My informant’s Irish ancestry has a belief about women’s purses. It is seen as bad luck for a woman to leave her purse on the ground, even for a second. Many believe that setting one’s purse on the ground will cause all the money in that purse to “run away”, leaving the owner with nothing. According to my informant, taking care of one’s money is very important to the Irish people, and to set it down, leaving it out of one’s attention and control, is seen as practically throwing money away for the very reason that without a hold on one’s purse, it could easily get lost, or worse be stolen by someone taking advantage of one’s neglectfulness. It seems like putting one’s purse down is about as much bad luck as being ignorant is.
Tag Archives: Irish
Folk Song
“Maresy-dotes andoesy-dotes an liddleambsy-divie, A kiddleedivydoo, woodnchoo?”
Repeat that, with on “Oh” between, and that’s the first verse. Verse two is:
“Oh, it may seem queer, or funny to your ear, a little bit dappled or
jivey, but sing ‘Mares eat oats, and does eat oats, and little lambs eat ivy.'”
This is a happy song that Gabi learned from her grandmother, whom she described as “born and raised working-class Rhode Island Irish.” Research revealed that this is a novelty song that has been around at least since 1943 when the first recording of it was released. Since then, it’s been recorded by several other artists and found success on the pop charts several times, most recently in 1967. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mairzy_Doats]
Annotation: Scott Weiland of Stone Temple Pilots and Velvet Revolver recorded a version of this song that incorporated some of his own lyrics. It can be heard here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IVF0xjRpkIg and found on promotional copies of the album “12 Bar Blues.”