List of the Child Ballads - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

This list of the Child Ballads contains all the 305 ballad types in Francis James Child

Francis James Child

Francis James Child was an American scholar, educator, and folklorist, best known today for his collection of folk songs known as the Child Ballads. Child was Boylston professor of rhetoric and oratory at Harvard University, where he produced influential editions of English poetry...

's collection Popular English and Scottish Ballads, collected in the 19th century, colloquially known as the Child Ballads

Child Ballads

The Child Ballads are a collection of 305 ballads from England and Scotland, and their American variants, collected by Francis James Child in the late nineteenth century...

; see this for further general information. In order to get more information on a certain ballad type, follow the corresponding link below.

Child grouped the ballads into rough categories, as follows, and attempted to sort the ballads within each category "according to the probable antiquity of the story".

BOOK I. contains Ballads involving Superstitions of various kinds, — as of Fairies, Elves,
Water-spirits, Enchantment, and Ghostly Apparitions; and also some Legends of Popular Heroes.

BOOK II. Tragic Love-ballads.

BOOK III. other Tragic Ballads.

BOOK IV. Love-ballads not Tragic.

BOOK V. Ballads of Robin Hood
Robin Hood
Robin Hood was a heroic outlaw in English folklore. A highly skilled archer and swordsman, he is known for "robbing from the rich and giving to the poor", assisted by a group of fellow outlaws known as his "Merry Men". Traditionally, Robin Hood and his men are depicted wearing Lincoln green clothes....

, his followers, and compeers.

BOOK VI. Ballads of other Outlaws, especially Border Outlaws, of Border Forays, Feuds, &c.

BOOK VII. Historical Ballads, or those relating to public characters or events.

BOOK VIII. Miscellaneous Ballads, especially Humorous, Satirical, Burlesque; also some specimens of the Moral and Scriptural, and all such pieces as had been overlooked in arranging the earlier volumes.

Riddles Wisely Expounded
Riddles Wisely Expounded
"Riddles Wisely Expounded" is a traditional English song, dating at least to 1450. It is Child Ballad 1 and Roud 161, and exists in several variants...
The Elfin Knight
The Elfin Knight
"The Elfin Knight" is a traditional Scottish folk ballad of which there are many versions, all dealing with supernatural occurrences, and the commission to perform impossible tasks.-Synopsis:...
The Fause Knight Upon the Road
The Fause Knight Upon the Road
The False Knight Upon the Road is a British ballad, collected and published as Child ballad 3, Roud 20. It features a riddling exchange between a schoolboy and a "false knight," the devil in disguise.-Synopsis:...
Lady Isabel and the Elf-Knight
Gil Brenton
Gil Brenton
Gil Brenton is Child ballad 5, Roud 22, existing in several variants.-Synopsis:A man has brought home a foreign woman to be his wife....
Willie's Lady
Willie's Lady
Willie's Lady is Child ballad number 6.A variant of this ballad was one of 25 traditional works included in Ballads Weird and Wonderful and illustrated by Vernon Hill.-Synopsis:...
Earl Brand
Earl Brand
Earl Brand is one of the Child ballads 7 . Legend claims it recounts a historical event.-Synopsis:The hero, who may be Earl Brand, Lord Douglas, or Lord William, flees with the heroine, who may be Lady Margaret. A Carl Hood may betray them to her father, but they are always pursued. The hero...
Erlinton
Erlinton
"Erlinton" is Child ballad 8.One variant features Robin Hood, but this variant forces the folk hero into a ballad structure where he does not fit naturally.-Synopsis:...
The Fair Flower of Northumberland
The Fair Flower of Northumberland
"The Fair Flower of Northumberland" is a folk ballad.-Synopsis:A Scottish knight is taken by the Earl of Northumberland. The knight persuades the Earl's daughter, the fair flower, to free him and come with him to Scotland, by promising to marry her. As soon as they reach his home, he tells her...
The Twa Sisters
The Twa Sisters
"The Twa Sisters" is a murder ballad that recounts the tale of a girl drowned by her sister. It is first known to have appeared on a broadside in 1656 as "The Miller and the King's Daughter." At least 21 English variants exist under several names, including "Minnorie" or "Binnorie", "The Cruel...

[or Minnorie or Binnorie]
The Cruel Brother
The Cruel Brother
-Synopsis:A knight courts a lady. She tells him he must win the consent of her kin. He neglects that of her brother John. John mortally stabs her on her wedding day...
Lord Randall
Lord Randall
"Lord Randall", or "Lord Randal", is an Anglo-Scottish border ballad, a traditional ballad consisting of dialogue. The different versions follow the same general lines: the primary character is poisoned, usually by his sweetheart; this is revealed through a conversation where he reports on the...
Edward
Edward (ballad)
Edward is a traditional murder ballad existing in several variants. In English its versions were collected by Francis James Child as Child ballad number 13.-Synopsis:...
Babylon; or, The Bonnie Banks o Fordie
Leesome Brand
Leesome Brand
-Synopsis:Leesome Brand went to court when ten years old. An eleven-year-old girl fell in love with him, but nine months later, called on him to saddle horses, take her dowry, and flee with her. They headed to his mother's house, but she went into labour on the way...
Sheath and Knife
Sheath and Knife
"Sheath and Knife" is a folk ballad.-Synopsis:A woman is pregnant with her brother's child. He takes her to the greenwood to have her child, but she dies...
Hind Horn
Hind Horn
"Hind Horn" is traditional folk ballad.-Synopsis:Hind Horn and the king's daughter Jean fall in love. He gives her a silver wand, and she gives him a diamond ring and tells him when the stones grow pale, he has lost her love. One day, on his travels, he sees it growing pale and sets out for her...
Sir Lionel
Sir Lionel
Sir Lionel is the younger son of King Bors of Gaunnes and Evaine and brother of Bors the Younger in Arthurian legend. He is a double cousin of Lancelot and cousin of Lancelot's younger half-brother Ector de Maris...
King Orfeo
The Cruel Mother
The Cruel Mother
"The Cruel Mother" is a murder ballad.-Synopsis:A woman gives birth to one or two illegitimate children in the woods, kills them, and buries them. On her return trip home, she sees a child, or children, playing, and says that if they were hers, she would dress them in various fine garments and...
The Maid and the Palmer
The Maid and the Palmer
"The Maid and the Palmer" or "The Well Below The Valley" is Child ballad 21 and a murder ballad. Because of its dark and sinister lyrics , the song was often avoided by folk singers. It is claimed that Tom Munnelly was largely responsible for preserving the song...

(The Samaritan Woman)
St. Stephen and Herod
Judas
Judas (ballad)
"Judas", Child ballad 23, dates to at least the 13th century and is one of the oldest surviving English ballads. It is numbered as 23 in Francis Child's collection.-Synopsis:...
Bonnie Annie
Bonnie Annie
"Bonnie Annie" is Child ballad 24, existing in several variants.-Synopsis:Annie, a merchant's daughter, falls in love with a sea captain and goes to sea with him, in some variants while pregnant. Something goes wrong, and they determine that Annie is the cause of it. She makes the captain throw...
Willie's Lyke-Wake
Willie's Lyke-Wake
-Synopsis:Willie sets up his wake and lies in his winding cloth. His love discovers this and pleads with her father to let her go. When he does, and she enters the room, Willie rouses himself and declares that he will marry her at once.-Variants:...
The Three Ravens
The Three Ravens
"The Three Ravens" is an English folk ballad, printed in the song book Melismata compiled by Thomas Ravenscroft and published in 1611, but it is perhaps older than that. More recent versions were recorded right up through the 19th century. Francis James Child recorded several versions in his...

(or Twa Corbies)
The Whummil Bore
The Whummil Bore
"The Whummil Bore" is Child ballad 27. A whummil is a tool for drilling holes.-Synopsis:The narrator served the king seven years and saw his daughter only once, through a whummil bore. She was being dressed by her maids.-Commentary:...
Burd Ellen and Young Tamlane
Burd Ellen and Young Tamlane
Burd Ellen and Young Tamlane is Child ballad number 28.Despite similarity in names, it appears to have no connection with Tam Lin, nor with the tale of Childe Rowland, though they both have characters named Burd Ellen; indeed, Francis James Child was unable to connect this ballad with any other...
The Boy and the Mantle
The Boy and the Mantle
"The Boy and the Mantle" is Child ballad number 29, an Arthurian story.Unlike the ballads before it, and like "King Arthur and King Cornwall" and "The Marriage of Sir Gawain" immediately after it in the collection, this is not a folk ballad but a song from professional minstrels.-Synopsis:A boy...
King Arthur and King Cornwall
King Arthur and King Cornwall
"King Arthur and King Cornwall" is an English ballad surviving in fragmentary form in the 17th-century Percy Folio manuscript. An Arthurian story, it was collected by Francis James Child as Child Ballad 30. Unlike other Child Ballads, but like the Arthurian "The Boy and the Mantle" and "The...
The Marriage of Sir Gawain
The Marriage of Sir Gawain
"The Marriage of Sir Gawain" is an English Arthurian ballad, collected as Child Ballad 31. Found in the Percy Folio, it is a fragmented account of the story of Sir Gawain and the loathly lady, which has been preserved in fuller form in the medieval poem The Wedding of Sir Gawain and Dame Ragnelle...
King Henry
Kempy Kay
Kemp Owyne
Kemp Owyne
-Synopsis:The heroine is turned into a worm , usually by her stepmother, who curses her to remain so until the king's son comes to kiss her three times. When he arrives, she offers him a belt, a ring, and a sword to kiss her, promising the things would magically protect him; the third time, she...
Allison Gross
Allison Gross
"Allison Gross" is a traditional ballad, catalogued as Child Ballad #35. It tells the story of "the ugliest witch in the north country" who tries to persuade a man to become her lover and then punishes him by a transformation.-Synopsis:Allison Gross, a hideous witch, tries to bribe the narrator to...
The Laily Worm and the Machrel of the Sea
The Laily Worm and the Machrel of the Sea
"The Laily Worm and the Machrel of the Sea" is Child ballad number 36.-Synopsis:A young man, transformed into a laily worm, tells his story: his father married an evil woman as his stepmother, and she transformed him into a worm and his sister into a mackerel. His sister combed his hair every...
Thomas Rymer
Thomas the Rhymer
Thomas Learmonth , better known as Thomas the Rhymer or True Thomas, was a 13th century Scottish laird and reputed prophet from Earlston . He is also the protagonist of the ballad "Thomas the Rhymer"...
The Wee Wee Man
The Wee Wee Man
"The Wee Wee Man" is Child ballad number 38, existing in several variants.-Synopsis:The narrator meets with a wee, wee man. He lifts an enormous stone and throws it, and she thinks that if she were as strong as Wallace, she could have lifted it to her knee...
Tam Lin
Tam Lin
Tam Lin is the hero of a legendary ballad originating from the Scottish Borders. The story revolves around the rescue of Tam Lin by his true love from the Queen of the Fairies...
The Queen of Elfan's Nourice
The Queen of Elfan's Nourice
"The Queen of Elfan's Nourice" or "The Queen of Elfland's Nourice" is Child ballad number 40, although fragmentary in form.-Synopsis:A mortal woman laments being taken from her four-day-old son. The Queen of Elfland promises that if she nurses the queen's child, she will be returned...
Hind Etin
Hind Etin
"Hind Etin" is a folk ballad existing in several variants.-Synopsis:Lady Margaret goes to the woods, and her breaking a branch is questioned by Hind Etin, who takes her with him into the forest. She bears him seven sons, but laments that they are never christened, nor she herself churched...
Clerk Corvill
The Broomfield Hill
The Broomfield Hill
"The Broomfield Hill" is a traditional folk ballad.-Synopsis:A man and a woman make a wager, that she can not visit him in the greenwood without losing her virginity, or she makes a tryst and realizes she can either stay and be foresworn, or go and lose her virginity...
The Twa Magicians
The Twa Magicians
"The Twa Magicians" or "The Two Magicians" is a British folk song. It first appears in print in 1828 in two sources, Peter Buchan's Ancient Ballads and Songs of the North of Scotland and John Wilson's Noctes Ambrosianae #40. It was later published as number 44 of Francis James Child's English and...
King John and the Bishop
King John and the Bishop
King John and the Bishop is an English folk-song dating back at least to the 16th century. It is catalogued in Child Ballads as number 45 and Roud Folk Song Index 302....
Captain Wedderburn's Courtship
Captain Wedderburn's Courtship
"Captain Wedderburn's Courtship" is an old Scottish ballad dating from 1785 or earlier. It is Child Ballad #46. It is known by a number of titles, including "Lord Roslin's Daughter" and "The Laird of Rosslyn's Daughter".-Synopsis:...
Proud Lady Margaret
Proud Lady Margaret
"Proud Lady Margaret" is Child ballad 47, existing in several variants.-Synopsis:A man arrives at the heroine's castle to woo her. She is frequently critical of him, on the grounds that his clothing shows him to be no gentleman. In most variants, he taxes her with riddles such as "What's the...
Young Andrew
Young Andrew
-Synopsis:Andrew seduces Helen and tells her he will fulfill his promise to marry her only if she brings him her father's gold. She does. He robs her not only of it but all her clothing. She goes home, naked. Her father is furious. Her heart breaks, killing her, and her father regrets it...
The Twa Brothers
The Twa Brothers
"The Twa Brothers" is Child ballad 49, existing in many variants.-Synopsis:Two brothers are wrestling when a blade that one of them is carrying mortally wounds the other; occasionally, one of them stabs the other intentionally....
The Bonny Hind
The Bonny Hind
-Synopsis:A squire persuades a maiden to lie with him. Afterward, she asks his name, and he reveals that he is a lord's son. She calls him a liar: she is that lord's daughter. The horror-struck son reveals that he was long at sea. She stabs herself to death, and he buries her...
Lizie Wan
Lizie Wan
-Synopsis:The heroine—Lizie, Rosie, Lucy—is pregnant with her brother's child. Her brother murders her. He tries to pass off the blood as some animal he had killed—his greyhound, his falcon, his horse—but in the end must admit that he murdered her...
The King's Dochter Lady Jean
The King's Dochter Lady Jean
-Synopsis:The heroine goes to the woods. A man meets her, tries to woo her, and rapes her. He asks her name, and they learn that they are brother and sister...
Young Beichan
Young Beichan
"Young Beichan" is a ballad, which with a number of variants and names such as "Lord Baker", "Lord Bateman", and "Young Bekie", was collected by Francis James Child in the late nineteenth century, and is included in the Child ballad as number 53 .-Synopsis:Beichan is born in London but travels to...

[or Young Bekie]
The Cherry-Tree Carol
The Cherry-Tree Carol
"The Cherry-Tree Carol" is a ballad with the rare distinction of being both a Christmas carol and one of the Child Ballads . The song itself is very old, reportedly being sung, in some form, at the Feast of Corpus Christi in the early 15th century...
The Carnal and the Crane
The Carnal and the Crane
"The Carnal and the Crane" is Child ballad 55 and a Christmas carol. It depicts a conversation between two birds—apparently, although the species of the "carnal" has never been identified with any certainty, though crow is generally assumed.-Synopsis:...
Dives and Lazarus
Dives and Lazarus (ballad)
Dives and Lazarus is Child ballad 56, and a Christmas carol. Francis James Child collected two variants, in The English and Scottish Popular Ballads...
Brown Robyn's Confession
Brown Robyn's Confession
-Synopsis:Brown Robyn goes to sea. On shipboard, they are unable to see any lights in the sky. They "cast kevels" which indicated that it was because of Brown Robyn. He confesses to incestous relations with his mother and his sister , or, in other variants, to killing his father...
Sir Patrick Spens
Sir Patrick Spens
"Sir Patrick Spens" is one of the most popular of the Child Ballads , and is of Scottish origin.-Historicity:The events of the ballad are similar to, and may chronicle, an actual event: the bringing home of the Scottish queen Margaret, Maid of Norway across the North Sea in 1290...
Sir Aldingar
Sir Aldingar
Sir Aldingar is Child ballad 59. Francis James Child collected three variants, two fragmentary, in The English and Scottish Popular Ballads. All three recount the tale where a rebuffed Sir Aldingar slanders his mistress, Queen Eleanor, and a miraclous champion saves her.Various forms of the...
King Estmere
King Estmere
King Estmere is an English and Scottish Child ballad and number 60 of 305 ballads collected by Francis James Child.-Synopsis:King Estmere's brother Alder the Younger urges him to marry King Adland's daughter, and suggests that he look at the lady himself, rather than be deceived by any description...
Sir Cawline
Sir Cawline
-Synopsis:Sir Cawline falls love with the king's daughter and falls ill from it. She tells him that he must do some great deed to be worthy of her: he must keep watch all night on the Eldritch Hill, and the Eldritch king has meant that no man has lived through that.Sir Cawline goes, the king...
Fair Annie
Fair Annie
-Synopsis:A lord tells Fair Annie to prepare a welcome for his bride, and to look like a maiden. Annie laments that she has borne him seven sons and is pregnant with the eighth; she can not look like a maiden. She welcomes the bride but laments her fate, even wishing her sons evil, that they...
Child Waters
Child Waters
-Synopsis:The pregnant Margaret, or Faire Ellen, is told by Child Waters that she should bide at home. In some variants, he offers her lands to support his child, and she tells him that she would rather have one kiss from him than all his lands. He tells her that she must dress his footpage and...
Fair Janet
Fair Janet
-Synopsis:Janet is in love with Willie, but her father insists on her marrying a French lord. They may attempt to flee, but she goes into labor and can not escape. She hands their baby to Willie, for his care, and he delivers the baby to his mother and goes to the wedding. Janet is ill and dies...
Lady Maisry
Lord Ingram and Chiel Wyet
Lord Ingram and Chiel Wyet
-Synopsis:Lord Ingram and Chiel Wyet are brothers who fall in love with the same woman, Maisry. She falls in love with Wyet and becomes pregnant by him. Her father arranges the marriage to Lord Ingram. At the wedding, he learns of the baby; he may offer to claim the baby as his own, and she...
Glasgerion
Glasgerion
-Synopsis:Glasgerion is a king's son and a harper. He harps before another king, whose daughter arranges a tryst with him. He tells his servant to ensure that he wakes in time to make the tryst. The servant goes in his place and rapes the princess. She learns the truth and kills herself,...
Young Hunting
Young Hunting
"Young Hunting" is a traditional folk song, collected by Francis James Child as Child Ballad number 68,, and has its origin in Scotland. Like most traditional songs, numerous variants of the song exist worldwide, notably under the title of "Henry Lee" and "Love Henry" in the United States and "Earl...
Clerk Saunders
Clerk Saunders
-Synopsis:Clerk Saunders and may Margaret are walking in the garden. He persuades her to go to bed with him before their marriage, saying that he will let himself in and she can cover her eyes, so that she can swear that she did not let him in or see him...
Willie and Lady Maisry
Willie and Lady Maisry
-Synopsis:Willie kills the watch on Lady Maisry's father's hall to get to her chamber. After the night, her father kills him. Lady Maisry taxes him with it. He may tell her that Willie killed the guard, but she retorts that they were in armor but Willie was not....
The Bent Sae Brown
The Bent Sae Brown
-Synopsis:Willie crosses land and sea to his love Annie. She tries to turn him away: her parents and brothers want her to never meet him. He tells her to cover her eyes and carry him to bed, so she can swear that she did not see him come in, and he never trod in her bower. Her mother sends her...
The Clerk's Twa Sons O Owsenford
The Clerk's Twa Sons o Owsenford
-Synopsis:The clerk's two sons seduce the two daughters of a mayor. The mayor sentences them to hang. Their father comes to plead for them, but is unsuccessful...
Lord Thomas and Fair Annet
Lord Thomas and Fair Annet
Lord Thomas and Fair Annet is an English folk ballad.-Synopsis:Lord Thomas is in love with Fair Annet, or Annie, or Elinor, but she has little property. He asks for advice. His father, mother, and brother advise that he should marry the nut-brown maid with a rich dowry...
Fair Margaret and Sweet William
Fair Margaret and Sweet William
"Fair Margaret and Sweet William" or Lady Margaret or Lady Margaret and Sweet William is a folk song, collected by Francis James Child as Child ballad number 74...
Lord Lovel
Lord Lovel
-Synopsis:A lord tells the lady he loves that he is going in a journey that will take several years. After a time, he longs to see her. He returns whereupon he hears of her death, and dies of grief....
The Lass of Roch Royal
The Lass of Roch Royal
-Synopsis:A woman comes to Gregory's castle, pleading to be let in; she is either pregnant or with a newborn son. His mother turns her away; sometimes she tells her that he went to sea, and she goes to follow him and dies in shipwreck. Gregory wakes and says he dreamed of her...
Sweet William's Ghost
Sweet William's Ghost
Sweet William's Ghost is a folk song, collected by Francis James Child in 1868 as Child ballad number 77. It exists in many forms but all versions recount a similar story. It was printed in Allan Ramsay's The Tea-Table Miscellany in 1740, and again in Thomas Percy's Reliques of Ancient English...
The Unquiet Grave
The Unquiet Grave
"The Unquiet Grave" is an English folk song in which a young man mourns his dead love too hard and prevents her from obtaining peace. It is thought to date from 1400 and was collected in 1868 by Francis James Child, as Child Ballad number 78....
The Wife of Usher's Well
The Wife of Usher's Well
"The Wife of Usher's Well" is a traditional ballad, catalogued as Child Ballad 79, originally from Britain, and is more particularly considered a Scottish ballad, but also popular in North America...
Old Robin of Portingale
Old Robin of Portingale
-Synopsis:It opens with a warning against old men marrying young women.Old Robin of Portingale marries the daughter of the mayor of Linn. She soon goes to Sir Gyles and asks his help in murdering her husband. They make plans to attack him with twenty-four knights. His foot page overhears and weeps...
Little Musgrave and Lady Barnard
The Bonny Birdy
The Bonny Birdy
-Synopsis:A knight is riding when a bird asks him why he is about so late and tells him his wife is with her lover. It had been a wild bird until the lover caught it and gave it to his love. She did not feed it well, so it is telling her story. It flew with the knight to her bower, and sang of...
Child Maurice
Child Maurice
-Synopsis:The hero sends tokens to his lady and asks her to see him in the woods. Her lord learns of it and comes to where he will meet her, and kills him uder the impression that he is her paramour. He brings back the head, and the lady confesses that he was her illegitimate son...
Bonny Barbara Allen
Lady Alice
Lady Alice
Lady Alice is Child ballad 85. It may be a fragment of a longer ballad that has not been preserved.-Commentary:The entwined flowers appear also in Barbara Allen, Lord Thomas and Fair Annet, and Fair Margaret and Sweet William.-External links:...
Young Benjie
Young Benjie
-Synopsis:Young Benjie and Marjorie are lovers. They quarrel. She says she would take another love. Benjie tries to get in when her brothers are gone; when she refuses, he says he will take another. She comes down, and he murders her and throws her body in the river.Her brothers find her body...
Prince Robert
Prince Robert
Prince Robert is Child ballad number 87, existing in several variants, and a murder ballad.-Synopsis:Prince Robert married against his mother's wishes and went to beg her blessing. She prepared a wine cup with poison, put it to her lips without drinking, and gave it to her son. He died...
Young Johnstone
Young Johnstone
Young Johnstone is Child ballad 88, a border ballad that exists in several variants.-Synopsis:Several variants open with the heroine's brother and love drinking together. One of them may propose that they each marry the other's sister...
Fause Foodrage
Fause Foodrage
-Synopsis:Nobles rebelled against the king, and Fa’se Footrage, among them, sneaks into the royal castle to kill the king—or, in other variants, the Eastmure king kills King Honour because his suit for King Honor's queen was rejected. The queen pleads for her life until her child is born. Fa’se...
Jellon Grame
Jellon Grame
-Synopsis:A woman goes to the greenwood to plead with her lover. When he threatens to kill her, she pleads for her baby's life. He cuts her open and takes out the baby, raising it as his sister's son. But one day, when his son wants to know why his mother never sees him, he tells the truth,...
Fair Mary of Wallington
Bonny Bee Hom
Bonny Bee Hom
-Synopsis:A lady laments that her love had left her. He, still there, comes to comfort her but tells her that he is sworn to leave. She gives him a ring: while he wears it, he will shed no blood, but if he sees the stone fade, he will know she is dead. He has not been gone more than months when...
Lamkin
Lamkin
"Lamkin" is an English ballad. It gives an account of the murder of a woman and her infant son by a man, in some versions, a disgruntled mason, in others, a devil, bogeyman or a motiveless villain...
Young Waters
Young Waters
-Synopsis:The queen sees Young Waters ride to court. A clever lord asks her who the comeliest man is, and she says Young Waters. The king is angry that she did not accept him...
The Maid Freed from the Gallows
The Maid Freed from the Gallows
"The Maid Freed from the Gallows" is one of many titles of a centuries-old folk song about a condemned maiden pleading for someone to buy her freedom from the executioner. In the collection of ballads compiled by Francis James Child, it is indexed as Child Ballad number 95; eleven variants, some...
The Gay Goshawk
The Gay Goshawk
-Synopsis:A Scottish squire sends a letter to his love by a goshawk, who tells her that he has sent many letters and will die for love. She goes to ask her father a boon, and he says, anything but leave to marry the squire. She asks that, if she dies, she will be buried in Scotland. He agrees,...
Brown Robin
Brown Robin
Brown Robin is the 97th Child ballad from the collection of 305 ballads from England and Scotland, and their American variants, collected by Francis James Child in the late nineteenth century.-Synopsis:...
Brown Adam
Brown Adam
-Synopsis:Brown Adam, a smith, is exiled from his family. He builds a house in the woods for himself and his lady. One day, he goes hunting. He returns home to find his lady with a knight—or king's son—trying to persuade her to leave Brown Adam. She refuses many rich bribes; she will stay with...
Johnie Scot
Johnie Scot
-Synopsis:Johnie Scot served the king of England and got his daughter pregnant. The king threw her in prison to starve. One day, back in Scotland, he sent a shirt to his love, and she sent back a letter with the news. He raised a force and came to her rescue....
Willie O Winsbury
Willie o Winsbury
Willie O Winsbury is Child Ballad #100, existing in several variants. It is a traditional Scottish ballad that dates from at least 1775, and is known under a number of different names, including Lord Thomas of Winesberry.-Synopsis:...
Willie O Douglas Dale
Willie o Douglas Dale
-Synopsis:Willie goes to court, and he and a lady fall in love. When she is pregnant, they flee, but she goes in labor on the way, and gives birth to a son. They go on with the child and reach his father's lands.-Motifs:...
Willie and the Earl Richard's Daughter
Rose the Red and White Lily
Prince Heathen
Prince Heathen
Prince Heathen is Child ballad 104, existing in several variants.-Synopsis:The heroine—Margery May or Margaret—is raped by Prince Heathen, sometimes after he has tried to woo her. Sometimes he tells her he has massacred her family; in all variants, he imprisons her until she bears a child.She has...
The Bailiff's Daughter of Islington
The Bailiff's Daughter of Islington
-Synopsis:A esquire's son fell in love with a bailiff's daughter. She would not believe him in love, and his family had him apprenticed for seven years when they discovered it. He believed that she did not think of him the whole time....
The Famous Flower of Serving-Men
The Famous Flower of Serving-Men
The Famous Flower of Serving-Men or The Lady turned Serving-Man is Child ballad number 106Francis James Child, English and Scottish Popular Ballads, and a murder ballad...
Will Stewart and John
Will Stewart and John
Will Steward and John is Child ballad 107, indexed as such in Francis James Child's 19th century collection of English and Scottish ballads.-Synopsis:...
Christopher White
Tom Potts
Tom Potts
-Synopsis:The heroine rejects a rich suitor, Lord Fenix/Phenix, for her poor true love, Tom Potts. Her angry father makes arrangements for the wedding. She sends word to Tom. He sends back word that he will be there and goes to his lord, asking for assistance. The lord is generous with him. ...
The Knight and Shepherd's Daughter
Crow and Pie
Crow and Pie
Crow and Pie is Child ballad 111. It is one of the oldest preserved ballads, dating to circa 1500. Pie is the now-obsolete original name for the magpie, a bird often connected with sorrow and misfortune...
The Baffled Knight
The Baffled Knight
The Baffled Knight or Blow Away the Morning Dew is Child ballad 112 , existing in numerous variants. A version is recorded in Thomas Ravenscroft's Deuteromelia with a matching tune, making this one of the few early ballads for which there is extant original music.-Synopsis:A knight meets a maid...
The Great Silkie of Sule Skerry
The Great Silkie of Sule Skerry
The Great Silkie of Sule Skerry or The Grey Selkie of Suleskerry is a traditional folk song from Orkney. The song was collected by the American scholar, Francis James Child in the late nineteenth century and is listed as Child ballad number 113...
Johnie Cock
Johnie Cock
Johnie Cock is Child ballad 114, existing in many variants. The Child Ballads were a collection of 305 ballads from England and Scotland, and their American variants, collected by Francis James Child in the late 19th century.-Synopsis:...

[or Johnnie O'Breadesley]
Robyn and Gandeleyn
Robyn and Gandeleyn
-Synopsis:Robyn kills a deer and is shot and killed. Gandeleyn looks about for the killer and finds Wrennok of Donne. They exchange words, and Gandeleyn says they shall shoot at a mark of each other's hearts...
Adam Bell
Adam Bell
Adam Bell was a legendary English outlaw.He and his companions William of Cloudsley and Clym of the Clough lived in Inglewood Forest near Carlisle and were figures similar to Robin Hood...

, Clim of the Clough, and William of Cloudesly
A Gest of Robyn Hode
A Gest of Robyn Hode
"A Gest of Robyn Hode" is Child Ballad 117; it is also called A Lyttell Geste of Robyn Hode in one of the two oldest books that contain it....
Robin Hood and Guy of Gisbourne
Guy of Gisbourne
Sir Guy of Gisbourne is a character from the Robin Hood legends of English folklore. In The Ballad of Robin Hood and Guy of Gisborne , he hunts Robin for the Sheriff of Nottingham, but Robin kills him and cuts off his head...
Robin Hood and the Monk
Robin Hood and the Monk
Robin Hood and the Monk is Child ballad 119, and among the oldest existing ballads of Robin Hood, existing in manuscript from about 1450 AD.It may have been originally recited rather than sung; it refers to itself as a "talking" in its last verse:...
Robin Hood's Death
Robin Hood's Death
Robin Hood's Death is the 120th ballad of the Child ballads collection published by Houghton Mifflin. The fragmentary Percy Folio version of it appears to be one of the oldest existing tales of Robin Hood; there is a synopsis of the story in the fifteenth century A Gest of Robyn Hode...
Robin Hood and the Potter
Robin Hood and the Potter
Robin Hood and the Potter is Child ballad 121, and among the oldest existing tales of Robin Hood.The device of disguising himself as a potter may have been taken from the older legends of Hereward the Wake.-Synopsis:...
Robin Hood and the Butcher
Robin Hood and the Butcher
Robin Hood and the Butcher is Child ballad 122. It may have been derived from the similar Robin Hood and the Potter.-Synopsis:Robin Hood meets with a butcher. In some variants, he fights with him. He always buys his goods and goes into Nottingham, where he sells the meat at ridiculously low...
Robin Hood and the Curtal Friar
Robin Hood and the Curtal Friar
"Robin Hood and the Curtal Friar" is Child Ballad number 123, about Robin Hood.-Synopsis:This ballad is one of those appearing in earlier and later versions, the earlier one appearing in damaged form in the Percy manuscript but, as with Robin Hood and Guy of Gisborne the story also appears in May...
The Jolly Pinder of Wakefield
The Jolly Pinder of Wakefield
The Jolly Pinder of Wakefield is Child ballad 124, about Robin Hood. The oldest manuscript was published in 1632 but is believed to based on works at least a century older. A fragmentary version appears in The Percy Folio.-Synopsis:...
Robin Hood and Little John
Little John
Little John was a legendary fellow outlaw of Robin Hood, and was said to be Robin's chief lieutenant and second-in-command of the Merry Men.-Folklore:He appears in the earliest recorded Robin Hood ballads and stories...
Robin Hood and the Tanner
Robin Hood and the Tanner
-Synopsis:A tanner, Arthur a Bland, goes to Sherwood. Robin Hood appears and accuses him of poaching. They fight. Robin blows on his horn, summoning his men, and tells them that the man is certainly a tanner, as he has tanned his hide...
Robin Hood and the Tinker
Robin Hood and the Tinker
-Synopsis:Robin Hood meets with a tinker and tells him that two tinkers were put in the stocks for drinking ale and beer. The tinker tells him that he has a warrant for Robin Hood in his pouch. Robin tells him to come with him to Nottingham. They stop at an inn to drink. When the tinker is...
Robin Hood and the Newly Revived
Robin Hood and the Prince of Aragon
Robin Hood and the Prince of Aragon
Robin Hood and the Prince of Aragon is Child ballad 129. Showing more imagination than fidelity to tradition, it catches up Robin Hood into a tale of chivalrous adventures, such as are uncommon in his ballads, and has seldom been featured in later tales....
Robin Hood and the Scotchman
Robin Hood and the Scotchman
-Synopsis:Robin Hood goes north and meets with a Scot, who wishes to enter his service. Robin refuses, because the Scot will prove false. A fight ensues. One variants is truncated at this point, but the other ends with the man entering his service....
Robin Hood and the Ranger
Robin Hood and the Ranger
-Synopsis:Robin Hood, going out to hunt deer, meets a forester who forbids him. They fight. Robin is beaten, and blows his horn, summoning his men. He offers to make him one of their company, and they hold a feast.-External links:*...
The Bold Pedlar and Robin Hood
The Bold Pedlar and Robin Hood
The Bold Pedlar and Robin Hood is Child ballad 132, featuring Robin Hood. It is a traditional version of Robin Hood Newly Revived.-Synopsis:...
Robin Hood and the Beggar, I
Robin Hood and the Beggar, I
"Robin Hood and the Beggar, I" is Child Ballad 133. It is related to Child Ballad 134, called "Robin Hood and the Beggar, II".-Synopsis:Robin Hood and a beggar meet. The beggar begs and is refused; Robin offers to fight him, and is worsted. They exchange clothing. Robin goes to Nottingham as a...
Robin Hood and the Beggar, II
Robin Hood and the Shepherd
Robin Hood and the Shepherd
-Synopsis:Robin Hood meets with a shepherd and demands to know what he has in his bottle; when the shepherd refuses, he says it will go worse with him if he does not give him some. Robin lays twenty pounds on a fight, and the shepherd agrees to bet his bottle and bag against it. They fight. ...
Robin Hood's Delight
Robin Hood's Delight
-Synopsis:Robin Hood, Will Scarlock, and Little John are walking in the forest when they met with three foresters, who fight with them. They refuse Robin permission to sound his horn, but Robin persuades them to go to an inn, and there they drink instead of fighting.-External links:**...
Robin Hood and the Pedlars
Robin Hood and the Pedlars
-Synopsis:Robin Hood, Little John, and Will Scarlet meet up with three pedlars and urge them to stay; they go on. Robin shoots at one, striking through his pack to the skin, with force enough to kill him without the pack having been in the way. They throw down their packs and await Robin, but the...
Robin Hood and Alan-a-Dale
Alan-a-Dale
Alan-a-Dale is a figure in the Robin Hood legend...
Robin Hood's Progress to Nottingham
Robin Hood's Progress to Nottingham
Robin Hood's Progress to Nottingham is Child ballad 139, a Robin Hood ballad, and in fact an original story.-Synopsis:A fifteen-year-old Robin Hood set out to Nottingham to compete in a shooting contest. The king's foresters make fun of him, offering a bet that he could not kill a deer. When he...
Robin Hood Rescuing Three Squires
Robin Hood Rescuing Three Squires
Robin Hood Rescuing Three Squires or Robin Hood and the Widow's Three Sons is Child ballad 140, about Robin Hood.-Synopsis:Robin meets an old woman lamenting that her sons will hang for poaching the king's deer. He persuades an old man to trade his ragged clothing for Robin's fine clothes, and in...
Robin Hood Rescuing Will Stutly
Robin Hood Rescuing Will Stutly
-Synopsis:Robin Hood is brought news that the Sheriff of Nottingham surprised Will Stutely, and though he killed two of the Sheriff's men, he was captured. They set out to rescue him, confirm the story from a palmer, and arrive as he is being brought out. Will Stutly offers to fight the sheriff's...
Little John a Begging
Little John a Begging
Little John A Begging is Child ballad 142 and about Robin Hood. It exists in two variants, one fragmentary.-Synopsis:In one variant, Robin Hood sends Little John out, disguised as a beggar. In the fragmentary one, Little John apparently exchanges clothing with a beggar, as the surviving ballads...
Robin Hood and the Bishop
Robin Hood and the Bishop
Robin Hood and the Bishop is number 143 in Francis James Child's collection of Child ballads, and describes an adventure of Robin Hood.-Synopsis:...
Robin Hood and the Bishop of Hereford
Robin Hood and the Bishop of Hereford
-Synopsis:Robin Hood, knowing the bishop is coming, has his men kill a deer, puts shepherd's clothing on himself and six others, and dresses the deer by the road. The bishop threatens to have them all hanged. Robin summons the rest of his men with his horn, compels the bishop to dine with them, and...
Robin Hood and Queen Katherine
Robin Hood and Queen Katherine
"Robin Hood and Queen Katherine" is Child ballad 145. "Robin Hood's Chase", Child ballad 146, takes up after it.The Queen Katherine of the title is not certainly identified. The periods of time with which Robin Hood has normally been associated did not have any queens named Katherine...
Robin Hood's Chase
Robin Hood's Chase
Robin Hood's Chase is Child ballad 146, and a sequel to Child ballad 145, Robin Hood and Queen Katherine.-Synopsis:It opens an account of the archery contest in Robin Hood and Queen Katherine, and King Henry chases Robin to Yorkshire, Newcastle, Berwick, and many more towns...
Robin Hood's Golden Prize
Robin Hood's Golden Prize
-Synopsis:Robin Hood disguises himself as a friar and begged from two priests. They said they had no money. He forced them to remain with him and pray for money. When several hours had passed, he searched them and found five hundred pounds...
The Noble Fisherman
The Noble Fisherman
The Noble Fisherman or Robin Hood's Preferment is Child ballad 148, a tale of Robin Hood.-Synopsis:Robin Hood decides to go to sea. Posing as a poor fisherman, he is hired by a woman with a boat, but laughed at for his lack of seamanship. French pirates try to take the ship, but Robin shoots them...

, or, Robin Hood's Preferment
Robin Hood's Birth, Breeding, Valor and Marriage
Robin Hood and Maid Marian
Maid Marian
Maid Marian is the wife of the legendary English outlaw Robin Hood. Stemming from another, older tradition, she became associated with Robin Hood only in the 16th century.-History:The earliest medieval Robin Hood stories gave him no female companion...
The King's Disguise, and Friendship with Robin Hood
The King's Disguise, and Friendship with Robin Hood
The King’s Disguise, and Friendship with Robin Hood is Child ballad 151. It holds the common tradition of the end of Robin Hood's outlawry, although it is a relative late ballad, as it puts Robin firmly in King Richard's reign...
Robin Hood and the Golden Arrow
Robin Hood and the Golden Arrow
-Synopsis:The sheriff of Nottingham complains to King Richard of Robin Hood.-Portrayals:An altered version of the tale appears in the first episode of the Robin of Sherwood television series, in which the prize offered is a silver arrow belonging to Herne the Hunter as a means of luring Robin to...
Robin Hood and the Valiant Knight
Robin Hood and the Valiant Knight
-Synopsis:The king and nobles meet to consider Robin Hood. They send Sir William with a hundred men. Sir William presents him with a letter from the king ordering Robin to surrender. When Robin refuses, Sir William attempts to seize him on the spot. Both Sir William and Robin summoned their...
A True Tale of Robin Hood
A True Tale of Robin Hood
A True Tale of Robin Hood is Child ballad 154, featuring Robin Hood and, indeed, presents a full account of his life, from before his becoming an outlaw, to his death. It describes him as the Earl of Huntington, which is a fairly late development in the ballads...
Sir Hugh
Sir Hugh
Sir Hugh is a traditional British folk song, Child ballad # 155, Roud # 73.-Synopsis:Some boys are playing with a ball, in Lincoln. They accidentally throw it over the wall of a Jew's house . The daughter of the Jew comes out, dressed in green, and beckons to a boy to come in to fetch it. He...

, or, The Jew's Daughter
Queen Elanor's Confession
Queen Elanor's Confession
Queen Elanor's Confession or Queen Eleanor's Confession is Child ballad 156. Although the figures are intended as Eleanor of Aquitaine, Henry II of England, and William Marshall, the story is an entire invention.-Synopsis:...
Gude Wallace
Gude Wallace
Gude Wallace is Child ballad 157, recounting in ballad form an exploit of William Wallace from the fourth book of Blind Harry's The Wallace. There are a number of variants, including two different stories.-Synopsis:...
Hugh Spencer's Feats in France
Durham Ford
The Knight of Liddesdale
The Battle of Otterburn
The Battle of Otterburn (ballad)
The Battle of Otterburn is a Scottish ballad.It appears in the border minstrelsy collected by Sir Walter Scott and the Child Ballads.It is an account of the Scottish victory at the Battle of Otterburn in 1388...
The Hunting of Cheviot (The Ballad of Chevy Chase
The Ballad of Chevy Chase
There are two extant English ballads known as The Ballad of Chevy Chase, both of which narrate the same story. As ballads existed within oral tradition before being written down, other versions of this once popular song may also have existed....

)
The Battle of Harlaw
King Henry Fifth's Conquest of France
King Henry Fifth's Conquest of France
King Henry Fifth's Conquest of France is a British ballad which recounts a highly fictionalized version of the Battle of Agincourt and the events surrounding it....
Sir John Butler
The Rose of England
The Rose of England
The Rose of England is Child ballad 166. It is an account of Henry VII of England claiming the throne from Richard III of England, frequently allegorically...
Sir Andrew Barton
Andrew Barton
Sir Andrew Barton served as High Admiral of the Kingdom of Scotland. Notorious in England and Portugal as a 'pirate', Barton was a seaman who operated under the aegis of a letter of marque on behalf of the Scottish crown, and is therefore more widely described as a privateer...
Flodden Field (describes the Battle of Flodden Field
Battle of Flodden Field
The Battle of Flodden or Flodden Field or occasionally Battle of Branxton was fought in the county of Northumberland in northern England on 9 September 1513, between an invading Scots army under King James IV and an English army commanded by the Earl of Surrey...

)
Johnie Armstrong
The Death of Queen Jane
The Death of Queen Jane
"The Death of Queen Jane" is an English ballad that describes the events surrounding the death of a Queen Jane. Many now believe that the Queen is Jane Seymour, the third wife of Henry VIII of England. However there is no evidence to support this assumption. Historically, Jane Seymour gave birth...
Thomas Cromwell
Musselburgh Field
Mary Hamilton
Mary Hamilton
"Mary Hamilton" and "The Fower Maries" are two common names for a famous, apparently fictional sixteenth-century ballad from Scotland....
Earl Bothwell
The Rising of the North
Northunberland Betrayed By Douglas
The Earl of Westmoreland
Captain Car, or, Edom o Gordon
Edom o Gordon
Edom o Gordon or Captain Car Edom o Gordon or Captain Car Edom o Gordon or Captain Car (Child #178, Roud #80]] is a traditional Scottish ballad that exists in several versions. The ballad recounts the gruesome events of Gordon's (or, in some versions, Car's) burning down of his enemy's castle thus...
Rookhope Ryde
King James and Brown
The Bonny Earl of Murray
The Bonny Earl of Murray
"The Bonnie Earl O' Moray" is a popular Scottish ballad, probably written as far back as the 17th century, and has been catalogued under the name "Bonny Earl O'Murray" as Child Ballad No. 181....
The Laird O Logie
The Laird o Logie
-Synopsis:Young Logie is imprisoned, to hang. May Margaret comes to court to plead for his life. She is unable to win a pardon but steals some token or a forged pardon , sometimes with the queen's aid...
Willie MacIntosh
The Lads of Wamphray
The Lads of Wamphray
The Lads of Wamphray is Child ballad 184, existing in fragmentary form. According to Walter Scott and others, the ballad concerns a 16th century feud between reiving families from Wamphray in the Scottish Borders.-Synopsis:...
Dick o the Cow
Dick o the Cow
Dick o the Cow is Child ballad 185 and a border ballad. Unusually for that genre, its hero is not the outlaw.-Synopsis:John Armstrang raids England, but finds only six sheep, which would humiliate him to steal. He asks his companion, Billie, about a man they met; Billie says that he's a...
Kinmont Willie
Jock o the Side
Archie o Cawfield
Archie o Cawfield
Archie o Cawfield is an Anglo-Scottish border ballad, number 188 of the Child ballads.-Synopsis:Two brothers lament that their third brother is to be hanged. A proposal of force is met by the more cunning brother with the suggestion that they bring only a handful of men. They get horses, have...
Hobie Noble
Hobie Noble
-Synopsis:Hobie Noble, an Englishman, was outlawed and fled to Scotland. A traitor tried persuade him to come to England. The traitor failed, but learned where Hobie was going, and sent word. Hobie dreamed that he was attacked and woke. He and his men tried to escape, but his attackers found...
Jamie Telfer of the Fair Dodhead
Hughie Grame
Hughie Graham
Hughie Graham or Hughie Graeme is Child ballad number 191, existing in several variants.-Synopsis:Hughie Graham is caught for stealing the bishop's horse, and sentenced to hang. Several pleas to ransom him are unavailing. He sees his mother or father and sends greetings to his father, his sword...
The Lochmaben Harper
The Lochmaben Harper (ballad)
"The Lochmaben Harper" or "The Blind Harper" is a traditional British Folk ballad "The Lochmaben Harper" or "The Blind Harper" is a traditional British Folk ballad "The Lochmaben Harper" or "The Blind Harper" is a traditional British Folk ballad ((Child # 192, Roud # 85) and is one of the ballads...
The Death of Parcy Reed
The Death of Parcy Reed
The Death of Parcy Reed is a Border ballad concerning the betrayal and murder of Percival Reed, believed to have been Laird of Troughend in Redesdale, Northumberland, in late 16th century England...
The Laird of Wairston
Lord Maxwell's Last Goodnight
Lord Maxwell's Last Goodnight
Lord Maxwell’s Last Goodnight is Child ballad 195. John, 8th Lord Maxwell, did historically kill Sir James Johnstone as the culmination of a family feud and was forced to leave Scotland to escape the death penalty. However, he came back in secret five years later. He was apprehended and...
The Fire of Frendraught
James Grant
James Grant
James Grant may refer to:*James Grant , American author, journalist, and publisher of Grant's Interest Rate Observer*James Grant , California painter and sculptor...
Bonny John Seton
The Bonnie House o Airlie
The Bonnie House of Airlie
The Bonnie House of Airlie is a traditional Scottish folk song of the seventeenth century, telling the tale of the raid by Archibald Campbell, Earl of Argyll, on Airlie Castle, the home of James Ogilvy, Earl of Airlie, in the summer of 1640...
The Gypsy Laddie
Bessy Bell and Mary Gray
Bessy Bell and Mary Gray
Betsy Bell and Mary Gray are "twa bonnie lassies", the subject of one of the Child Ballads.According to the ballad, Betsy and Mary were daughters of two Perthshire gentlemen, who in 1666 built themselves a bower to avoid catching a devastating plague...
The Battle of Philiphaugh
The Baron of Brackley
Jamie Douglas
Loudon Hill, or, Drumclog (recounts the events of the Battle of Drumclog
Battle of Drumclog
The Battle of Drumclog was fought on 1 June 1679, between a group of Covenanters and the forces of John Graham of Claverhouse, at High Drumclog, in South Lanarkshire, Scotland.- The battle :...

)
Bothwell Bridge
Lord Delamere
Lord Derwentwater
Geordie
Geordie (ballad)
-Synopsis:The "Geordie" of the title is taken for a crime, to hang; it may be rebellion, murder, horse-stealing, or poaching deer. His wife goes to appeal for his life, sometimes refusing offers to marry her, once widowed, along the way....
Bonnie James Campbell
Bewick and Graham
The Duke of Athole's Nurse
The Duke of Athole's Nurse
-Synopsis:A man looks to meet his love—sometimes through the intermediary of the Duke of Athole's nurse—and is directed to wait for her at an inn; she will come in the morning. Armed men come instead....
Sir James the Rose
Sir James the Rose
-Synopsis:The broadside opens with the account of Sir James the Rose's love for a lady named Matilda, how her family tried to marry her off, and how he killed her brother for spying on them....
The Braes o Yarrow
The Dowie Dens o Yarrow
"The Dowie Dens of Yarrow", also known as "The Braes of Yarrow" is a Scottish border ballad. It exists in many variants and it has been printed as a broadside, as well as published in song collections...
Rare Willie Drowned in Yarrow, or, the Water o Gamrie
The Mother's Malison
The Mother's Malison
-Synopsis:Willie, against his mother's advice, goes to May Margaret's home, where he is not admitted. He drowns in the Clyde. May Margaret wakes and says she dreamed of him. Her mother tells her that he had been there half an hour before...

, or, Clyde's Water
Broom of the Cowdenknowes
Broom of the Cowdenknowes
"Broom of the Cowdenknowes" is a traditional Scottish love ballad, Child #217. It is traceable back to the seventeenth century, but the exact origin is unknown. The title of the song references the Scotch Broom flower, a vibrant yellow flower found throughout Scotland, including in Cowdenknowes,...
The False Lover Won Back
The False Lover Won Back
-Synopsis:A maid pleads with her lover, who tells her that he is going to woo a fairer lady, and she can chose another man for all he cares. She chases after him on foot. As they reach towns, he tries to bribe her with gifts, to leave him, but at the third town, he has fallen in love with her again...
The Gardener
The Gardener
The Gardener is Child ballad 219; the collection includes several variants, many fragmentary.-Synopsis:A gardener wooes a lady, proposing to dress her in various flowers. She rejects him with a suggestion that he wear snow and other wintry weather....
The Bonny Lass of Anglesey
The Bonny Lass of Anglesey
-Synopsis:Fifteen English lords come to the king "To dance and win the victory." He gets the bonny lass to dance with them, offering her lands and either the fairest knight , or the bravest, in his court. She wins...
Katharine Jaffray
Katharine Jaffray
-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...
Bonny Baby Livingstone
Eppie Morrie
Eppie Morrie
"Eppie Morrie" is one of the Child Ballads , and is of Scottish origin. The author and date are unknown. It was printed in James Maidment's anthology A North Country Garland in 1824. That version is reprinted in James Kinsley's The Oxford Book of Ballads, 1969...
The Lady of Arngosk
Rob Roy
Lizie Lindsay
Lizie Lindsay
Lizie Lindsay is Child ballad 226, existing in several variants .-Synopsis:A highland Laird courts Lizie Lindsay in Edinburgh, sometimes after his mother had warned him not to hide his highland origins. Her family warns him off, but her maid encourages her...
Bonny Lizie Baillie
Bonny Lizie Baillie
Bonny Lizie Baillie is Child ballad 227. Some traditions claim it recounts an actual courtship.-Synopsis:Lizie Baillie meets a Highlander, Duncan Grahame, who courts her. She says she does not know how to work at a farm, and he promises to teach her. She will not have any Lowlander or Englishman,...
Glasgow Peggie
Glasgow Peggie
-Synopsis:A Highlander comes to steal Peggie. In most variants, her father , declare that he might steal their animals, but not their daughter. He carries her off anyway.A few variants end there....
Earl Crawford
Earl Crawford
-Synopsis:Earl Crawford marries the youngest of seven sisters. She has a son. One day, she complains that he makes too much of the boy. Angry, he sends her back to her father. Her father goes back to appeal to him, and he refuses to take her back. She receives the news and dies. He receives...
The Slaughter of the Laird of Mellerstain
The Earl of Errol
The Earl of Errol
The Earl of Errol is Child ballad 231, existing in several variants.-Synopsis:The earl marries; the bride, if named, is Kate; some variants mention the agreement about her dowry.In various combinations, though always in the order:...
Richie Story
Richie Story
-Synopsis:Of a group of sisters , one falls in love with Richie Story and rejects an earl for him...
Andrew Lammie
Andrew Lammie
Andrew Lammie is Child ballad 233. It is said to record a historical event, with the grave of the heroine in the at Fyvie.-Synopsis:Tifty’s Annie falls in love with Andrew Lammie, a lord's trumpeter. Her parents refuse permission because he is poor. He has to leave, and although he has promised...
Charlie MacPherson
The Earl of Aboyne
The Laird o Drum
The Laird o Drum
-Synopsis:The lord of Drum goes to woo a shepherd lass. She does not believe him but sends him to her father, who gives his consent. His brother claims that it disgraces the family. The lord says that his brother wedded a wife to spend money, and he a wife to work and win; he had a lady of...
The Duke of Gordon's Daughter
The Duke of Gordon's Daughter
-Synopsis:Lady Jean falls in love with Captain Ogilvie and runs away with him. The duke tries to have him executed, but the king consents only to have him demoted. Lady Jean finds following after him in poverty, with children, unbearable and goes back to her family, where she is welcomed. Then...
Glenlogie
Glenlogie
-Synopsis:Jeannie, fifteen or seventeen, sees Glenlogie and falls in love. Various attempts to persuade her that he's unsuitable for her, either by offering another match or by pointing out the disparity of their stations, are unavailing. Glenlogie hears and agrees to marry her.-External links:*...

, or, Jean o Bethelnie
Lord Saltoun and Auchanachie
Lord Saltoun and Auchanachie
- Synopsis :Its heroine, Jeannie, is to be married off at the insistence of her father to a wealthy man, Lord Saltoun, but she is in love with Anachie Gordon, the subject of the song. The song chronicles her resistance to the marriage before she is eventually dragged to the church. Jeannie...
The Rantin Laddie
The Rantin Laddie
The Rantin' Laddie or Lord Aboyne is a traditional Scottish folk ballad telling of the valiant rescue of his lover by a noble Highland lord.-Synopsis:...
The Baron o Leys
The Coble o Cargill
James Harris (The Daemon Lover
The Daemon Lover
"The Daemon Lover", also known as "James Harris", "James Herries", or "The House Carpenter" is a popular English ballad. It tells the story of a man , who returns to a former lover after a very long absence, and finds her with a husband and a baby...

)
James Hatley
James Hatley
James Hatley is Child ballad 244, existing in several variants. It appears to have no historical basis.-Synopsis:A villain—Sir Fenwick, False Fennick, or fause Phenix—steals the king's jewels. He lays the blame on James Hatley or Jamie O’Lee....
Young Allan
Redesdale and Wise William
Redesdale and Wise William
-Synopsis:Redesdale says that he can win the love of any lady. William rashly says his sister will not give him her favor, and bets his head against Redesdale's lands. Redesdale throws him in prison, but he writes a letter and sends it to his sister. Redesdale's attempt to woo her are...
Lady Elspat
Lady Elspat
-Synopsis:Elspat agrees to meet with Sweet William, but her brother's page overhears them and tells her mother, who imprisons them. When the justice comes to town, the mother accuses him of breaking into her castle and robbing her. Elspat tells that he and she are in love, and her mother objects...
The Grey Cock
The Grey Cock
The Grey Cock or Saw You My Father is one of the famous English/Scots Child ballads . and is sometimes known as 'The Lover's Ghost'It has been recorded many times, in particular by Eliza Carthy-Synopsis:...

, or, Saw You My Father?
Auld Matrons
Auld Matrons
-Synopsis:Willie comes to his love, Annie, and she urges him to come to bed. He is wary of the auld Matrons, sitting by the fire, but Annie says she never moves. As soon as they're gone, auld Matrons wakes the sheriff with the news that his daughter's abed with a lover. The sheriff rouses his men....
Henry Martyn [aka Henry Martin]
Lang Johnny More
Lang Johnny More
-Synopsis:The song concerns a member of a clan of Scottish giants, one of whom, the Johnnie of the title, goes to visit London and falls in love with the kings daughter. The king subdues Johnnie by giving him drops of Laudanum and imprisoning him...
The Kitchie-Boy
The Kitchie-Boy
The Kitchie-Boy is Child ballad number 252; Roud number 252.-Synopsis:A lady falls in love with the kitchen boy. She manages to speak with him, but he is afraid that her father will kill him. She takes her dowry and has a bonny ship built, and the kitchen boy sets sail in it...
Thomas o Yonderdale
Lord William
Lord William
Lord William, Sweet William or Lord Lundy is a traditional Scottish folk ballad telling how a pair of lovers, William and Janet, outwit her father, her bethrothed and the priest in order to marry one other....

, or, Lord Lundy
Willie's Fatal Visit
Willie's Fatal Visit
-Synopsis:A woman asks after her mother, her father, her brother John, and her true love Willie. Only Willie was nearby. He came to her at night, and she took him to bed, telling the cock not to crow until daylight. It crows earlier, and she takes the moonlight for dawn. Willie goes. He meets...
Alison and Willie
Alison and Willie
-Synopsis:Willie is in love with Alison. She asks him to her wedding; he says only if he is the bridegroom; she declares that will never be and he will forget her. He rides on, thinking only of her, sees animals, where a knight can not catch one, and realizes that he will never win her...
Burd Isabel and Earl Patrick
Burd Isabel and Earl Patrick
Burd Isabel and Earl Patrick or Burd Bell is a traditional folk song framed with explicit warnings about loving above your station.-Synopsis:...
Broughty Wa's
Broughty Wa's
Broughty Wa's or Helen is a traditional folk song.-Synopsis:Helen is a beautiful heiress, betrothed to Hazelan. Glenhazlen visits her and is well received, until his men surround her and they carry her off. She laments that the Highlands are not Dundee or the banks of the Tay. One day as they...
Lord Thomas Stuart
Lord Thomas Stuart
-Synopsis:Thomas Stuart wooes the Countess of Balquhin and gives her, as her morning gift, Strathboggie and Aboyne. She insists on seeing them. They ride off, and he takes ill. He sends her on....
Lord Thomas and Lady Margaret
Lord Thomas and Lady Margaret
Lord Thomas and Lady Margaret or Clerk Tamas is a traditional folk song.-Synopsis:Lord Thomas, or Clerk Tamas, sees Lady Margaret, or fair Annie, in the woods and, although she was in love with him, hunts her like a deer...
Lady Isabel
Lady Isabel
-Synopsis:Her stepmother says that Lady Isabel is said to be her father's whore, and cites that he dresses his daughter better than her, his wife. Isabel denies it, says their clothing befits their ages, and claims a lover beyond the sea. Her stepmother offers her a poisoned drink; she puts it to...
Lord Livingstone
The New-Slain Knight
The New-Slain Knight
-Synopsis:A man tells a woman that he has seen a knight murdered outside her father's garden. She insists on a description and laments that she has no father for her baby. He offers to take her love's place, and she refuses. He pulls off his disguise and reveals himself as her love, and assures...
The White Fisher
The White Fisher
The White Fisher is Child ballad 264, existing in different variants.-Synopsis:A man tells his wife that they have been married only one month and asks why the child is quickening. The woman blames her pregnancy on a priest, or on a kitchen boy...
The Knight's Ghost
The Knight's Ghost
-Synopsis:A woman goes to bring her son to the shore, to greet her husband. She receives news that he was killed in the city they had gone to. She invites his men to the castle to drink, gets them drunk in the cellar, locks them in, and throws the keys into the sea...
John Thomson and the Turk
The Heir of Linne
The Heir of Linne
The Heir of Linne is a traditional folk song existing in several variants.Francis James Child, English and Scottish Popular Ballads, -Synopsis:...
The Twa Knights
Lady Diamond
Lady Diamond
-Synopsis:A great king had a daughter , who fell in love with his kitchen boy. She became pregnant. Her father demands to know the father, and she tells him. He has the kitchen boy secretly murdered, but then, in most variants, brings his heart to his daughter. She dies...
The Earl of Mar's Daughter
The Earl of Mar's Daughter
-Synopsis:The Earl of Mar's daughter saw a lovely bird, and promised it a golden cage if it would come to her. It did, and that night transformed into a prince in her bedroom. His mother had transformed him to that form. They lived together; she bore seven sons, but the prince carried them safe...
The Lord of Lorn and the Flas Steward
The Suffolk Miracle
The Suffolk Miracle
-Synopsis:A young maiden of noble birth comes to love a young commoner, so her father sends her away. Whilst in exile, the maid wakes one night to find her lover at her window mounted upon a fine horse. They go out riding together until the man complains he has a headache; the maid tends to him and...
King Edward the Fourth and a Tanner of Tamworth
King Edward the Fourth and a Tanner of Tamworth
King Edward the Fourth and a Tanner of Tamworth is Child ballad 273. A ballad of this title was licensed in 1564.-Synopsis:King Edward goes hunting and sees a tanner riding a mare with a cowskin for a saddle. He tells his men to stay back and goes to talk...
Our Goodman
Our Goodman
-Synopsis:A man returns home to find evidence that his wife has a lover there: a horse, a sword, a wig, etc, up to finding the lover. His wife makes absurd claims: the horse is a sow, the sword is a porridge-spurtle, the wig is a clocken-hen, the lover is a milk-maid...
Get Up and Bar the Door
Get Up and Bar the Door
Get Up and Bar the Door is a medieval Scots ballad about a battle of wills between a husband and wife. It is Child ballad 275. According to Child, it was first published by David Herd.-Synopsis:...
The Friar in the Well
The Friar in the Well
-Synopsis:A friar tries to seduce a maiden. She cites fear of hell for refusing. He says he could whistle her out. She hangs a cloth in front of the well and invites him home, with directions to bring money. Then, she declares that her father is coming and tells him to hide behind the cloth. ...
The Wife Wrapt in Wether's Skin
The Wife Wrapt in Wether's Skin
-Synopsis:A man has married a woman of higher birth than him. She scorns the household labor. The man kills a wether, skins it, and wraps her in it. He declares that he can not beat her, but he can certainly beat a wether's skin...
The Farmer's Curst Wife
The Farmer's Curst Wife
The Farmer's Curst Wife is Child ballad number 278. It has been recorded by Pete Seeger and Jean Ritchie-Synopsis:A farmer had a bad woman for his wife, and one day the devil came for her. They reached Hell, and the gates were shut, so she struck him. She made life in hell so bad that the devil...
The Jolly Beggar
The Jolly Beggar
The Jolly Beggar also known as The Gaberlunzieman is Child ballad 279. The song's chorus inspired lines in Lord Byron's poem So, we'll go no more a roving.-Synopsis:...
The Beggar-Laddie
The Beggar-Laddie
The Beggar-Laddie is a traditional English ballad existing in several variants. It was collected by Francis James Child as Child ballad 280.-Synopsis:...
The Keach i the Creel
The Keach i the Creel
-Synopsis:A young woman tells a man that her parents keep her too close for them to meet. The man has his brother make a ladder and a reel; the ladder takes him to the chimney, and by the reel, he is lowered into her bedroom. Her mother guesses there is a man in her bed and sends the father. She...
Jock the Leg and the Merry Merchant
Jock the Leg and the Merry Merchant
-Synopsis:Jock the Leg and a merchant meet; Jock tries to get him to pay at a tavern. Then Jock wakes him and tells him they should be on their way. The merchant says he can not take the roads Jock wants, because Jock the Leg would rob him. Jock says he'll protect him. In the forest, Jock tries...
The Crafty Farmer
The Crafty Farmer
The Crafty Farmer is Child ballad 283, existing in several variants.-Synopsis:A farmer is travelling with a sum of money—sometimes because he must pay his rent for a long period of time, sometimes because he has sold a cow—when he falls in with a highwayman. He either admits to the money, or the...
John Dory
The George Aloe and the Sweepstake
The George Aloe and the Sweepstake
The George Aloe and the Sweepstake or The Coasts of High Barbary is Child ballad 285.In 1595, a ballad was entered into the Stationers' Register with the note that it was to be sung to the tune of The George Aloe and the Sweepstake.-Synopsis:...
The Sweet Trinity
The Sweet Trinity
"The Sweet Trinity", also known as "The Golden Vanity" or "The Golden Willow Tree", is Child Ballad 286. The first surviving version, about 1635, was "Sir Walter Raleigh Sailing In The Lowlands "The Sweet Trinity", also known as "The Golden Vanity" or "The Golden Willow Tree", is Child Ballad 286....

(The Golden Vanity)
Captain Ward and the Rainbow
Captain Ward and the Rainbow
Captain Ward and the Rainbow or Ward the Pirate is Child ballad 287. It recounts a tale of the pirate Captain Ward, who may be a historical figure.-Synopsis:The king sends a ship, the Rainbow, after Captain Ward...
The Young Earl of Essex's Victory over the Emperor of Germany
The Young Earl of Essex's Victory over the Emperor of Germany
The Young Earl of Essex’s Victory Over the Emperor of Germany is Child Ballad 288.-Synopsis:The earl takes to sea—despite, in some variants, the pleas of his love and her reminder of the fate of Benbow -- and meets up with ships of the emperor of Germany. They hail each other, and the earl's proud...
The Mermaid
The Wylie Wife of the Hie Toun Hie
The Wylie Wife of the Hie Toun Hie
The Wylie Wife of the Hie Toun Hie is Child ballad 290, existing in several variants, some of them fragmentary.-Synopsis:A man expresses an interest in a woman. The hostler's wife lures her to him with an offer of fine wine. After he has his will of her, she demands his name...
Child Owlet
Child Owlet
Child Owlet is Child ballad 291 and a murder ballad. It was performed by English folk-rock band Steeleye Span on their album They Called Her Babylon.-Synopsis:...
The West Country Damosel's Complaint
The West Country Damosel's Complaint
-Synopsis:The heroine demands of William that he will marry her or kill her. He warns her that living with him in the wild will be very hard. She comes, but after three months has enough of cold and hunger and goes to her sister, begging for alms. Her sister calls up her huntsman and has them...
John of Hazelgreen
John of Hazelgreen
John of Hazelgreen or Jock O'Hazeldean is Child ballad 293. The Jock O'Hazeldean variant was published by Sir Walter Scott.-Synopsis:...
Dugall Quin
Dugall Quin
-Synopsis:Dugall Quin wooes Lisie Meanes, asking her how she likes him in his ragged dress; she answers that she likes him and asks how he likes her in her fine clothing; he likes her and asks her to come with him. Her father asks her not to go. She defies him. Dugall tells her that if he comes...
The Brown Girl
The Brown Girl
-Synopsis:The brown girl received a letter from her lover, telling her that he was rejecting her for a more beautiful woman. Then she received another, saying he was dying and summoning her. She told him she was delighted at his dying.-External links:*...
Walter Lesly
Walter Lesly
-Synopsis:Walter Lesly asks a lady to come to Conland. Then his kinsmen, led by Geordy Lesly, carry her off. A wedding feast is ready, and they are put in bed together. When he is asleep, she gets up, dresses, and runs off, swearing to deal no more with him....
Earl Rothes
Young Peggy
Trooper and Maid
Blancheflour and Jollyflorice
Blancheflour and Jollyflorice
"Blancheflour and Jollyflorice" is a traditional ballad from Great Britain, It is included in a collection published as "The English and Scottish Popular Ballads between 1882 and 1898" by Francis James Child in the late 19th century...
The Queen of Scotland
The Queen of Scotland
The Queen of Scotland is Child ballad 301.-Synopsis:The Queen of Scotland tries to lure Troy Muir to her bed. When she fails, she directs him to lift a stone in her garden, and a hungry snake emerges. A woman cut off her breast to appease the beast, and the wound healed within an hour. Troy...
Young Bearwell
The Holy Nunnery
Young Ronald
Young Ronald
-Synopsis:Young Ronald falls in love with the daughter of the King of Linn. She tells him she's too young, his mother tells him that she's refused many, and Ronald takes to his bed. His father weeps for his son's illness, and Ronald rouses himself, to ride back to the princess...
The Outlaw Murray

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.