Humours of Glasgow Fair, The

DESCRIPTION: At dawn Willock wakes Tam to go to the fair with Jenny and Maggy. There was "funning and sporting," drinking, music and shows. They spend the night at Luckie Gunn's. "Ne'er saw ye sic din and guffawing -- Sic hooching and dancing was there"
AUTHOR: John Breckinridge (source: Whitelaw and Greig/Duncan4)
EARLIEST DATE: 1823 (Hutchison citing Glasgow chapbook MU25-f.12:12, according to Greig/Duncan4)
KEYWORDS: commerce sports drink food music humorous
FOUND IN: Britain(Scotland(Aber))
REFERENCES (3 citations):
Greig/Duncan4 887, "The Sun Frae the Eastward was Peepin'" (1 fragment)
Whitelaw-BookOfScottishSong, pp. 212-213, "The Glasgow Fair " (1 text)
ADDITIONAL: Robert Ford, editor, Vagabond Songs and Ballads of Scotland [first series] (Paisley,1899), pp. 198-204, "The Humours of Glasgow Fair"
Roud #6260
BROADSIDES:
Bodleian, Harding B 11(1336), "Glasgow Fair" ("O, the sun frae the eastward was peeping"), J. Wright (Edinburgh), no date
NOTES [109 words]: "This ditty, descriptive of 'The Humours of Glasgow Fair' was popular as a street song some twenty-five years ago.... The fair of Glasgow is held annually, and has been so from time immemorial, on the second week of July that includes a Monday" (Whitelaw-BookOfScottishSong, 1843).
Greig/Duncan4: "Cf. Peter Ross, The Songs of Scotland, pp. 376-9, "Glasgow Fair," where the song is attributed to John Breckenridge, a compositor in Glasgow about 1820."
Apparently broadside Bodleian, 2806 c.11(218), "Humours of Glasgow Fair" ("O, the sun frae the eastward was peeping"), The Poet's Box (Glasgow), 1866 is this song but I could not download and verify it. - BS
Last updated in version 3.2
File: GrD4887

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