: "A skeleton is a man with his insides out and his outsides
off." Her statement, humorous though it was, had no relation whatever to the previous conversation.
She told me that she had been baptized in her 86th year, that she was now 87 1/2 years old, and had not cussed a single cuss since baptism. She also said she had made enough tied lace in her lifetime to stretch from Trade to Oregon. One of her enterprises was the making of Battenberg lace. It is made of linen tape sewed onto a paper design and connected with the most intricate kind of threadwork.
Her bitterness concerning the people in her community expressed itself in her frequent narration of the famous "drap-sucker" yarn - a story in which a man is made out a fool by a piece of machinery. She is even credited with having invented the tale.
When she sang "The Lady of York," however, Aunt Didie seemed to be a different kind of person. For a few moments she could forget her 87 years of poverty and slim rewards. "The Lady of York" was, in fact, "The Cruel Mother." She had reduced the text to 9 verses, action-packed and tragic. Her melodic material, while not of the very best, was managed clearly and accurately. She was a willing informant. At the conclusion of the song I thanked Aunt Didie, and started to take my leave, but she,
following her process of uttering disassociated statements, turned to me and said: "Young man, I want you to know that hit takes a liar to raise gourds." This was a widely accepted old wives' tale, but coming frorn Aunt Didie Netherly, it sounded quite a lot like Holy Writ. Here are the verses of her version of "The Cruel Mother":
The Lady of York (Niles No. 14 B)
1. A great lady lived all in York,
Allay, allay, and all alone,
A great lady lived all in York,
And she was much loved by her father's clerk,[1]
While the babes are under the marble stone.
2. She went into the deep oak wood,
Allay, allay, and all alone,
She went into the deep oak wood,
And birthed her babes as best she could,
While the babes are under the marble stone,
3. She leaned the oak, she leaned the thorn,
Fornenst[2] the sky her babes were born.
4. She took her dress off o'er her head
To wrap up her babes when they were dead.
5. She walked in her bowery hall,
The fairest maid of maidens all.
6. "Come, pretty boys, what play at ball,
I'll dress you up in satlins[3] all."
7. "Oh Mother dear, when we were thine,
You robbed us of our life divine.
8. "You have some clothes in every press,
But we were wropped in your bloody dress.
9. "Oh mother dear, hell is so deep,
And lossed souls in hell do weep."
1. Aunt Didie made no attempt to rhyme
2. Opposite to, against or under.
3. Satins.