More Irish Songs and Ballads Trivia Quiz

Answer: The Bold Black and Tan

"I'll send over Greenwood, a much stronger man/And fill up the Green Isle with the Bold Black and Tan."
Formed in 1920, the "Black and Tans" were an auxiliary branch of the Royal Irish Constabulary (RIC). Supposedly sent to Ireland to maintain order, they behaved like Slobodan Milosevic's death squads, shooting unarmed civilians (including children), burning and looting. But they proved no match for the Irish Republican Army's Flying Columns.

Answer: The Rifles of the IRA

"By '21 Britannia's Huns/Were forced to earn their pay/And the Black and Tan like lightning ran/From the rifles of the IRA."
This sprited song mentions many Irish heroes, such as Tom Barry, Sean Treacy, and Dennis Lacey, who fought the Black and Tans in County Cork.

Answer: Tipperary So Far Away

This song tells of the death of Sean Treacy, a hero of the Irish War of Independence, who was gunned down in Dublin on October 14, 1920.

Answer: An Old Maid in the Garrett

Irish women, like women everywhere, are anxious to lure unsuspecting men into the vile prison of matrimony. This humorous song tells the story of a 45-year-old spinster who vows: "If I can't get a man, I'll surely get a parrot."

Answer: The Mountains of Pomeroy

These mountains are in County Tyrone. The song tells the story of a beautiful Irish girl in love with an outlaw. They arrange to elope, but she is drownded before they can run away together. This is an excellent song, but does not seem to have been recorded very frequently.

Answer: Moses Ri-Tooral-I-Ay

This very funny song tells the story about a policeman who arrests a Jew for having a sign in his shop window written in Hebrew. At one time the Irish language was outlawed; although in the U.S. we are used to seeing Irish written in the Roman alphabet, it has its own alphabet and looks nothing like English when written in Gaelic characters.

The song makes fun of policemen who can't tell Hebrew from Gaelic. The policeman is demoted to being a garbage collector!

Answer: The Men Behind the Wire

For many years the British government refused to grant IRA prisoners political status; they were "interned" in horrible conditions behind prison walls festooned with barbed wire, often without being tried or even charged with a crime. This song urges all patriotic Irishmen to support the prisoners, "The Men Behind the Wire."

Answer: The Fields of Athenry

This is a song about the great famine that struck Ireland in the 1840's. The destruction was on a scale equal to that of the Holocaust. In 1845, Ireland had a population of 9 million people; in 1851 the population had declined to 6.5 million, and continued to decline for the next 90 years. Between 1.5 and 2 million people starved to death; millions more were forced to emmigrate, many to the United States.

The Trevelyan mentioned in the song is Charles Edward Trevelyan, the English official in charge of "famine relief." England actually did very little to help the Irish; food exports from Ireland to England continued throughout the famine.

Many people think this is a "traditional" song; it was actaully written by Peter St. John in 1979. Athenry is a village in Co. Galway.

The song is based on a true story.

Answer: The Old Triangle

This song was written by Brendan Behan about the days he was a prisoner in Mountjoy Gaol from 1942 to 1946 for his Republican activities. Behan was a fine writer and something of a character. As he lay on his deathbed in a Dublin hospital in 1964, his supposed last words were addressed to a nun who was attending him: "Ah, bless you sister; may all your sons be bishops."

Answer: Danny Boy

Thought you deserved an easy one. Now for something you may not know. This song isn't Irish at all! It was written by an Englishman, Frederic Edward Weatherly (1848 - 1929), who never once set foot in Ireland. Even the origin of the melody, usually called "A Londonderry Air", is somwhat in doubt.

While it was first recorded in Ireland, technical aspects of the tune have led some scholars to believe it may have originated in the Lowlands of Scotland.

Answer: The Real Old Mountain Dew

Writing this quiz is making me thirsty - time for a drinking song. According to this ditty, the "poteen" will "Cure all ills of the Pagan, Christian or Jew."

Answer: The Cruiscin Lan

"Let the shepard praise his dewy-scented lawn/Ah, but I more wise than they/Spend each happy night and day/With my darling little cruiscin lan."
"Cruisgean" is a Gaelic word meaning jug; "lan" means "full." A "cruiscin" (pronounced crush-keen)is a little jug, so a "cruiscin lan" is a "little full jug." One the best of all drinking songs. Like many songs translated from Irish, the verses are in English, but the chorus is in Gaelic.

Answer: The Galway Races

This spirited song is so popular that it has been recorded by groups as diverse as the Chieftains, the Clancy Brothers, and the Pogues.

Answer: Bold Robert Emmet

Robert Emmet, like so many of Ireland's great patriots, was a Protestant from a well-to-do family. He was a founder of the United Irishmen, and led a rising against the English in 1803 that failed. He was tried, found guilty, and sentenced to death.

At his trial he made his famous "Speech From the Dock" that concluded with the words: "When my country takes her place among the nations of the Earth, then, and not till then, let my epitaph be written." He was publically beheaded on September 20, 1803 at the age of 25.

Answer: Garryowen

This rollicking tune is named for a district of Limerick City, where evidently a lot of rowdy behavior took place. It is most famous as the marching song of the 7th Calvary. Whenever a movie or television program shows Custer getting his at the Little Big Horn, that lively music you hear in the background is likely to be "Garryowen."

Answer: The Bonny Bunch of Roses

This is an interesting song about Napoleon. The "Bonny Bunch of Roses" is the United Kingdom of England, Scotland, and Ireland. There are many versions of this song.

Answer: Easy and Slow

"And what's it to any man, whether or no/Whether I'm easy or whether I'm slow/As she lifted her petticoats, easy and slow/And I rolled up my sleeve for to buckle her shoe."
This lovely song was written by the great Irish playwright, Sean O'Casey.

Answer: A Nation Once Again

One of many songs written by Thomas Davis (1814-1845), a founder of the "Nation" magazine and the "Young Ireland" movement. He died of an attack of scarlet fever at the age of 30.
"And then I prayed I yet might see/Our fetters rent in twain/And Ireland long a province be/ A Nation once again!"

Answer: The Wind That Shakes the Barley

This is a truly beautiful, sad song written by Robert Dwyer Joyce (1830-1883). He was a gifted scholar and poet, and translated many works form Gaelic into English. This is a song of the Rebellion of 1798; it tells the story of a young man whose sweetheart is killed by a stray bullet and how he seeks revenge.

There is a much inferior version set to a livelier tune called "The Wind That Shakes the Corn."

Answer: My Wild Irish Rose

I thought this would be easy, but evidently everyone knows the chorus and few know the verses. Unlike "Danny Boy", this one was written by an Irishman - or at least an Irish-American. Chauncy Olcott (1860 - 1932), who also co-wrote "When Irish Eyes Are Smiling."

Answer: The Wild Rover

A very popular pub song. "It's no, nay, never/No, nay, never no more/Will I play the Wild Rover/No, never no more!"

Answer: Croppies Lie Down

"We'll fight for our country, our King and his crown/And make all the traitors and croppies lie down." Another song from the Rebellion of 1798 - but this one is from the Loyalist side. "Croppies" was the term Tories used to describe the United Irishmen, who wore their hair short.

This song boasts that they will make them "lie down" on the battlefield. It may be blasphemous to admit it, but many of the Loyalist songs are very good.

Answer: The Orange and the Green

A very funny song about the results of a "mixed marriage."
"I was christened David Anthony, but still inspite of that/My father called me Billy and my mother called me Pat."

Answer: The Bold Tenant Farmer

When Ireland was under English rule, most farmers did not own their land; they rented their small farms from "absentee landlords" at very high rates. In 1879 the National Land League was formed to help the small farmers stand up to the outrageous demands the large landowners who were exploiting them.

This song (which is seldom sung with all the verses included) details a dispute between the landlord's son and a farmer's wife.

Answer: The Castle of Dromore

This lovely lullaby is a very, very old song; I believe I read soewhere that it is thought to date back to the 9th century. Sometimes said to be Dromore Castle is near Kenmare, Co. Kerry, but that castle is not nearly old enough to have inspired this song.

There are several other castles by that name in Ireland. "Blackwater" is the Blackwater River; there is a river by that name in Kerry which flows near Dromore Castle, but, again, there are other rivers of that name elsewhere in Ireland. So perhaps we'll never know its true origin. This is the the second verse; sometimes I have heard the first two lines transposed, but the song doesn't seem to sound right if they are. I've never found the original Gaelic lyrics, so I don't know which is correct. With all traditional songs, one will find many variations.