The Bitter Withy: Difference between revisions

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Latest revision as of 07:29, 27 June 2022

The Bitter Withy is an English folk song (also said to be a Scots-cum-Appalachian ballad or carol). It is also known as "The Bitter Withy Tree", "The Withies", "Three Jolly Jerdins" or "The Sally Twigs". The song reflects an unusual and apocryphilic vernacular idea of Jesus Christ. The withy of the title is the willow (note: "withy" is specifically the name given to strong flexible willow stems).

The song gives an explanation as to why the willow tree rots from the centre out, rather than the outside in. The story told in the song has been traced back to a legend from around the 14th century. Interestingly, the song has not caused anywhere as much scandal as Max Ernst's 1926 painting The Virgin Spanking the Christ Child, despite the fact that the story must seem even more outrageous from a Christian point of view:

  • Jesus being portrayed as a boy who abuses his divine powers by killing three boys who have refused to play with him,this bears some similarity to certain stories of Jesus in the apocryphal infancy gospel of Thomas
  • the punishment he receives for this "mischief" (actually an act of triple murder) being three strokes with a bunch of willow twigs,
  • after which he puts a curse on the tree from which the twigs were taken.

The song is given an update in a recent recording by the British folk artist John Tams on his album 'The Reckoning' (2006).

Lyrics

The Bitter Withy
As it fell out on a high holiday
Small rain from heaven did fall,
Sweet Jesus asked his mother dear
If he might play at ball.
"To play, to play," dear child she did say
"It's time that you were gone
And don't let me hear of any mischief
At night when you come home."
So it's up the hill and down the hill
Our sweet young savior ran,
And there he met three rich young lords,
Good morning to each one.
"Good morn," "Good morn," "Good morn," they said,
"Good morning," then said he,
And which of you three fine children
Will play at the ball with me?
Oh, we are lords and ladies sons
Born in a bower and hall
And you are nothing but a poor maid's child
Born in an oxen stall.
Well, if I'm nothing but a poor maid's child
Born in an oxen stall,
I'll make you believe in your latter end,
For I'm an angel above you all.
So he built a him a bridge of the beams of the sun
And over the water ran he,
Them three little lords followed after him
Drowned they were all three.
So it's up the hill and down the hill
Three rich young mothers ran,
Crying, "Mary mild, fetch home your child,
For ours he's drownded each one."
So Mary mild fetched home her child,
And laid him across her knee,
And with a handful of withy twigs
She gave him slashes three.
Oh bitter withy, oh bitter withy,
You've caused me to smart,
And the withy shall be the very first tree
To perish at the heart.

See also

More information is available at [ Wikipedia:Withy ]


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