Transcript

Ó, is a bhuinneáin bhuí, sé mo léan do luí
Is do chnámha sínte (ar leac Uí Fhloinn),
Ní díobháil bídh (ann ach) easbhaidh dí,
Órú, a d'fhág tú sínte ar chúl do chinn.
Dá gcuirfeá scéala fá mo dhéin
Bheinn féin (ar an rith id chomhair)
Go mbrisfinn béim ar an loch (faoi chéim),
Órú, a fhliuchfadh do chroí is do bhéilín binn.

Agus tá mo chorp leontaí agus m'intinn buarthaí,
Agus tháinig an óigbhean chugam isteach,
Órú, d'iarr mise póg uirthi uair nó dhó
Leis an tsláinte mhór a thabhairt ar ais,
M'ochón ó, mo mhíle brón,
Gan mé (óg is mé póstaí ort),
Órú, níl go fóill 's ní bheidh go deo,
Is a mhuirnín ó, mo bheannacht leat.

Ó, is ní hiad mur gcuid éanlaith atá mé (dh'iarraidh),
An chuach ná an (chraobh) ná an chorra ghlas,
Ach an buinneán (péacach ar talamh féarach),
Is gur dheise liom é (nach a dhlúth ná a dhath).
Bhí siad ag síor-ól na dí,
Is deir siad go mbím ar an (nóisean cheart),
Níl braon dá bhfaighinn nach ligfinn síos
(Ar) faitíos go bhfaighinnse bás den tart.

Translation

Oh, yellow bittern, alas that you are lying
With your bones stretched on O'Flynn's flagstone (?),
Not lack of food but want of a drink
Has left you lying face up.
If you had sent me word
I'd have run to your aid (?)
And dealt a blow to the lake (...)
Which would have wetted your heart and your sweet mouth.

And my body is hurt and my mind vexed,
And the young woman came to visit me,
I asked her for a kiss once or twice
To bring me back to health,
Alas, my thousand sorrows,
That I am not young and married to you,
I am not yet, and I will never be,
And my young sweetheart, farewell.

Oh, and it's not your birds that I am seeking,
The cuckoo or the (...) or the grey crane,
But the beautiful(?) bittern on the pasture (?),
And I prefer it to (...).
They were forever drinking,
And they say that I am right (?),
There isn't a drop I get that I don't swallow
For fear I'd die of thirst.

Commentary

This song was composed by the south Ulster poet Cathal Buí Mac Giolla Ghunna (c.1680-1756). He is a very popular poet in the oral tradition of Ulster and is reputed to have lived a life of pleasure and poverty after abandoning the idea of life in the priesthood. Patrick Higgins collected a version of the song in 1845 and wrote that the song was 'composed by a drunken poet some years back in the county of Fermanagh, called Charles Gun who, on walking out of a frosty day near Lough MacNean, met a dead bittern on the ice and composed this song for the dead bird as the bittern is always fond of drink, and so was he' (Journal of the Irish Folk Song Society 20 (1967), 47). Edward Bunting published the melody 'The Yellow Bittern' in The ancient music of Ireland (Dublin, 1840), 56. The song is well known throughout Ireland both in Irish and in English translation. Thomas McDonagh (1878-1916), the revolutionary, composed a particularly popular translation. For more information on the poet and the song see: Breandán Ó Buachalla, Cathal Buí: amhráin (Dublin, 1975); Liam Mac Con Iomaire, Seosamh Ó hÉanaí: nár fhágha mé bás choíche (Indreabhán, 2007); and Pádraigín Ní Uallacháin, A hidden Ulster: people, songs and traditions of Oriel (Dublin, 2003).