Volume IV, song 320, page 331 - 'Fine flowers in the Valley' - Scanned from the 1853 edition of the 'Scots Musical Museum', James Johnson and Robert Burns (Edinburgh and London: W. Blackwood & Sons, 1853)

Verse 1: 'She sat down below a thorn, Fine flowers in the valley And there she has her sweet babe born And the green leaves they grow rarely.' The 'Scots Musical Museum' is the most important of the numerous eighteenth- and nineteenth-century collections of Scottish song. When the engraver James Johnson started work on the second volume of his collection in 1787, he enlisted Robert Burns as contributor and editor. Burns enthusiastically collected songs from various sources, often expanding or revising them, whilst including much of his own work. The resulting combination of innovation and antiquarianism gives the work a feel of living tradition. Stenhouse, an 1850s commentator on the 'Museum', said of this tune, 'This ancient and beautiful air, with the fragment of the old ballad beginning, 'She sat down below a thorn', were both transmitted by Burns to Johnson for the 'Museum''. Very little else, though, is known about this sad tune. The repetition of the second and fourth lines is very typical of narratives from the oral tradition. It not only makes it easier for the teller to remember but also gives the listener a strong sense of structure making it easier to follow. It was most probably used as a moral warning which could be disseminated to a lot of people at once in the public arena.

Collection

Scots Musical Museum

Inventory Number

4503516

Title

Volume IV, song 320, page 331 - 'Fine flowers in the Valley' - Scanned from the 1853 edition of the 'Scots Musical Museum', James Johnson and Robert Burns (Edinburgh and London: W. Blackwood & Sons, 1853)

Object Type

PhysicalObject

Measurements

- 132 x 211 mm