Dance Corn Rigs 1348

The original song, “Corn Rigs”, is ancient and, since it lies close to the heart of rural Scotland, it is one of timeless truth and beauty. John Playford included the melody in his Choice Ayres and Songs, book 3, published in 1681, as “A Northern Song”. Since Playford was English, “Northern” must be presumed to mean “Scots”.

Adam Craig published the tune to “Corn Rigs” in his 1730 volume, A Collection of the Choicest Scots Tunes. Craig, a violinist of note, was a leading performer at the concert on St. Cecilia’s Day in Edinburgh in 1695.

The chorus of the original “Corn Rigs” remains for us to enjoy today:

O corn rigs and rye rigs,
And corn rigs are bonnie,
And gin ye meet a bonnie lass,
Prin up her cockernony.

Allan Ramsay (1686–1758), poet and editor of The Tea Table Miscellany, wrote a song called “Corn Riggs are Bonny” to the old tune and put it to his ballad opera The Gentle Shepherd of 1725. In 1733 William Thomson included the song in Volume 2 of Orpheus Caledonius.

My Patie is a Lover gay,
  His Mind is never muddy,
His Breath is sweeter than new Hay,
  His Face is fair and ruddy.
His Shape is handsome, middle Size;
  He’s stately in his wawking:
The shining of his Een surprise;
  'Tis Heaven to hear him tawking.

Last night I met him on a Bawk,
  Where yellow Corn was growing,
There mony a kindly Word he spake,
  That set my Heart a glowing.
He kiss’d, and vow’d he wad be mine,
  And loo’d me best of ony;
That gars me like to sing sinsyne,
  O Corn Riggs are bonny.

Let Maidens of a silly Mind,
  Refuse what maist they’re wanting,
Since we for yielding are design’d,
  We chastly should be granting:
Then I’ll comply, and marry Pate,
  And syne my Cockernony,
He’s free to touzle air or late,
  Where Corn riggs are bonny.

Lest any misunderstanding exist, a “cockernony” or “cockernonie” is a hair arrangement, a length of hair tied with a ribbon or into a snood or fillet.

It was quite natural that Robert Burns would have chosen this old tune for one of his most beautiful songs, one that was certainly a vast improvement upon Ramsay’s verses.

As a farmer, a poet who spent his life close to the earth, the chorus of “Corn rigs” must have struck a responsive and sympathetic chord within him. The “corn” or oats, the chief crop of the land, he had sown and harvested. The rigs or runrigs was the method in which the farmer or the various tenants of a farmtoun divided the arable land, the “ploughgates”, into sections to be cultivated. This was the traditional form of farming under which he had laboured. From his deep understanding and personal experience, came a song of evanescent beauty. In 1783 Burns wrote “The Rigs o’ Barley” and it was included in his Kilmarnock volume of 1786. Now it is commonly called“Corn Rigs”.

It was upon a Lammas night,
  When corn rigs are bonie,
Beneath the moon’s unclouded light,
  I held awa to Annie;
The time flew by, wi’ tentless heed;
  Till, ‘tween the late and early,
Wi’ sma’ persuasion she agreed
  To see me thro’ the barley.

The sky was blue, the wind was still,
  The moon was shining clearly;
I set her down, wi’ right good will,
  Amang the rigs o’ barley;
I ken’t her heart was a’ my ain;
  I lov’d her most sincerely;
I kiss’d her owre and owre again,
  Amang the rigs o’ barley.

I lock’d her in my fond embrace;
  Her heart was beating rarely:
My blessings on that happy place,
  Amang the rigs o’ barley!
But by the moon and stars so bright,
  That shone that hour so clearly!
She ay shall bless that happy night
  Amang the rigs o’ barley.

I hae been blythe wi’ comrades dear;
  I hae been merry drinking;
I hae been joyfu’ gath’rin’ gear;
  I hae been happy thinking:
But a’ the pleasures e’er I saw,
  Tho’ three times doubl’d fairly –
That happy night was worth them a’
  Amang the rigs o’ barley.

Anne Rankine, daughter of Burns’ friend John Rankine of Adamhill farm near Lochlea, who was the subject of the “Epistle to John Rankine”, claimed to have been the “Annie” of this song.