Сэр Джон Бэксворд [Sir John Backsword] [English translation]

Sir John Backsword 1 was to find for battle

Ten hundred Welsh longbowmen 2

Sir John Backsword was fat as a cat

His steed was horseshoeing spared

Sir John Backsword enjoyed Scottish ale3

By night he got tired to death

Under spruce he fell as if into bed

And slept until Easter Day

Islay , Islay, as if into bed

And slept until Easter Day

So come pour it out once more in a row

Since morn, I’m down with hang o’er... 4

King Edward’s 5been waiting a fortnight until

Backsword’s party arrives

Ten thousand spears and as many steeds

Don’t drink, don’t eat or don’t drowse

King Edward has had an eighth message man

Hanged on a tree in woods

Yet Backsword’s away, the hangman’s grim looks

Are driving the troops into gloom

Islay, Islay, the hangman’s grim looks

Are driving the troops into gloom

So come pour it out once more in a row

Since morn, I’m down with hang o’er.....

King Edward pronounced his verdict of brief

Dabbing his sweat, he spoke:

“Sir John Backsword’s a traitor and thief

The scaffold’s meant for this rogue”6

Sir John’s in Wales asleep on the grass

His helmet is by his side

And he never suspects that his head badly asks

Asks for a headsman’s strike

Islay, Islay, his head badly asks

Ah, asks for a headsman’s strike

So come pour it out once more in a row

Since morn, I’m down with hang o’er....

Lord Chancellor Сromwell’s7 rushing the troops

To glens where sleeps Backsword

The King’s order’s attached tightly next to

The bridle of every horse

Marching are troops, ending’s the year

London has no defence

And the fleet of France came across la Manche8

And took o’er rewarding Kent9

Islay, Islay, came across la Manche

And took o’er rewarding Kent

So come pour it out once more in a row

Since morn, I’m down with hang o’er

Sir John is in Wales asleep in the chains

On spruce, his shoulder’s leant

The troops are at large in Welsh good green lands

Enjoying Sir John Backsword’s ale

Lord Chancellor Сromwell’s London bound with

A bag to his pommel tied

A round big thing that is seamed in it

Is the head of Backsword, ha-ha! 10

Islay, Islay, that is seamed in it

Is the head of Backsword, ha-ha!

So come pour it out once more in a row

Since morn, I’m down with hang o’er....

King Edward is brought to Paris dressed in

A good iron choker on neck11

And all that because his army lacks in

John of Backsword as yet12

And all that because the great king forgot

What an old saying recites 13

That until there’s drinks for English good folk, England will be alive

And until there’s drinks for French good old folk, France will, too, be alive

And until there’s drinks for Irish good folk, Ireland will be alive

And until there’s drinks for folk in Japan, Japan will, too, be alive

But until there’s drinks for Russian good folk, the planet will be alive!

So come pour it out once more in a row

Since morn, I’m down with hang o’er

And once more, once more, once more in a row

I wish I were always hung o’er

And always unsober!

1. No doubt that in this song Sir John Backsword stands for Shakespeare’s most popular character Sir John Falstaff – a collective image of a laidback common Englishman enjoying life far from political turmoil.

Henry IV, Part II, Act 3

Shallow: By the mass, Sir John, when you were a young man, I knew you to be a good backsword man; but, bodykins, good Sir John, until now I knew not of your skill in archery – particularly in drawing a long bow as to the number of arrows in the quiver of Sir John Falstaff the First.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Falstaff 2. The longbow was originally a Welsh mortal weapon which the English put to best use in the Hundred Years' War against France (1337–1453). The longbow became legend after it played a key role in securing the great English victories at Crécy (1346), Poitiers (1356), and Agincourt (1415) 3. The fact that Sir John was in Wales enjoying Scottish ale makes him a symbol of British common people 4. Больной = sick is often a slang for "hung over" Funny but Russians like to get that idea across with the following phrase "Ich bin больной" 5. Though the Hundred Years' War took five generations of kings it was Edward III who launched it after he had come up with claims to the French Crown upon the death of his uncle on the maternal side Charles IV of France and ensured England's greatest victories at the initial stages of the war 6. To raise funds for his ambitious warfare king Edward tried to deprive the House of Commons of their right to endorse any new taxation which he hoped to introduce directly, without their consent. Besides, he limited the peasant labour movement in the country which looked like serfdom. It made the war highly unpopular among common people and led to peasants' uprisings 7. Lord Protector Oliver Cromwell usurped power and dissolved Parliament. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oliver_Cromwell 8. the English Channel 9. During endless military campaigns British provinces were left defenceless and fell victims to French pirates, which added to grievances of common people 10. Cromwell's bloody policy against Irish, Welsh and Scottish Catholics are now looked on as genocide 11. That's an allegory of England's defeat in the Hundred Years' War after which King Edward's claims to the French Crown were renounced 12. The defeat of the English can be put down to the fact that the war was unpopular with common people while the French united as a nation inspired by Joan of Arc who had called on them to stand up and fight for their national identity 13. In fact, the phrase goes "As long as English (French...) people drink, England will be alive. But it evokes another popular one "-How long are you going to drink?" "- As long as there's drinks!"