John Barleycorn
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"John Barleycorn" is an English and Scottish folk song.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> The song's protagonist is John Barleycorn, a personification of barley and of the beer made from it. In the song, he suffers indignities, attacks, and death that correspond to the various stages of barley cultivation, such as reaping and malting.
The song may have its origins in ancient English or Scottish folklore, with written evidence of the song dating it at least as far back as the Elizabethan era.<ref name=wigington>Template:Cite web</ref> It is listed as number 164 in the Roud Folk Song Index. The oldest versions are Scottish and include the Scots poem "Quhy Sowld Nocht Allane Honorit Be". In 1782, the Scottish poet Robert Burns published his own version of the song, which influenced subsequent versions.
The song survived into the twentieth century in the oral folk tradition, primarily in England, and many popular folk revival artists have recorded versions of the song. In most traditional versions, including the sixteenth century Scottish version entitled Alan-a-Maut, the plant's ill-treatment by humans and its re-emergence as beer to take its revenge are key themes.<ref name=mustrad>Template:Cite web</ref>
History
Possible ancient origins
The Penguin Book of English Folk Songs (London, 1959), edited by the folk singer A. L. Lloyd and the composer Ralph Vaughan Williams, ponders whether the ballad is "an unusually coherent folklore survival" or "the creation of an antiquarian revivalist, which has passed into popular currency and become 'folklorisedTemplate:'". It has been theorised that the figure could have some relation to the semi-mythical wicker man ritual, which involves burning a man in effigy.<ref name=wigington/>
A link between the mythical figure Beowa (a figure from Anglo-Saxon paganism, appearing in early Anglo-Saxon royal genealogies; his name means "barley") and John Barleycorn is suggested by the author Kathleen Herbert. In her 1994 book Looking for the Lost Gods of England, she suggests that Beowa and Barleycorn are one and the same, noting that the folksong details the suffering, death, and resurrection of Barleycorn, yet celebrates the "reviving effects of drinking his blood".<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>
Written versions
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The first song to personify Barley was called Allan-a-Maut ('Alan of the malt'), a Scottish song written prior to 1568;<ref name=mustrad/>
Allan is also the subject of "Quhy Sowld Nocht Allane Honorit Be", a fifteenth or sixteenth century Scots poem included in the Bannatyne Manuscript of 1568 and 17th century English broadsides.
"A Pleasant New Ballad" (1624)
The first mention of "John Barleycorn" as the character was in a 1624 London broadside entitled introduced as "A Pleasant New Ballad to sing Evening and morn, / Of the Bloody murder of Sir John Barley-corn".<ref name=mustrad/> The following two verses are from this 1624 version:
The final two verses of this 1624 version show Barleycorn's vengeance through intoxicating his killers:
Robert Burns (1782)
Robert Burns published his own version in 1782, which adds a more mysterious undertone and became the model for most subsequent versions of the ballad. Burns's version begins:
Unlike other versions, Robert Burns makes John Barleycorn into a saviour:
Field recordings
Many field recordings of the song were made of traditional singers performing the song, mostly in England. In 1908, Percy Grainger used phonograph technology to record a Lincolnshire man named William Short singing the song; the recording can be heard on the British Library Sound Archive website.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> James Madison Carpenter recorded a fragment sung by a Harry Wiltshire of Wheald, Oxfordshire in the 1930s, which is available on the Vaughan Williams Memorial Library website<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> as well as another version probably performed by a Charles Phelps of Avening, Gloucestershire.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> The Shropshire singer Fred Jordan was recorded singing a traditional version in the 1960s.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
A version recorded in Doolin, Co. Clare, Ireland from a Michael Flanagan in the 1970s is available courtesy of the County Clare Library.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
The Scottish singer Duncan Williamson also had a traditional version which was recorded.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
Helen Hartness Flanders recorded a version sung by a man named Thomas Armstrong of Mooers Forks, New York, USA in 1935.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
Musical adaptations
Ralph Vaughan Williams used a version of the song in his English Folk Song Suite (1923).<ref>Template:Cite journal</ref> Many versions of the song have been recorded, including popular versions by the rock groups Traffic (appearing on their 1970 album John Barleycorn Must Die) and Jethro Tull (appearing first on their 1992 album A Little Light Music and then on various other albums). The song is a central part of Simon Emmerson's The Imagined Village project. Martin and Eliza Carthy perform the song alongside Paul Weller on the Imagined Village album. Billy Bragg sang in Weller's place on live performances. Rock guitarist Joe Walsh performed the song live in 2007 as a tribute to Jim Capaldi. English folk musician Sam Lee recorded a version on his album "Old Wow," accompanied by a video filmed at Stonehenge.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
In popular culture
"John Barleycorn" has been used as a symbol or a slang term for alcohol,<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> and its association with alcohol has been used in various areas of life. Several pubs in the South of England are called "John Barleycorn", in places including Duxford,<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Harlow,<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Goring,<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> and Southampton.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Jack London's 1913 autobiographical novel John Barleycorn takes its name from the song and discusses his enjoyment of drinking and struggles with alcoholism.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> The use of the term to symbolise alcohol misuse was so widespread that it was used as a headline on court reports about drunkenness in late Victorian times.<ref name="Cymru 1893">Template:Cite news</ref> In the climax of the Inside No. 9 episode "Mr King", the song is performed by a class of schoolchildren as they prepare to ritualistically sacrifice their teacher for their harvest festival.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
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The John Barleycorn, Duxford, Cambridgeshire
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Use of "John Barleycorn" to symbolise alcohol in an anti-prohibition illustration
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John Barleycorn use of name in headline<ref name="Cymru 1893"/>
See also
References
Sources
- The Function of Song in Contemporary British Drama by Elizabeth Hale Winkler On line book
- British Folk Music – John Barleycorn
- "John Barleycorn: The evolution of a folk-song family", Peter Wood, Folk Music Journal, Vol. 8 no. 4, 438-455.
External links
- "John Barleycorn revisited", essay by Peter Wood, British folk music scholar, 2004
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- A pleasant new Ballad to sing both Euen and Morne, / Of the bloody murther of Sir John Barley-corne, 1624?, English Broadside Ballad Archive.