The medieval ballad

Performer Shaping Ideas

Marina Spiazzi, Marina Tavella,
Margaret Layton © 2020
 The medieval ballad

1. Stylistic features
The medieval ballads:
• belonged to‘folk’or ‘popular’ tradition;
• told short dramatic stories about ordinary people;

• were preserved and transmitted orally;

• were impersonal: narrator / singer rarely interferes.

Performer Shaping Ideas

 The medieval ballad

1. Stylistic features
The ballad:
•is composed of short four-line stanzas;
•contains repetition of words or refrains.
O where ha’ you been, Lord Randal my son?
And where ha’ you been, my handsome young man?
I ha’ been at the greenwood; mother, mak my bed soon,
For I’m wearied wi’ hunting and fain wad lie down.

(Anonymous ballad, Lord Randal)

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 The medieval ballad

2. Narrative features
• There is often a mixture of dialogue and narration.

O sister, sister let me live,

And all that’s mine I’ll surely give.

It’s your own true love that I’ll have and more
But thou shalt never come ashore.

(Anonymous ballad, Cruel Sister)

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 The medieval ballad

3. Content
• The ballad focuses on a single crucial episode or situation
told through a series of rapid flashes.

There were three gypsies tae oor hall door,

An’ O but they sang bonnie O
They sang so sweet and too complete
That they stole the heart of our lady, O!

(Anonymous ballad, Gypsy Ladies)

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 The medieval ballad

4. Setting
• There is little description of the setting.
There was a king and a noble king
A king of muckle1 fame
And he had an only daughter dear,
Lady Diamond was her name.

He had a servant, a kitchen boy,

A lad of muckle scorn
And she loved him long and she loved him aye
Till the grass overgrew the corn.

(Anonymous ballad, Lady Diamond)

1. Great.

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 The medieval ballad

5. Characters
• The characters are both supernatural and real.
Fair Lady Isabel sits in her bower sewing
Aye as the gowans1 grow gay.

There she heard and elf-knight blowing his horn

The first morning in May.

(Anonymous ballad, Lady Isabel and the Elf-knight)

1. Daisies.

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 The medieval ballad

6. The language
• The language is simple.
1
There lived a lady in the north sea shore
Lay the bent1 to the bonnie broom2
Two daughters were the babes she bore
Fa la la la la la la la la la.

2
As one grew bright as in the sun
Lay the bent to the bonnie broom
So coal black grew the elder one
Fa la la la la la la la la la.

(Anonymous ballad, Cruel Sister) 1. Giunco.

2. Ginestra.

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 The medieval ballad

7. Theme
• Ballads deal with magic, love, war, dramatic events, outlaws.

• They have no moral aim.

Ah my Geordie will be hanged in a golden chain

‘Tis not the chain of many,
Stole sixteen of the King’s royal deer
And he sold them in Bohenny

(Anonymous ballad, Geordie)

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