#john barleycorn

"A Pleaſant New Ballad to ſing Ev'ning and morn, Of the Bloody murder of Sir John Barley-corn."

(in a more legible face)

If you're familiar with this tune via Traffic's version from the titular John Barleycorn Must Die album, this is the extended version, if you will.

Part 2

Part 3

Not doing five pages, but I've done enough research to know some things, so here's some brief(ish) info:

So John Barleycorn is a folk song with origins as far back as the 1600s. Traffic did a version of the song in the 1970s that's fairly well known. It's not my favorite rendition, but I'll include it here for context:

The sort of "joke", or riddle behind the song, is as follows (note that the exact events vary depending on version—see below):

Some men (often three men from the west, but not always) decide that another man named John Barleycorn must die. They kill and bury him. However, he survives this. Over the course of the summer, he rapidly ages into an old man—growing a beard, then becoming pale and stooped. Due to him weakening, his killers come back and torture him in various ways (cutting him "off at the knee", tying him up, stabbing him with a pitchfork, and so on and so forth). He then dies for real (kind of), and they drink his blood.

It all sounds really fucked up—until you realize that John Barleycorn is literally barley, the plant. The stuff in the song is just describing the process of planting the seed, the plant growing into maturity, reaping and harvesting it, and then malting it to make liquor. It's funny but also horrific at the same time, and has this great "mystical" kind of vibe to it that I really like.

(As a side note I've heard this song sometimes referred to as the "Passion of the Corn" which, like, Yeah)

The song itself is sometimes speculated to be of ancient origins dating back to the pagan era (Kathleen Herbert), but I'm inclined more to believe that humans are just naturally inclined to personify things (Lloyd/Williams from The Penguin Book of English Folk Songs speculate it might also be a history buff who wrote the song in the first place). What we do know is that the song almost definitely originated through the 15th century poem Quhy Sowld Nocht Allane Honorit Be (Eng: "Why Should Not Allan Honored Be"), which is Scottish in origin.

I need to break up this wall of text so here's some period depictions of John Barleycorn (source 1, source 2), and one supplementary meme:

There are several versions of John Barleycorn as a song that branched out from this, including but not limited to:

A Pleasant New Ballad to sing Evening and morn, Of the Bloody murder of Sir John Barley-corn (1600s): This is the oldest version, at least to my knowledge, that mentions John Barleycorn as a character (1600s). It is similar to the version discussed above, but with a few major notes.

First, the entire opening is different: John meets up with two other knights (hence the "sir" in his name): "Richard Beer" and "Sir William White Wine" (it's mentioned that he has a cousin, "Thomas Good Ale", but we don't see him) and they have what's supposed to be a friendly match.

Sir John wins, and the other two vow to kill him. This is very different than other versions, where the men are generally implied to just be farmers and they don't have a reason to kill him aside from just money.

The next parts are similar to the aforementioned, but with a much longer, slightly more brewing-accurate torture. Also, this version makes it clear that they're terrified of Sir John kicking their asses again, which I think is very funny

He is killed by having his blood (read: ale) drained, which is a detail left out of some versions. He then becomes "Sir John Goodale" (note the parallel to his cousin) and kicks their asses by giving them hangovers in a murder/revenge-type plot. I really like this ending, but at the same time, it does lack the mysticism of some of the other variations.

The song ends with the author praising those who make good ale and hoping the devil pulls out the eyes of whoever waters down theirs, which like. gee author, why don't you tell us how you REALLY feel

I like this one

The Little Barleycorn (1600s):

Not as relevant as the other versions; this one just describes John Barleycorn (alcohol) with high praise, and he Does Not Die for a change.

Themes from this one worked their way into the next version.

John Barleycorn (1700s):

This is very likely a stripped-back version of the "Pleasant Ballad" above. (The Traffic cover above is this version.)

Robert Burns did his own version in 1782, which is where most other versions of this one spring from. His takes a tip from The Little Barleycorn and portrays Sir John's sacrifice as a noble one and a good thing.

As a side note, his is one of my favorite takes; it has the strengths of the Pleasant Ballad, but pairs back all of the details that confused the analogy. However, it doesn't have some of the more questionable parts of the other versions noted below.

Unsure of where the Traffic version first originated from, but I think it's a little weaker in some areas. For example, there's no given reason for them to leave Sir John alone once he's risen (sprouted) from the human side of things, and the song looses something without the casual human sacrifice and blood drinking mentioned in the other versions. Also, the mention of brandy here is particularly off because brandy is made from grapes (in all other versions, he becomes ale instead). However, this version does have my favorite ending verses out of all of them.

Due to the ending of the song(s), "John Barleycorn" is sometimes used as slang for alcohol, especially in the Victorian ages. In particular, John Barleycorn would often be treated as an anti-prohibition figure, which I think is really funny. Like I get the rationale behind it, because he also personifies alcohol, but he also personifies alcohol Because He Died, so somehow I don't think he'd be in support of it. To quote that one meme, John Barleycorn has joined the war on prohibition. On the side of the prohibitioners. He is out there in the field holding up a sign encouraging people to drink more water or something

As a side note, this epitaph from "A Huy and Cry After Sir John Barlycorn" was written in 1725, but I feel like it's relevant to this section:

I have no idea what to leave off on here, so I'm just going to drop the Martin Carthy version of the song (falls under the third version):

And I'll also toss in Johnny Flynn's excellent "Barleycorn", which is a great haunting song that deals with the cyclical nature of the character: