Today is the last day of the 12 days of Christmas, and I spent the day with my family, making rather merry. We have a tradition in my family of saving one of our Christmas gifts to be opened on this day, and there are always a couple smaller things given on this Little Christmas. We dine upon gnocchi and ham, as we do upon Christmas day itself, and if every way possible, we treat it very much like a big feast day. It was a beautiful and joyous day with family and friends, made even more festive by a snow fall, and a warm fire.
This song is actually a bit more fitting for Christmas day itself, but it is very joyful sounding, and once I got The Christmas Traveller out of my head, this is what was going round and round, so you are getting it to finish off the Long Christmas. We are now in the season of Epiphany. My we all, like the Wisemen of the East have the faith and courage to see the Stars God sends to guide us to Himself, and may we have the grace to see Him, however He choses to show Himself to us.
I Saw Three Ships Come Sailing In, seems a good almost-Epiphany song, so that is what I am going to post today:
Today is also the feast day of St. Edward the Confessor, the last Anglo Saxon King of England and the uncle of St. Margaret of Scotland. I did spend a certain amount of the day attempting research on Anglo Saxon Christmases, to very little avail. I did, however, and most happily make a discovery. In spite of my interest in Old English language and poetry, I am only passingly familiar with Cynewulf's Crist -- here meaning that I am very aware of its importance, know that it is an epic poem on about our Lord, and (because I am me) that it is the poem containing the line Eala Earendel, Engla Beorhtast, which inspired Tolkien's story of Earendil. What I did not know is that the first part of the poem-- the Advent part, the part praising the bright light of Earendel-- are a poetic expansion of the Great O Antiphons sung by the Church during the last days leading up to Christmas. This delighted me all out of proportion. So, in order to sneak in a little Anglo Saxon, in honour of King Edward, I am presenting to you the following:
So today you get an odd little thing that just worked itself onto my youtube suggestions. What intrigued me about it is that it has retained some Middle English spelling. And that eia exclamation is something I've come across before. I went down the rabbit hole last year, trying to track down the etymology when I posted Eia Martyr Stephane. But I had no idea what "susanni" meant.... And here is where things get confusing. Apparently, "susanni" (which has a great variety of spellings) is a German word. (I double checked this and found several other sources claiming the same thing.) There is a German carol that contains the "eia susanni" lines as well. The problem is, the English carol is older. It is attested in Ashmole Manuscript, dated 1393, and stored in the Bodleian Library at Oxford. Hymns and Carols of Christmas gives the lyrics to the English version, and gives comparison links to variants, including the Middle English Ashmole version, Gloria Tibi Domine. You will notice that the worlds correspond almost exactly with the more modern English of the carol I am posting, but with Latin refrains instead. Further searching was interesting, but didn't shed a huge amount of light on how we went from a macaronic carol, to one with an odd, borrowed German word, and that curious "eia" sticking out like a sore thumb. The nearest I can figure out is that the Germans borrowed it from us, sometime around the 1500s, and then we borrowed it back, retaining the "susanni" bit. I suppose that in this case, the "eia" could have been acquired the same way, but I am dubious of this. To start with, Eia Martyr Stephane dates to about the same perioud as this tune, so we know that it was an English expression. Secondly, most of the resources I found in my poking were far more concerned with explaining where "susannni" came from, and if they bother with "eia" at all, it is generally dismissed as "an exclamation", with no effort to identify it as a particularly German exclamation. I am a very amature philologist, and ahve no business saying things like "my instinct says that it got into the Middle English version of Susanni independent of German influence"... but that is what my instinct says :-)
"May they outlast the Sarumans and see spring again in the trees." (Tolkien's toast at the Hobbit Dinner in Rotterdam, March 28th, 1958.)
Today is the birthday of John Ronald Reuel Tolkien, and as all good Tolkienists do, I celebrated with right good cheer. I prepared a most satisfactory, and hobbit-like repast of sausage and mushrooms, which I consumed while listening to music inspired by the Professor's subcreation. More to the point, in a couple of hours, I shall join legions of Tolkien admirers around the world by standing up at 9 pm, raising a cup of cheer (in my case, Talisker) and saying with great enthusiasm "To the Professor!"
In honour of the great philologist, philosopher and subcreator, you get the following Christmas song, which I am ridiculously pleased to be posting. Several years ago, when I first discovered Tolkien's poem, Noel, I posted it on my blog with the comment, "it seems the sort of thing that ought be set to melody, and sung by people who are glad to sing and do so heartily." And lo and behold, when I did my daily searching after songs, I found that people who are glad to sing, did indeed set it to song, and here it is:
Yes, yes, it is in Polish, and they use the introductory preamble from Peter Jackson's Fellowship of the Ring to start it out, but it actually sort of works, and it is quite a hearty rendition of the poem. I rather love it..... it rather made me cry. (The disclaimer is that I am inclined to happy tears these days. No reason. I just am. It is rather novel after years of not doing that....me that always cried in deep emotion.)
And for those of you who would prefer a more traditional Christmas tune for the day (sure and I don't blame you) here's The Boar's Head Carol, because it is associated with Oxford, and what could be more hobbit-like than a carol about a procession of food?
It occurs to me that it might be nice to share a more upbeat Christmas song for a change. You are getting a very idiotically cheerful song by the Irish Rovers and I really cannot tell you much more about it. Their liner notes attribute it to S. C. Smith, whoever that is. Google is not forthcoming, no matter how many ways I try to make inquiry. It suggests that I really want Arthur "Guitar Boogie" Smith, and I am pretty darned sure that I do not. I also found several website solemnly averring that the first line runs, "When I was afar one winters day I took my TV neath the tree" which is just stupid. To begin with, no one just happens to be carrying a TV when their afarring. And even if we suppose that the TV was obtained when the person had settled down for the night in that far away place, taking it out neath the trees during winter is exceedingly ill-advised. And lastly, the rest of the song is a pretty traditional and straightforward retelling of the Christmas story, which would make a TV's appearance highly anachronistic. If you ask me (and I know you won't) the line actually runs "When I was afar one winters day, I took my tea beneath a tree". But what do I know?
Without further ado, let me present The Christmas Traveller:
And if you have ever heard a hallelujah sung with more unbridled mirth than they do, I'd like to here it!
I know that it is almost cliche to post Auld Lang Syne as the song for New Year's Day, nor is this the first time I have done so, but I came across this so very charming old video of being performed, that delighted me so much that I feel duty-bound to share it. The singer's voice threw me at first-- one does not expect this Scots when one sees the name Paolo Nutini-- but it is perfect for the song, as is the setting, and is the fact that it is old, and the quality is poor. It is not sung to the more common tune we are accustomed to hearing. This is the older, original tune that Rabbie Burns had in mind when he wrote the thing.
And for those of you who find the Scots rather beyond your ken, here is a rather decent explanation of the lyric that not only translates some of the more obscure phrases (right guid-willie waught....huh?) but also gives a bit of background and commentary upon it, which is worth reading.
And since today is also a holy day of obligation-- amongst other feasts, commemorating the Holy Name of Jesus, I am posting this beautiful Gregorian hymn, in honour of His Name. (And there are bells, whats not to love?)
