"Barbara Allen" is a traditional folk song that is popular throughout the English-speaking world and beyond. It tells of how the eponymous character denies a dying man's love, then dies of grief soon after his untimely death.
"The Daemon Lover" – also known as "James Harris", "A Warning for Married Women", "The Distressed Ship Carpenter", "James Herries", "The Carpenter’s Wife", "The Banks of Italy", or "The House-Carpenter" – is a popular ballad dating from the mid-seventeenth century, when the earliest known broadside version of the ballad was entered in the Stationers' Register on 21 February 1657.
"Lady Isabel and the Elf Knight" is the English common name representative of a very large class of European ballads.
"The Twa Sisters" is a traditional murder ballad, dating at least as far back as the mid 17th century. The song recounts the tale of a girl drowned by her jealous sister. At least 21 English variants exist under several names, including "Minnorie" or "Binnorie", "The Cruel Sister", "The Wind and Rain", "Dreadful Wind and Rain", "Two Sisters", "The Bonny Swans" and the "Bonnie Bows of London". The ballad was collected by renowned folklorist Francis J. Child as Child Ballad 10 and is also listed in the Roud Folk Song Index ., Whilst the song is thought to originate somewhere around England or Scotland, extremely similar songs have been found throughout Europe, particularly in Scandinavia.
The Famous Flower of Serving-Men or The Lady turned Serving-Man is a traditional English language folk song and murder ballad. Child considered it as closely related to the ballad "The Lament of the Border Widow" or "The Border Widow's Lament".
"Unusually, it is possible to give a precise date and authorship to this ballad. It was written by the prolific balladeer, Laurence Price, and published in July 1656, under the title of The famous Flower of Serving-Men. Or, The Lady turn'd Serving-Man. It lasted in the mouths of ordinary people for three hundred years: what a tribute to the work of any writer, leave alone the obscure Laurence Price. Oral tradition, however, has made changes. The original has twenty-eight verses and a fairy-tale ending: “And then for fear of further strife, / he took Sweet William to be his Wife: / The like before was never seen, / A Serving-man to be a Queen”. - Roy Palmer, A Book of British Ballads
"Geordie" is an English language folk song concerning the trial of the eponymous hero whose lover pleads for his life. It is listed as Child ballad 209 and Number 90 in the Roud Folk Song Index. The ballad was traditionally sung across the English speaking world, particularly in England, Scotland and North America, and was performed with many different melodies and lyrics. In recent times, popular versions have been performed and recorded by numerous artists and groups in different languages, mostly inspired by Joan Baez's 1962 recording based on a traditional version from Somerset, England.
"Young Beichan", also known as "Lord Bateman", "Lord Bakeman", "Lord Baker", "Young Bicham" and "Young Bekie", is a traditional folk ballad categorised as Child ballad 53 and Roud 40. The earliest versions date from the late 18th century, but it is probably older, with clear parallels in ballads and folktales across Europe. The song was popular as a broadside ballad in the nineteenth century, and survived well into the twentieth century in the oral tradition in rural areas of most English speaking parts of the world, particularly in England, Scotland and Appalachia.
"Hind Etin" is a folk ballad existing in several variants.
"Lord Thomas and Fair Annet", also known as "Lord Thomas and Fair Eleanor", is an English folk ballad.
"The Lass of Roch Royal" is Child ballad number 76, existing in several variants.
"Sheath and Knife" is a folk ballad.
"The Broomfield Hill", "The Broomfield Wager" "The Merry Broomfield", "The Green Broomfield", "A Wager, a Wager", or "The West Country Wager" (Child 43, Roud 34) is a traditional English folk ballad.
"Gil Brenton" is Child ballad 5, Roud 22, existing in several variants.
"Earl Brand" is a pseudo-historical English ballad.
"Our Goodman" is a Scottish and English humorous folk song. It describes the efforts of an unfaithful wife to explain away the evidence of her infidelity. A version of the song, "Seven Drunken Nights", was a hit record for The Dubliners in the 1960s.
"The Maid and the Palmer" is an English language medieval murder ballad with supernatural/religious overtones. Because of its dark and sinister lyrics, the song was often avoided by folk singers. Child's main text in English comes from the seventeenth century ballad collection compiled by Thomas Percy, supplemented by a nineteenth century fragment recalled by Sir Walter Scott, although both Child and later scholars agree that the English language version(s) of the ballad derive from an earlier Continental original or "Magdalene ballad" that is based upon a medieval legend associated with Mary Magdalene, in which her story has become conflated with that of the Samaritan woman at the well in the Gospel of John. The ballad was present in oral tradition in Scotland in the early years of the nineteenth century but was subsequently lost there, however versions have since been recovered in Ireland, in particular among the Irish Traveller community, with an intervening gap of some 150 years. A small fragment of the ballad has also been claimed to have been recovered in the US, but the veracity of this record is disputed. The "palmer" of Child's title, as included the Percy MS version, refers to a pilgrim, normally from Western Europe, who had visited the holy places in Palestine and who, as a token of his visits to the Holy Land, brought back a palm leaf or a palm leaf folded into a cross. In the ballad the palmer, as a holy man, has the ability to see the Magdalene character/protagonist's past in which she has borne and buried numerous children and to prescribe what fate awaits her in the hereafter, in the form of a set of seven year penances following which she will be absolved from her sins; in Continental versions, and in one variant collected in Ireland, the palmer is in fact Jesus.
The Suffolk Miracle is Child ballad 272 and is listed as #246 in the Roud Folk Song Index. Versions of the ballad have been collected from traditional singers in England, Ireland and North America. The song is also known as "The Holland Handkerchief" and sometimes as "The Lover's Ghost".
"The Dowie Dens o Yarrow", also known as "The Braes of Yarrow" or simply "Yarrow", is a Scottish border ballad. It has many variants and it has been printed as a broadside, as well as published in song collections. It is considered to be a folk standard, and many different singers have performed and recorded it.
"Weela Weela Walya", also called "Weila Waile", "Wella Wallia" or "The River Saile", is an Irish schoolyard song that tells the story of an infanticide in a light-hearted way. It was popularised in the 1960s by Irish folk bands The Dubliners and The Clancy Brothers.
