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Top pop from seventeenth-century England. Broadside ballads were single-sheet songs that sold for a penny a piece. This website concentrates on over 100 resoundingly successful examples that you can investigate through recordings, images and a wealth of other materials. Whether you are interested in music, art, love, gender, tragedy, politics, family life, crime, history, humour or death, you will find something to engage you here. See also User’s Guide.

Clark, John   Coles (Aka Coules), Francis   Disability - Physical   British Library  

Showing 1 to 7 of 7

13 The rarest Ballad that ever was seen,/ Of the Blind beggers daughter of Bednall-green [Euing 293]
15 The Lamentable and Tragicall History of Titus An-/dronicus [Folger L252a]
19 A Pleasant Ballad of Tobias, wherein is shewed/ what wonderful things chanced to him in his Youth [Euing 270]
67 A new Ditty, shewing the wonderfull Miracles of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ [Pepys 1.58]
85 A new Ballad, intituled, The stout Cripple of Cornwal [Euing 242]
86 A most excellent Ballad, of an old man and his wife, who in great want and misery sought to/ Children for succour, by whom they were disdained [Pepys 1.43]
92 An Excellent Ballad of the Mercers son of Midhurst, and/ the Clothiers daughter of Guilford [Euing 91 and 12]

Top Fives

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Authors

  • Anonymous  (7)

Publishers

  •   Clark, John  (7)
  •   Coles (aka Coules), Fra...  (7)
  • Gosson, Henry  (7)
  • Grismond, John  (7)
  • Passinger, Thomas  (7)

Topics

  •   Disability - physical  (7)
  • Economy - money  (5)
  • Family - children/paren...  (5)
  • Places - travel/transpo...  (5)
  • Bodies - health/sicknes...  (4)

Instruments

  • Cittern  (3)
  • Fiddle  (2)
  • Bassoon  (1)
  • Drum  (1)
  • Guitar  (1)

Performers

  • Lewin, Giles  (3)
  • Vitale, Steno  (3)
  • Banks, Steve  (1)
  • Couper, Victoria  (1)
  • Ellis, Vivien  (1)

Tunes

  • The blind beggar  (2)
  • Dainty come thou to me  (1)
  • Fortune my foe  (1)
  • Priscilla  (1)
  • Triumph and joy  (1)

Woodcuts

  • Blind beggar with dog a...  (1)
  • Countryman with staff  (1)
  • Jesus with kneeling wom...  (1)
  • Little man on grass  (1)
  • Parents pleading with s...  (1)

Holding Libraries

  •   British Library  (7)
  • No known copy  (7)
  • Pepys Library, Magdalen...  (7)
  • Bodleian Library, Oxfor...  (6)
  • University of Glasgow  (5)

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