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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.
The ballad opens with a description of the robberies of the Galiard and Galiard's men before the text breaks off.
When the ballad resumes, the Galiard has taken a horse, but it proves not fast enough; he is captured, and his captors hang him. His nephew sees, raises men, and avenges his death. They return home safely.
Percy Grainger took inspiration from this for his 1905 work The Lads Of Wamphray March, his first composition for wind band.
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Illustrations of Northern Antiquities (1814), or to give its full title Illustrations of Northern Antiquities, from the Earlier Teutonic and Scandinavian Romances; Being an Abstract of the Book of Heroes, and Nibelungen Lay; with Translations of Metrical Tales, from the Old German, Danish, Swedish, and Icelandic Languages; with Notes and Dissertations, was a pioneering work of comparative literature which provided translations and abstracts of various works written in medieval Germany and Scandinavia. Its three authors were Henry Weber, who précised the Nibelungenlied and Heldenbuch; Robert Jamieson, who translated Danish and other ballads, stressing their close connection with Scottish ballads; and Walter Scott, who provided an abstract of Eyrbyggja saga. It significantly extended British readers' access to early Germanic literature.