Delkiow Sivy is a Cornishfolk song. A young maiden is on her way to pick strawberry leaves which, so the song alleges, make young girls pretty. She meets a travelling tailor, who seeks to seduce her. "Who will clothe the child?" asks the young man. "Ah, but his father will be a tailor," the maiden concludes. The repeated refrain "dark face and yellow hair" probably alludes to the traditional view of female beauty. The original 'Late' Cornish version of "Delyow Syvy" can be found in both Inglis Gundry's 1966 Canow Kernow: Songs and Dances from Cornwall and in Peter Kennedy's 1997 Folksongs of Britain and Ireland. It has been suggested that the song is a Cornish version of the song "Sweet Nightingale". In her 2011 book Celtic Myth and Religion, Paice MecLeod claims that there are no surviving traditional Cornish songs and that the song was borrowed from England and sung in Cornish. A version appears, however, on the 1975Sentinel Records album Starry-Gazey Pie, by Cornish folk singerBrenda Wootton, with accompaniment by Robert Bartlett. The sleeve notes claim that the song is "the only living remnant" of the Cornish language and that it "has never been translated into English".
Lyrics
Delkiow Sivy Peleah ero why a moaz, moze fettow teag
Gen agoz pedn due ha goz bleaw mellin? Pe ve moaz gena why moze fettow teag Gen agoz pedn due ha goz bleaw mellin? Fatla gwra ve agoz gurra why en doar Gen agoz pedn due ha goz bleaw mellin? Fatla gwra ve agoz dry why gen floh Gen agoz pedn due ha goz bleaw mellin? Pew vedo why gawas rag seera rag goz floh Gen agoz pedn due ha goz bleaw mellin? Pandra vedo why geel rag ledno rag goz floh Gen agoz pedn due ha goz bleaw mellin?
Where are you going, pretty maid, with your white face and your yellow hair? I'll go with you, pretty maid, with your white face and your yellow hair? What if I get youon the ground, pretty maid, with your white face and your yellow hair? What if I get you with child, pretty maid, with your white face and your yellow hair? Who will you get to be the father for your child, pretty maid
with your white face and your yellow hair? What will you do for clothes for your child? with your white face and your yellow hair?
