Annotation:Moudiewart (The)

Back to Moudiewart (The)

---

MOUDIEWART, THE (The Mole). AKA - "The Mowdewort," "The Mowdiewart." AKA and see "Ane an' Twenty Tam," "O! For One and Twenty," "Porto Bello." Scottish, Jig. F Major. Standard tuning (fiddle). AB. Scots poet Robert Burns remarked to Thomson that he had one of "our ancienter Scots Fiddlers' play him 'The Moudiewart'" in strathspey time; Emmerson (1971) takes from this remark that it was the habit of untutored folk fiddlers to render tunes in strathspey style at their pleasure. "The Moudiewart" means 'the mole' (Shakespeare called the rodent a "moldwarp"), and is an old Jacobite air on the death of William of Orange, who it is said expired after a fall from his horse after it had stumbled over a mole-hill. The air was published as "Scotch Jig" by Oswald in his Caledonian Pocket Companion, iv, 1752. It had appeared earlier under the title "Porto Bello," printed by Walsh in his Caledonian Country Dances (book 3), c. 1740. English printings of the tune include John Johnson's Choice Collection of 200 Favourite Country Dances, vol. 3 (London, 1744), and Longman and Broderip's Compleat Collection of 200 Favourite Country Dances (London, 1781); both under the title "The Mowdewort".

Poet Robert Burns penned a song, "O, for Ane-and-Twenty, Tam," to tune which relates the promise of a lass when she finally comes of age. Stenhouse says:

This comic song, the manuscript of which is before me, was written by Burns on purpose for the Museum. The subject of the song had a real origin. A young girl having been left some property by a near relation and at her own disposal on her attaining majority, was pressed by her relations to marry and old rich booby. Her affections, however, had previously been engaged by a young man, to whom she had pledged her troth when she should become of age, and she of course obstinately rejected the solicitations of her friends to any other match. Burns represents the lady addressing her youthful lover in the language of constancy and affection.

It appears in Johnson's Scots Musical Museum, vol. 4 (1792, p. 366), with the indicated tune being "The Moudiewart." A notation in The Songs of Robert Burns (1903, p. 415) says that the setting of the tune in The Scots Musical Museum did not please Burns, who recommended Thomson publish it in his Scottish Airs (1799, 59) after having "any of our ancienter Scots fiddlers play you in Strathspey time 'The moudiewart'--that is the name of the air--I think it will delight you." However, Thomson ignored the poets suggestion and instead printed the air "Cold and Raw." There is a bawdy song in The Merry Muses of Caledonia on the moudiewart that goes:

This moudieward tho' it be blin',
If ance its nose you lat it in;
Then to the hilts, within a crack,
Its out o' sight, the woudiewark.

Lord Henry Cockburn (1779-1854), writing in his posthumously published book Memorials of His Time (1856), gives the anecdote:

Laing had an incomprehensible reverence for Dugald Stewart. Stewart used to tell, how he was walking in the Meadows (Edinburgh) very early one morning, when he saw a number of people within the enclosure seemingly turning up the turf, and that upon going up to them he found his fried Jamie Laing, who explained that in these short light nights there was noting going on with the blackguards, "and so, ye see, Mr. Professor, I've just brought oot the constables to try oor hands at the moudieworts. ..... [p. 90]

Source for notated version:

Printed sources: Howe (1000 Jigs and Reels), c. 1867; p. 127.

Recorded sources:

---