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Lyrics

In The Sunny Long ago

7.
Ailean, Ailean


Scotland has never been short of songs of conflict, war, and political activity. Dr John MacInnes taught me this song for our series of Edinburgh Festival recital-lectures on the anniversary of the death of the Jacobite Prince Charles Edward Stuart. Composed around the 1740s (possibly earlier) by an unknown woman, the song is a cry to battle, not only to her husband, Allan, but also to anyone who cares about the fate of their country. 'Morag' is one of several code-names for the prince.

 

Ailein, Ailein, 's fhad an cadal
Tha'n uiseag a' gairm 's an là glasadh
A ghrian ag èiridh air a' leacainn
'S fhad bhuam fhin luchd nam breacan.

Hug o ro hi, hug oireannan
Hug o ro hi, ri ri-i ri hiu
O hithill u hug oireannan.

Ailein duinn, gabh sgoinn 's bi g' eirigh
Tionail do chloinn, is cuimhnich t' fheum orr'
Bidh Alba mhòr fo bhinn nam bèisdean
Mara dion a muinntir fhein i.

A Mhòrag na faicinn t' fhear-ceusaidh
Ga b' ann air cabhsair Dhun Eideann
Tharainn na lainn chaola, gheura,
'S dh' fhagainn fhin e marbh gun èiridh

  

Return to In the Sunny Long Ago

Translation

Allan, Allan, you've slept too long/ The skylark is singing, the day is dawning /The sun is rising on the hillside /And far in front of me are the men in tartan.

Brown-haired Allan, take courage and stir yourself/Gather your clan, remember your need of them/Great Scotland will be under sentence of doom/Unless her own people defend her.

Morag, if I could meet your torturer/Were it on a street in Edinburgh/I myself would draw the keen, slender blade/And I'd leave him lying lifeless