My lady went to Caunterbury
For Christmas
Words:
English Traditional
Huntington
Library. Christmas carolles newely Inprynted (Richard Kele) c. 1550.
Source: Edward Bliss Reed, ed., Christmas Carols Printed in the 16th Century Including Kele's Christmas Carolles Newly Inprynted. (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1932).
This carol requires the installation of the "Old Blacketter" font for best display.
Available in a Middle English Font: My lady went to Caunterbury
My harte of golde as true as ~tele.
As I me lened to a bough
In fayth but yf ye loue my well
Lorde ~o Robyn lough
My lady went to Caunterbury
The ~aynt to be her bothe
She met with cate of Malme~bery
Why ~hepy~t thou in an apple rote
My hart. &c.
Nyne myle to Mychelmas
Our dame began to brew
Mychell ~et his mare to gras
Lord ~o fa~t it ~new
My hart. &c.
For you loue I brake my gla~~e
Pour gowne is furred with blew
The deuyll is dede: for there I was
I wys it is full trew
My hart. &c.
And yf ye ~lepe, the cocke wyll crow
True hart thynke what I ~ay
Jack napes wyll make a mow
Loke who dare ~ay hym nay
My hart. &c.
I pray you haue me now in mynde
I tell you of the mater
He blew his horne agayn~t the wynde
The crow gothe to the water
A.iiii.
My hart. &c.
Yet I tell you mekyll more
The cat lyeth in the cradell
I pray you kepe true hart in ~tore
A peny for a ladell
My hart. &c.
I ~were by faynt Katheryn of kent
The go~e gothe to the grene
All our dogges tayle is brent
It is not as I wene
My hart. &c.
Tyrlery lorpyn the lauerocke ~onge
So meryly pypes the ~parow
The cow brake lo~e, the rope ran home
Syr god gyue yow good morow
My hart. &c.
Finis.
Excerpt of notes from Richard Greene, A Selection of English Carols (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1962), pp. 262-263:
The words and first stanza occur in a round or canon in Ravenscroft's Pammelia (1609)....
The nonsense of this delightful piece if free-ranging, and it is hardly to be classified as a 'lying song' as Utley suggests (p. 203).
The reference is to Francis Lee Utley, The Crooked Rib, Ohio State University Contributions in Language and Literature, No. 10. Columbus, 1944.
This is one of the carols that were first printed by Richard Kele, Christmas Carolles Newly Inprynted (circa 1550), reprinted by Philip Bliss, Biographical Miscellanies (1813), and included in Edward Bliss Reed, Christmas Carols of the 16th Century, Including Kele's Christmas Carolles Newly Inprynted (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1932).
If you would like to help support Hymns and Carols of Christmas, please click on the button below and make a donation.
Related Hymns and Carols