Babylon (ballad)

"Babylon" or "The Bonnie Banks o Fordie" is Child ballad 14,^[1] Roud 27.

Synopsis

An outlaw comes upon three sisters in the woods. He threatens each one in turn to make her marry him. The first two refuse and are killed. The third threatens him with her brother or brothers. He asks after them and discovers that he is the brother. He commits suicide.

Parallels

Forms of this ballads are known throughout all of Scandinavia.^[2]

Versions

Dick Gaughan features it on his album No More Forever

Broadside Electric included it in the 1996 album More Bad News ...

Malinky played a version, called "The Bonnie Banks O Fordie", on their 2005 album The Unseen Hours

Nic Jones version of the song, "Banks of Fordie", is included on his 2006 compilation Game Set Match

John Jacob Niles version of "Bonny Farday", is included in his album, My Precarious Life in the Public Domain, and is printed in The Ballad Book of John Jacob Niles

Old Blind Dogs version of "The Bonnie Banks O' Fordie" is included on their 1992 album, "New Tricks"

Howard Mitchell version of "The Bonnie Banks of the Virgie O'" is included on his self-titled 1962 album.

See also

• The King's Dochter Lady Jean
• The Bonny Hind
• Fair Flowers of the Valley

References

1. Francis James Child, English and Scottish Popular Ballads, "Babylon or The Bonnie Banks o Fordie"
2. Francis James Child, The English and Scottish Popular Ballads, v 1, p 171, Dover Publications, New York 1965

External links

• Bonny Farday, an American variant
• The Bonnie Banks o Fordie with music and commentary