The
Wren Boys
The
Wren Boys
Taken from the Journal of the Cork Archaeological and Historical Society,
1894, Vol. III, p. 22
“St.
Stephen’s his day” is a red-letter event in the canaille calendar
of Cork and neighbourhood. When the “wran-boys,” as they are
locally termed, have captured a wren, the luckless bird is borne through
the streets in a sort of triumphal progress, secured in a bush of holly
or other evergreen, which is usually garnished with streamers of coloured
ribbons, or variegated papers, according to the resources of tile exhibitors.
In early morning the city resounds with the din of the wren-boys (which
term, by the way, embraces matured manhood), who are making a house
to house visitation, singing at each halt a chant, something as follows:-
“Mr.
Blank is a worthy man,
And to his house we've brought the wran;
The wran, the wran that you may see
Is uarded by the holly-tree.
Sing holly,
sing ivy, sing ivy, sing holly,
To keep a had Christmas it is but a folly;
For Christmas comes but once a year,
And when it comes it brings good cheer.
The wran,
the wran, the king of all birds,
St. Stephen's his Day was cot in the furze;
And though he is little, his family’s great,
So arise, good lady, and give us a trate.
Sing holly, sing ivy, etc.
Yet if
you do fill it of the small,
It will not do for our boys at all;
But if you fill it of the best,
We hope in heaven your soul may rest.
Sing holly, sing ivy, etc.
This lyric,
with its refrain, is long drawn out, and as its aim is the acquisition
of largesse, the ballad does not fail to make eulogistic reference to
the good cheer provided by the worthy master and mistress of the house,
and their high reputation for hospitality during the festive season.
Richard Dowden, mayor of Cork in I845, issued a proclamation during
his mayoralty forbidding, on the score of cruelty, “the hunting
of the little bird on St. Stephen’s day by all the idle fellows
of the country,” a precedent which has never been followed by any
of his successors in the civic chair. The origin of this brutal custom
is not known. Professor Ridgeway, writing to the Academy, suggested
the theory that the death of the wren symbolizes the death of winter;
other correspondents of the same journal traced analogy between the
Cork wren-boys and the Rhodian swallow-boys and the crow-boys of ancient
Greece who went around with similar begging- songs. Goldsmith, while
dealing elaborately with the superstitions connected with other birds,
does not notice the custom ill his brief article on the wren; but the
English General Vallancey, who spent a considerable time in Cork and
the neighbourhood, and became an enthusiastic student of the Irish language
and archaeology, asserts that the Druids regarded the wren as a sacred
bird, which caused the early Christian missionaries to place it under
ban, and issue an edict for its extermination. Windele, the Cork antiquary,
however, assures us that Vallancey “dreamt things as visionary,
and disported ill fancies as wild and incongruous, as any of the Irish
Keatinges or O'Hallorans who had preceded him.” Another origin
of the wren-slaughter is advanced in Hall’s “Ireland,”
which contains a sketch of the St. Stephen’s Day ceremony by the
distinguished Cork painter, Maclise. “ As to the origin of the
whimsical but absurd and cruel custom,” writes Mr. Hall, “we
have no data. A legend, however, is still current among the peasantry
which may serve in some degree to elucidate it. In a grand assembly
of all the birds of the air, it was determined that the sovereignty
of the feathered tribe should be conferred upon the one who would fly
highest. The favourite in the betting-book was, of course, the eagle,
who at once, and in full confidence of victory, commenced his flight
towards the sun; when he had vastly distanced all competitors, he proclaimed
ill a mighty voice his monarchy over all things that had wings. Suddenly,
however, the wren, who had secreted himself under the feathers Of the
eagle’s crest, popped from his hiding-place, flew a few inches
upwards and chirped out as loudly as he could, “Birds, look up,
and behold your king.” In other parts of Ireland it seems the wren
and robin find special favour. Mr.Watters of the Dublin University Zoological
Society, asserts in his “Birds of Ireland” that the most heartless
youngster who indulges in “practical ornithology” with the
eggs and young of other birds, regards the redbreast as too sacred to
be molested. “Wild and untutored,” he writes “ask him
his reasons for allowing it to remain in safety, and in many parts of
Ireland you are simply answered
“The robin and the wren
Are God’s two holy men”
apparently
a local variant of' the Lancashire folk-rhyme:
“Cock Robin and Jenny Wren
Are God Almighty’s Cock and Hen”
In view
of the fine Corsican spirit in which the wren is annually done to death
in the South of Ireland vendetta, it is needless to say that the rustic
rhyme quoted by the Dublin ornithologist has no place ill the bird-lore
of these parts. Nor does the pretty fiction of the robins forming a
coverlet of leaves for the dead Babes in the Wood, so generally potent
for their protection elsewhere, invest them with any peculiar sanctity
in the eyes of the average Cork person.
From The Journal of the Kildare
Archaeological and Historical Society, Vol. V., 1906-1908
‘Customs peculiar to certain days, formerly observed in County
Kildare
St.
Stephen’s Day, 26th December.
This is the day on which “the Wran-Boys” go their rounds.
For a day or two previously the wren has been hunted over with stick
or stone. Two or three of them are tied to a branch torn from a holly
bush, which is decorated with coloured ribbons. On St. Stephans Day
small parties of young boys carry one of these bushes about the country,
and visit houses along the road, soliciting coin or eatables. At each
house, they come to, the repeat a verse or two of a ‘song’
which commences:-
The wren,
the wren, the king of all birds,
St. Stephen's Day was caught in the furze;
Though his body is small, his family is great,
So, if you please, your honour, give us a treat.
On Christmas
Day I turned a spit;
I burned my finger: I feel it yet.
Up with the kettle, and down with the pan;
Give me some money to bury the wren.”
The song
varies in different localities, but all versions appear disjointed,
and in no way refer to St. Stephen’s Day, nor to the object of
killing the wren.
In some
cases, the wren-boys carry round little toy birds on a decorated bier,
and they themselves have ribbons and coloured pieces of cloth pinned
to their clothes.
If they
receive no welcome at a house and are told to “be of out of that,”
there is the danger of their burying one of the wrens opposite the hall-door,
through which no luck would then enter for a twelvemonth. Eventually,
at the end of the day, each wren is buried with a penny.
The origin
of this custom is very doubtful, and as a rule, the old people cannot
account for it except that they carried round the wren when they were
‘gossoons’ (young lads). One theory is that when the Danes
were in Ireland, the Irish on a certain occasion had planned a night
attack on their camp; they were silently creeping forward, and had,
unperceived by the Danes’ sentries, reached to almost charging
distance, when a flock of “scooter-wrens,” which had been
disturbed and had flown on in front of them, lit on some drums ear the
sentries, who were asleep, and by their twitters of alarm and their
hopping about, awoke the sentries, who perceived their danger, and so
aroused the camp in time to drive off the Irish with heavy loss.
Other
versions of this tale place the date with the discomfiture of the Irish,
from the same cause, at the time the Jacobites were endeavouring to
withstand William III and his Orangemen in 1690.
