RE: [Mid] Re: Greensleeves

Kitel,

I would be a fool to argue that King Henry VIII was not a wonderful musician
and a good poet.

However, the only substantiation available to credit Greensleeves to his
works is the hopelessly romantic 19th century speculation that it might have
been his. Unfortunately, William Chappell (Popular Music of the Olden Time)
and his contemporaries did fanciful research and changed and invented things
at whim.

To my knowledge, there's no extant document which can place Greensleeves any
earlier. Yes, a lot of 19th century writers speculate that Greensleeves may
be a new name for the tune which the ballad "The Lord of Lorne" was sung to,
however, if that was the case, the tune would have (at least in the first
printings of the Greensleeves ballads) been indicated as "Lord of Lorne" and
not "Greensleeves".

Respectfully,

Constance Fairfax

> -----Original Message-----
> From: owner-sca-middle@midrealm.org
> [mailto:owner-sca-middle@midrealm.org]On Behalf Of
> KitelYngvarsson@aol.com
> Sent: Sunday, November 28, 1999 1:27 PM
> To: sca-middle@midrealm.org
> Subject: [Mid] Re: Greensleeves
>
>
> In a message dated 11/28/99 10:36:23 AM Central Standard Time,
> fairfax@tir.com writes:
>
> > Henry VIII, however, there's absolutely no reference to the song until
> > almost 30 years after he dies, but there are many songs which
> he wrote or
> > liked which are extant in several contemporary song books (one
> of which was
> > HIS)...but no reference to Greensleeves.
>
> In another post I mentioned the "Letters and Papers of Henry
> VIII." It is a
> large, multi-volume, set of books (lots of letters and papers,
> besides the
> commentaries). My mother has my father's copy (I don't have it
> here with me,
> being separated from it by about 2000 miles), so I can't look up
> the page and
> refer you to it. But, it does contain a large body of his poetic work.
> Interestingly enough, he often signed another name to the poem,
> had them read
> at feasts and then asked his courtiers what they thought of the poet. An
> interesting way to get a honest opinion. Of course, after a
> while, this trick
> became known and they simply gave good opinions, regardless, but
> I'm sure it
> worked a few times. Probably good that he was a fairly decent writer. At
> least for the hapless courtiers.
>
> In service,
> Kitel
> From: KitelYngvarsson@aol.com
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From: "Kate/Constance" <fairfax@tir.com>
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Received on Sun Nov 28 14:07:31 1999