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Rynerdine

from Love Call Me Home by Peggy Seeger

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(note by Elisabeth Higgins Null with Charles H. Baum)
Peggy describes Reynard the Fox as 'the sly seducer, the will-o'-the-wisp who vanishes when sought, along with those pretty young girls who cannot resist following him.' A touch of the supernatural reverberates in the tune and arrangement to which she has set lyrics substantially the same as those contributed by H.F. Watson, Marion County, West Virginia to Josiah H. Combs' Folksongs of the Southern United States (ed. D.K. Wilgus, Austin: 1967).

Playing a four-stringed Appalachian dulcimer (three high Cs and an F) backed by a drone psaltery, Peggy sings her own haunting melody with a frequently sharped 4th, used without modulating from one key to the next. She says she wrote the tune deliberately in the Lydian mode (found on the white keys of a piano by starting with F) which she loves because it sends 'chills into interesting places.' Even so, it also has a decidedly mixolydian feeling with its use of the flatted 7th and naturalized 4th in the phrase 'two miles below Pomeroy.' (Peggy reaffirms the song is in Lydian with cross relations on the 4th and 7th intervals.)

The song appeared in British broadsides in the early nineteenth century where it was usually titled 'On the Mountains High.' In most texts, it deals with the seduction of a female by a mysterious stranger or outlaw who introduces himself to her on the Hills of Pomeroy (probably in County Tyrone, Northern Ireland). The stranger promises to protect her with a gun. After she swoons into his arms, he urges confidentiality and informs her that he might be found at his castle in the forest. Occasionally the maiden warns others against falling for such a rake, but in other versions she sets off searching for him.

The ballad has rarely been collected from oral tradition in England or Scotland. Doug DeNatale's ' 'Reynardine': A Broadside Ballad of Seduction' (Western Folklore, Vol. 39: 1980) traces Reynardine's publishing history as well as its wide diffusion in America, where it can be traced back as far as a manuscript sheet in 1801. Traditional singers have also sung it in Canada as well as throughout the eastern half of the United States, and its frequent appearance in nineteenth century songsters seems to have stabilized the plot and text. Peggy's words are notable for grace rather than for idiosyncrasies. An enticingly sinister mood is suggested by such phrases as 'All on this lonely mountain I'm glad to see you here,' 'These words had scarce been spoken/She fell in a maze,' 'And she fell in my arms/Silent as morning dew.' They combine with Peggy's ambiguous added verse:

She sought him in his forest
Perhaps she did him find.
But she's not in that castle
Nor is Rinordine.


As the Vermont folksinger Margaret MacArthur wrote in her 'Introduction' to her album, On the Mountains High (Cambridge: Living Folk Records F-LFR-100, 1971), one Kentuckian accused of rape explained to the judge that when he sang 'that ald sang Rinordine' to his victim, 'she r'ared up on her hind legs like a stallion.' In America at least, the mysteries of seduction and surrender seem paramount in this ballad.

Fragmentary versions were set down with their tunes by some of the early 20th-century Irish collectors, most notably Herbert Hughes in Irish Country Songs, Vol. 1 (London: 1909) who claimed that in Donegal, where he collected a verse or two of the song, Reynardine is considered to be a 'faery who changes into the shape of a fox.' Stephen D. Winick, in his 'A.L. Lloyd and Reynardine: Authorship and Authenticity in the Afterlife of a British Broadside Ballad,' (Folklore, Dec, 2004) argues that this is the only explicit reference to Reynardine as a supernatural character prior to A.L. Lloyd's reworking of the song in the late 1950s through the mid 1960s. Winick believes that Lloyd created his own supernatural version out of Hughes' fragments, other literary reworkings and verses, and versions derived from the broadsides. In none of his writings about Reynardine does Lloyd make a direct connection to the bluebeard-like and decidedly paranormal Mr. Fox of British legend. Rather, he juxtaposes Reynard with references to Mr. Fox as if trying to merge aspects of the two characters. The result is a song so compelling that its supernatural aspects have bubbled over and affected how most singers touched by the British folksong revival view versions of the song today. Lloyd's transformation of Reynardine has touched an emotional core. In keeping with this magical spirit, Peggy joins tune and word to traditional text, forming her own eerie and psychologically powerful version.

For a partial listing of written and recorded versions consult The Traditional Ballad Index www.csufresno.edu/folklore/ballads/LP15.html

For more recorded versions search for Reynardine in The Folk Music Index
www.ibiblio.org/folkindex/r05.htm - Rey

Some Versions of Reynardine as recorded by A.L Lloyd:
Lloyd, A. L. n.d. (1956?) The Foggy Dew and Other Traditional English Love Songs. Tradition Records TLP 1016 (earlier version)
Lloyd, A. L. 1966. First Person. Topic 12T11

lyrics

06 RYNERDINE

words and music: traditional USA
lap dulcimer tuning: Key of F; double strings tuned to a high C; lower strings on a middle C and F below middle C

One morning as I rambled
Two miles below Palm Roy;
I met a farmer's daughter
All on the mountain high.

I said, My dear, my fair one,
Your beauty shines so clear
All on this lonely mountain
I'm glad to meet you here.

Your beauty has ensnared me
I cannot pass you by,
But with my gun I'll guard you
All on the mountains high.

These words were scarcely spoken
When she fell in a maze,
Her eyes as bright as diamonds
Upon me she did gaze.

Her rosy lips and cheeks
They lost their former hue
And she fell in my arms
Silent as morning dew.

I had but kissed her once or twice
When she come to again
and modestly she asked me
Pray, sir, what is your name?

Go look in yonder forest
My castle you will find
'Tis wrote in ancient history
My name is Rynerdine.

But now, my dear, my fair one,
Don't let your parents know
For they may prove my ruin
Perhaps my overthrow.

If you come to yonder forest
Perhaps you' will me find,
Enquire at my castle
Call for Rynerdine.

She sought him in his forest
Perhaps she did him find.
But she's not in that castle
Nor is Rynerdine.

credits

from Love Call Me Home, released April 26, 2005

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Peggy Seeger Oxford, UK

Peggy is one of the most influential folk singers on either side of the Atlantic. She is Pete Seeger’s half-sister and Ruth Crawford Seeger’s daughter; her first life partner was the English songwriter Ewan MacColl, who wrote First Time Ever I Saw Your Face for her. She has made more than 22 solo recordings to date. Please check ewanmaccoll.bandcamp.com for other albums featuring Peggy. ... more

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