Lady Isabel and the Elf Knight

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Lady Isabel and the Elf Knight (Roud [21], Child 4) is the English representative of a very large class of European ballads, most frequently known under the title Halewyn (or some variant). The general plot goes as follows:

A Elf-Knight blows a magic horn (or, in European variants, sings a magic song), causing a lady (sometimes described as a king's daughter) to profess love to him.

If I had yon horn that I hear blawing,

And you elf-knight to sleep in my bosom.

The elf carries her off to a deep wood, where he tells her that he has killed seven (eleven, some large number) other women and plans to do the same to her (in many European versions it is made explicit that he proposes to "dishonor" her as well).

The lady (Isobel, Isabel, Janet) offers to de-louse the knight, or tells him to "lay your head upon my knee", to which he agrees (often on the condition that should he fall asleep, she shall not harm him while he sleeps). She sings a magic song:

Wi a sma charm she lulld him fast asleep

While he sleeps, she ties him up, then wakes the elf and beheads him:

If seven king's-daughters here ye hae slain,

Lye ye here, a husband to them a

Lady Isabel and the Elf Knight is unusual in the English ballad tradition in that the lady saves herself rather than depending on her father, brothers, or fiancee to defend her. A related ballad, Hind Etin (Child Ballad #41), also begins with abduction and rape by an elf, but ends with the pair falling in love and living happily together.

External links

[Child Ballad #4: 'Lady Isabel and the Elf Knight] The 6 versions described by Child

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