The song is believed to be about Jane Seymour (c. 1509–37), Henry VIII's third wife - one of only two of his six wives he neither divorced nor beheaded. She gave birth to a son, Edward, who briefly become King, Edward VI of England and Ireland, before his early death in his late teens, when his older sisters, Mary and then Elizabeth, took over. There is no historical evidence for any Caesarian section being carried out on Jane during her labour and Jane was well enough to receive visitors after Edward's birth. However, she fell ill within a week and died 12 days later.
Helen Grehan sang a beautiful version the other night, to a different tune than that usually heard. Daithí Sproule composed a tune for it in the early 70s and this is the version the Bothy Band and Mícheál Ó Domhnaill recorded on their Afterhours album.This is also the version in the new Coen brothers' film: Inside Llewyn Davis, although that film is about a folk singer in Greenwich Village in 1961, before the tune was composed.
The words to the ballad are (Bothy Band
version):
Queen Jane lay in labor full nine days or more
'Til her women grew so tired, they could no longer there
They could no longer there
"Good women, good women, good women as ye be
Will you open my right side and find my baby?
And find my baby"
"Oh no," cried the women, "That's a thing never can be
We will send for King Henry and hear what he may say
And hear what he may say"
King Henry was sent for, King Henry did come
Saying, "What do ail you, my lady? Your eyes, they look so dim
Your eyes, they look so dim"
"King Henry, King Henry, will you do one thing for me?
That's to open my right side and find my baby
And find my baby"
"Oh no," cried King Henry, "That's a thing I'll never do
If I lose the flower of England, I shall lose the branch too
I shall lose the branch too"
There was fiddling, aye, and dancing on the day the babe was born
But poor Queen Jane beloved lay cold as the stone
Lay cold as the stone
Queen Jane lay in labor full nine days or more
'Til her women grew so tired, they could no longer there
They could no longer there
"Good women, good women, good women as ye be
Will you open my right side and find my baby?
And find my baby"
"Oh no," cried the women, "That's a thing never can be
We will send for King Henry and hear what he may say
And hear what he may say"
King Henry was sent for, King Henry did come
Saying, "What do ail you, my lady? Your eyes, they look so dim
Your eyes, they look so dim"
"King Henry, King Henry, will you do one thing for me?
That's to open my right side and find my baby
And find my baby"
"Oh no," cried King Henry, "That's a thing I'll never do
If I lose the flower of England, I shall lose the branch too
I shall lose the branch too"
There was fiddling, aye, and dancing on the day the babe was born
But poor Queen Jane beloved lay cold as the stone
Lay cold as the stone
