ROUD 65: Willie O' Douglas Dale
Dame Oliphant, Douglass Dale, Willie of Duglass Daill, The Earl of Douglas and Dame Oliphant
Like many of the more wholesome ballads with happy endings and a distinct lack of dismemberment, abuse or death, this story has failed to ignite the world with its popularity. However, in my humble opinion, it is none the less for that, and we have yet another example to offer when someone says “Ugh folk music, it’s all songs about death innit?”
While large portions of this song follow familiar Child ballad themes and patterns, there are several points of interest beyond its relatively uplifting storyline, not least the female character with both means and agency to escape the clutches of her overbearing family, and a reliable and capable man who is true to his word.
Music
I’m very happy to introduce Helen Lindley, whom I commissioned to create the arrangement for this ballad. Here is what she has to say about it:
Willy O’Douglas Dale features Dame Oliphant who, having fallen in love with the ‘wrong’ man and getting pregnant, isn’t standing by to wait for trouble. Willy wants her to go with him, so she gives him money, jumps over the castle walls (still very pregnant!), has a baby in the woods and elopes to Scotland with him. The ballad obviously fell out of use since it was first written. It was from a time when obedience was required in royal women (still is?) – certainly no hanky panky before an arranged marriage to a preferred suitor - and if they did, there was supposed to be some comeuppance, especially for a man of lesser status. So, hats off to Dame Oliphant for doing it her way! But with no reprisals, a successful elopement to Scotland and no one dying, in folk ballad terms it’s an abject failure! And the lack of a reprimand was probably very against certain Victorian sensibilities.
When Karl asked me to create something for modern day singing from this song (or more likely, to avoid having to miss out songs in the Sing Yonder sequence!) it was a challenge to begin with. For this version, more accessible lyrics were needed as the originals in Child are heavy on dialect. The Sing Yonder page word limit meant that elements not essential to the tale had to go. For the tune, Bronson’s suggestions didn’t fit well so it was necessary to compose a new one to make it ‘singable’. The tune took a while as I tend to need to live with a song for a while; the lyrics develop a rhythm in my head and it’s from this that the tune develops. With unaccompanied singing, you can easily change rhythm during a song and I’d decided on the penultimate line having a slightly different pace to break up any rhythmic monotony. Parts of the melody changed several times the more I sang it (thank goodness for Voice Notes on phones to record changes immediately) until finally, I arrived at the version here!
The Oliphant in the Room
The name Oliphant is unusual and worthy of a quick look. As far as I can find, it’s unique in traditional balladry. The now widely established Scottish family name Oliphant comes from David Olifard, a 12th century clan chief in southern Scotland, whose name is related to the “olif” or olive, and probably was meant to denote “bringer of peace”, as in the offering of an olive branch. Olifard came from an Anglo-Norman family and was actually born in Nottinghamshire, but was given lands in Scotland by King David I in return for saving the King’s life in battle. His relocation from England to Scotland echoes the journey of Dame Oliphant from England to Scotland in the song.
On a side note, the name sounded familiar to me, at first I thought it was just from well known US actor Timothy Olyphant (different spelling but surely from the same Anglo-Norman root) but I have also recently written about an Oliphant here: Ruth K Oliphant was an illustrator who provided imagery for The Gay Goshawk in a lovely little book of ballad stories called “True Thomas the Rhymer, and other tales of lowland Scots” from 1971.
Douglas Dale, Douglasdale, Castle Douglas, Douglas Castle?
The Douglas name is worthy of mention too. Initial searches for Douglas Dale, or Douglasdale, show that term used both for the area around the town of Castle Douglas in Dumfries and Galloway in the south of Scotland, and also for the area around the small village of Douglas, in Lanarkshire.
You might think a town would be a more prominent location from which early poets might draw inspiration. However, the village was the location of Douglas Castle, built by the Douglas clan sometime before 1288, and captured by the English in the 1307 Wars of Scottish Independence. Sir James Douglas subsequently recaptured his family seat, and in recognition was rewarded with an Earldom by Robert the Bruce - tales of whom were surely a source of inspiration for early Scots balladeers. Sadly the castle was demolished in 1938 - only a partial tower remains today.
Castle Douglas, on the other hand, is a relatively recent addition to the map - a vanity project of wealthy 18th Century industrialist William Douglas (apparently no direct relation to the famous Clan Douglas), it was only founded in 1792. This is approximately concurrent with the collection of songs from Anna Gordon, AKA Mrs Brown of Falkland, so just about possible, and it might be tempting to conflate William Douglas with our Willie O’ Douglas Dale. However, Anna Gordon presented her repertoire as old songs she had learned as a child some 40 years previously.
Sources
As you might have already gathered, you will find no great treatises on this ballad in the history books - however, it does merit the odd passing mention. Some engage themselves fruitlessly in speculation as to the identities of the protagonists, but as always we can pick up a bit of interesting Scottish history on the way. For example, here is Peter Buchan in his 1875 “Ancient Ballads and Songs of the North of Scotland”.
The only published tune can be found in Christie’s Traditional Ballad Airs - in the footnote he also has a good go at connecting the ballad to William de Douglas, with equally questionable results.
In 1955 MacEdward Leach published one of the most comprehensive ballad books of all time - 370 songs made it into his hefty volume, and Roud 65 was one of them. Here is his brief note:
He doesn’t have much to say, but does point out a couple of points of interest from the ballad:
The folkloric use of mountain ash to bring about successful childbirth
The common trope of the man disappearing off while the woman gives birth alone. One can only wonder what these poor chaps would make of an antenatal appointment.
David Fowler, an English lecturer at the University of Washington in the 1960s published his folk music course “A Viewer’s Guide to Folk Balladry” in 1965. In it he makes a compelling comparison to Child Waters (Roud 43), claiming Willie O’ Douglas Dale is a later retelling, from the woman’s point of view.
You can read the full excerpt in the book here.
Willie O’ Gorgeous Male
As you might expect, this ballad does not feature heavily in popular culture - except intriguingly in the 1992 romance novel “A Valentine’s Day Fancy” by Julie Caille, an author who seemingly specialised in love stories set in the Regency period.
To whet your appetite, here is the back cover blurb:
Makes a change from the usual academic prose. Here is the passage in question:
On that crashing spelling error, I’ll leave it there; you can read on at your leisure here.
Draft pages and audio guide
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