Twa Corbies

"The Three Ravens" (Child 26, Roud 5) is an English folk ballad, printed in the song book Melismata compiled by Thomas Ravenscroft and published in 1611, but it is perhaps older than that. Newer versions (with different music) were recorded right up through the 19th century. Francis James Child recorded several versions in his Child Ballads (catalogued as number 26). A Scottish version is called "Twa Corbies" ("Two Ravens" or "Two Crows"), and it follows a similar general story, but with a darker twist.

The ballad takes the form of three scavenger birds conversing about where and what they should eat. One tells of a newly slain knight, but they find he is guarded by his loyal hawks and hounds. Furthermore, a "fallow doe", an obvious metaphor for the knight's pregnant ("as great with young as she might go") lover or mistress (see "") comes to his body, kisses his wounds, bears him away, and buries him, leaving the ravens without a meal. The narrator, however, gradually departs from the ravens' point of view, ending with “God send euery gentleman/Such haukes, such hounds, and such a Leman” - the comment of the narrator on the action, rather than the ravens whose discussion he earlier describes.

Alternatively, the lyrics may simply ascribe the apparent narrator's sentiments to the raven(s), which given the previous personification of the raven(s) seems just as possible.

The lyrics to "The Three Ravens" are here transcribed using 1611 orthography. They can be sung either straight through in stanzas of four lines each, or in stanzas of two lines each repeating the first line three times depending on how long the performer would like the ballad to last. The second method appears to be the more canonical, so that is what is illustrated below. The refrains are sung in all stanzas, but they will only be shown for the first.

"The Twa Corbies" is a related Scottish version of the song with a more dark and cynical tone. There are only two scavengers in “The Twa Corbies”, but this is the least of the differences between the songs, though they do begin the same. Rather than commenting on the loyalty of the knight's beasts, the corbies tell that the hawk and the hound have forsaken their master, and are off chasing other game, while his mistress has already taken another lover. The ravens are therefore given an undisturbed meal, as nobody else knows where the man lies, or even that he is dead. They talk in gruesome detail about the meal they will make of him, plucking out his eyes and using his hair for their nests. Some themes believed to be portrayed in "Twa Corbies" are: the fragility of life, the idea life goes on after death, and a more pessimistic viewpoint on life. The loneliness and despair of the song are summed up in the final couplets;

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