John Barleycorn

"John Barleycorn" is an English folk song[1] (Roud 164). The character of John Barleycorn in the song is a personification of the important cereal crop barley and of the alcoholic beverages made from it, beer and whisky. In the song, John Barleycorn is represented as suffering indignities, attacks and death that correspond to the various stages of barley cultivation, such as reaping and malting.

For the novel by Jack London, see John Barleycorn (novel). For the lost 1914 silent film, see John Barleycorn (film).

Broadside ballad entitled 'A Huy and Cry After Sir John Barlycorn' by Alexander Pennecuik, 1725

Origins

Kathleen Herbert draws a link between the mythical figure Beowa (a figure stemming from Anglo-Saxon paganism that appears in early Anglo-Saxon royal genealogies whose name means "barley") and the figure of John Barleycorn. Herbert says that Beowa and Barleycorn are one and the same, noting that the folksong details the suffering, death, and resurrection of Barleycorn, yet also celebrates the "reviving effects of drinking his blood".[2]

In their notes to the Penguin Book of English Folk Songs (London, 1959), editors A. L. Lloyd and Ralph Vaughan Williams ponder whether the ballad is "an unusually coherent folklore survival" or "the creation of an antiquarian revivalist, which has passed into popular currency and become 'folklorised'". It is in any case, they note, "an old song", with printed versions dating as far back as the sixteenth century.

Versions and variants
Porcelain toy image of John Barleycorn, c .1761

Countless versions of this song exist. A Scottish poem with a similar theme, "Quhy Sowld Nocht Allane Honorit Be", is included in the Bannatyne Manuscript of 1568 and English broadside versions from the 17th century are common. Robert Burns published his own version in 1782, and modern versions abound. Burns's version makes the tale somewhat mysterious and, although not the original, it became the model for most subsequent versions of the ballad.

Burns's version runs:

There was three kings unto the east,
Three kings both great and high,
And they hae sworn a solemn oath
John Barleycorn should die.

They took a plough and plough'd him down,
Put clods upon his head,
And they hae sworn a solemn oath
John Barleycorn was dead.

But the cheerful Spring came kindly on,
And show'rs began to fall;
John Barleycorn got up again,
And sore surpris'd them all.

The sultry suns of Summer came,
And he grew thick and strong;
His head weel arm'd wi' pointed spears,
That no one should him wrong.

The sober Autumn enter'd mild,
When he grew wan and pale;
His bending joints and drooping head
Show'd he bagan to fail.

His colour sicken'd more and more,
He faded into age;
And then his enemies began
To show their deadly rage.

They've taen a weapon, long and sharp,
And cut him by the knee;
Then tied him fast upon a cart,
Like a rogue for forgerie.

They laid him down upon his back,
And cudgell'd him full sore;
They hung him up before the storm,
And turn'd him o'er and o'er.

They filled up a darksome pit
With water to the brim;
They heaved in John Barleycorn,
There let him sink or swim.

They laid him out upon the floor,
To work him further woe;
And still, as signs of life appear'd,
They toss'd him to and fro.

They wasted, o'er a scorching flame,
The marrow of his bones;
But a miller us'd him worst of all,
For he crush'd him between two stones.

And they hae taen his very heart's blood,
And drank it round and round;
And still the more and more they drank,
Their joy did more abound.

John Barleycorn was a hero bold,
Of noble enterprise;
For if you do but taste his blood,
'Twill make your courage rise.

'Twill make a man forget his woe;
'Twill heighten all his joy;
'Twill make the widow's heart to sing,
Tho' the tear were in her eye.

Then let us toast John Barleycorn,
Each man a glass in hand;
And may his great posterity
Ne'er fail in old Scotland!
[3]

An early English version runs thus:

There was three men come out o' the west their fortunes for to try,
And these three men made a solemn vow, John Barleycorn must die,
They ploughed, they sowed, they harrowed him in, throwed clods upon his head,
Til these three men were satisfied John Barleycorn was dead.

Earlier versions resemble Burns' only in personifying the barley, and sometimes in having the barley be foully treated or murdered by various artisans. Burns' version, however, omits their motives. In an early seventeenth century version, the mysterious kings of Burns's version were in fact ordinary men laid low by drink, who sought their revenge on John Barleycorn for that offence:

Sir John Barley-Corn fought in a Bowl,
  who won the Victory,
Which made them all to chafe and swear,
  that Barley-Corn must dye.

Another early version features John Barleycorn's revenge on the miller:

Mault gave the Miller such a blow,
That from [h]is horse he fell full low,
He taught him his master Mault for to know
  you neuer saw the like sir.

One of the more frequently performed versions today runs thusly:

There were three men came out of the West
Their fortunes for to try
And these three men made a solemn vow:
John Barleycorn must die

They've ploughed, they've sown, they've harrowed him in
Threw clods upon his head
And these three men made a solemn vow:
John Barleycorn was dead

They've let him lie for a very long time
Till the rains from heaven did fall
And little Sir John sprung up his head
And so amazed them all

They've let him stand till Midsummer's Day
Till he looked both pale and wan
And little Sir John's grown a long, long beard
And so become a man

They've hired men with the scythes so sharp
To cut him off at the knee
They've rolled him and tied him by the way
Serving him most barbarously

They've hired men with the sharp pitchforks
Who pricked him to the heart
And the loader he has served him worse than that
For he's bound him to the cart

They've wheeled him around and around the field
Till they came unto a barn
And there they made a solemn oath
On poor John Barleycorn

They've hired men with the crab-tree sticks
To cut him skin from bone
And the miller he has served him worse than that
For he's ground him between two stones

And little Sir John and the nut-brown bowl
And his brandy in the glass;
And little Sir John and the nut-brown bowl
Proved the strongest man at last

The huntsman, he can't hunt the fox
Nor so loudly to blow his horn
And the tinker he can't mend kettle nor pot
Without a little Barleycorn

Recordings and modern performances

Some field recordings of authentic performances were made, including one by an unidentified singer recorded by Keith Summers in 1973.[4]

Many versions of the song have been recorded, including a popular version by the rock group Traffic, appearing on their 1970 album John Barleycorn Must Die. The song has also been recorded by Fire + Ice, Gae Bolg, Bert Jansch, the John Renbourn Group, Pentangle, Finest Kind, Martin Carthy, Roy Bailey, Martyn Bates in collaboration with Max Eastley, the Watersons, Steeleye Span, Jethro Tull, Joe Walsh, Steve Winwood, Fairport Convention, the Minstrels of Mayhem, Galley Beggar, Donnybrook Fair, Oysterband, Frank Black, Chris Wood, Quadriga Consort, Maddy Prior, Heather Alexander, Leslie Fish, Tim van Eyken, Barry Dransfield, Of Cabbages and Kings, Winterfylleth (band), John Langstaff, Ayreheart, and many other performers. The song is also 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. Lithuanian folk-blues band Working Hobo performs this song in Lithuanian which is called Džonas Miežis.

Julian Cope's album Drunken Songs has the following written on its front cover: "John Barleycorn died for somebody's sins but not mine." This is both a reference to John Barleycorn, Patti Smith, and the Traffic album mentioned above.

See also

References
  1. Winkler, Elizabeth Hale (1990). The Function of Song in Contemporary British Drama. University of Delaware Press. pp. 75–76. ISBN 978-0-87413-358-5.
  2. Herbert, Kathleen (2007). Looking for the Lost Gods of England. Anglo-Saxon Books. p. 16. ISBN 978-1-898281-04-7.
  3. "John Barleycorn: A Ballad". Robert Burns Country.
  4. "John Barleycorn". Keith Summers English Folk Music Collection - World and traditional music - British Library.

Sources
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