As an instrumental and session tune there has been much additional variation since 1995 -7 see Fooch 1

Sung as a duet by Brenda Wootton and Ben Luxon (Archive footage courtesy of Sue Ellery Hill and Ben Luxon).

Delyow_Sevi ;  pdf score plus original spelling, translation and notes

The story of “Delyow Sevi” is a strange one. It is the one complete folk song that has survived in the Cornish language and yet was completely overlooked in Ralph Dunstan’s 1929 Cornish Song Book. It was given to the Cornish language scholar, Thomas Tonkin in 1698 by Edward Chirgwin. From Tonkin’s notes it was evidently sung to him, but the music was not recorded. The lyrics survive in manuscript form in both Tonkin’s manuscripts held by the Royal Institution of Cornwall and the manuscripts of William Gwavas held by the British Museum. The lyrics were published by William Pryce in his Archaeologia Cornu-Britannica in 1790 and also by Edward Jones in his Musical and Poetical Relicks of the Welsh Bards in 1794, albeit with some of the more robust verses omitted!

The theme is one that is repeated throughout human folklore and belongs to a family of songs of similar ilk. Several such have been collected in Cornwall. One was learned by Rev. Baring Gould from James Olver of Launceston in 1891. This was quickly connected with Edward Jones’ lyrics by Rev. Baring Gould and publisher Harold Boulton who, as Kan Kerniw, set them to Olver’s tune in his Songs of the Four Nations published in 1893. B0th Henry Jenner and Robert Morton Nance would have been familiar with the Tonkin and Gwavas manuscripts. Jenner was even in possession of a copy of Jones’ “Kan Kerniw” so had a less suggestive version to use if his sensitivities were offended by the original. Nance did eventually provide a study of “Delyow Sevi” in the Old Cornwall Journal of 1947 but still failed to set the lyrics to music.

It was left to Cornish composer Inglis Gundry to bring “Delyow Sevi” to a wider audience when he published it in his folk song collection Canow Kernow in 1960. Cornish singer Brenda Wootton drew it in to her repertoire of songs in Cornish and and included it in her 1975 album “Starry Gazy Pie”. It has since found its way into the repertoire of most Cornish folk musicians.

Brenda Wootton and Ben Luxon sing Delyow Sevi

Delyow Sevi Time Line

• 1698 Sung to Thomas Tonkin, the Cornish scholar, by Edward Chirgwin who also wrote out the lyrics for him.[i] No tune was named or recorded but it was the practice at the time for folk song and broadsheet lyrics to be sung to well-known and interchangeable tunes. Robert Morton Nance assumed that Chirgwin had translated into Cornish from an English original [ii] but his words differ slightly from surviving English versions of the song. It does have a universal folkloric theme and appears in other Celtic languages. Peter Kennedy argues that this 1698 version may  be the oldest that we have in writing and that the Cornish version is the original.[iii]  If Chirgwin did translate it, then the Cornish tunes used for the English language versions for this song collected by Rev Baring Gould in the late 19^th century would be strong candidates as music for Chirgwin’s original.
• 1790 Published as “A Cornish Song” under Heading “A Collection of Proverbs and Rhymes” in William Pryce’s “Archaeologia Cornu-Britannica.” [iv]
• 1774 Version published as “Kan Kerniw” in Edward Jones, “Musical and Poetical Relicks of the Welsh Bards”.[v]
• 1875 Two verses attributed to Pryce appear as “Old Cornish Song” in Worth’s Westcountry Garland. [vi]
• 1891 Rev S.Baring Gould and Rev H F Shepherd collected song in English and tune from James Olver of Launceston. [vii] Note indicates that Baring Gould  is aware of Cornish version in Pryce’s Dictionary.
• 1893 Rev Sabine Baring Gould recognised the connection between Pryce’s “Cornish Song” and “My Pretty Fair Maid” as transcribed from the singing of James Olver of Launceston circa 1990. It was published with an arrangement by Arthur Somerville in Boulton’s “Songs of the Four Nations”.[viii]
• 1929 Surprisingly it was not included in Ralph Dunstan’s “Lyver Canow Kernewek – Cornish Songbook” which was a seminal work for the Cornish cultural revival. Both Henry Jenner and Robert Morton Nance were aware of the song.[ix]
• 1932 Under the title “Pray whither so Trippingly?” Ralph Dunstan sets the two verses quoted in Worth’s West Country Garland” to a different tune but does not give source.
• 1947 Robert Morton Nance publishes a short study of Delyow Sevi entitled “Edwin Chirgwin’s Cornish Song”, in Old Cornwall, Vol 4, no6, pp.210-213.[x]
• 1966 Inglis Gundry includes Delywo Sevi with Chirgwin’s original spelling as a Cornish version of “Where are you going?” in Canow Kernow.[xi]
• 1974 Included in Brenda Wootton’s “Pamplemousse” Album with Rob Bartlett.  Also included in subsequent albums and compilations: Starry Gazey pie (1975); Way down to Lamorna (1984): The Voice of Cornwall (1996): Brenda Yn Kernewek (2021).
• 1975 Peter Kennedy published a version entitled Pe lea era why moaz, Moes fettow teag. In his Folk songs of Britain and Ireland ibid.
• 1978 Delyow Sevi, sung by Kemysk of Fal Folk Club winning entry for Celtic Traditional singing competition at Pan Celtic festival held in Killarney, Ireland.
• 1983 Brenda Wootton and Ben Luxon sing Delyow Sevi as a duet – archive footage used for video with Cornish subtitles courtesy of Ben Luxon and Sue Ellery Hill (Brenda’s daughter) as part of Kenewgh! Project 2019. [xii]
• 1997 Tune used as an instrumental and subsequently adapted as a dance tune by Dalla to become popular Cornsh session tune in 21st Century. Pete Berryman included Delyow Sevi as an instrumental in his album, “The Ghosts of May” 2010.
• 2019 Included in Federation of Old Cornwall Society project “Kenewgh! Sing!” Print Publication / Website / Youtube.

[i] Tonkin MSS Royal Institution of Cornwall; p135;  Gwavas MSS, British Museum

[ii] Old Cornwall 1947, vol 4, no 6 page 210 -213

[iii] Peter Kennedy, Folksongs of Britain and Ireland. (New York: Schirmer Books, 1975)

[iv] William Pryce. Archaeologia Cornu-Britannica (Sherborne, 1790) p. 245.

[v] Edward Jones, Musical and Poetical Relicks of the Welsh Bards (London, printed for the Author, 2nd edition 1794) p. 69.

[vi] Richard N Worth. The West Country Garland: Selected from the Writings of the Poets of Devon and Cornwall. (London Houlston & sons, 1875) p.87.

[vii] Baring Gould Personal Copy Manuscript Wren Trust Okehampton / Devon Archive Plymouth.

[viii] Henry Boulton, Songs of the Four Nations, (London, J.B. Cramer & Co.,1893) p. 58 et seq.

[ix] Merv Davey “Lyver Canow Kernewek / The Cornish Songbook – An Ideological Battleground?”: Paper presented at the Kesareth Ilow Kernow / Cornish Music Symposium 5th November 2017 Hotel Bristol Newquay. https://cornishnationalmusicarchive.co.uk/content/lyver-canow-kernewek-the-cornish-songbook-an-ideological-battleground/

[x] Robert Morton Nance “Edwin Chirgwin’s Cornish Song”, Old Cornwall,  Vol 4, no6, pp.210-213.

[xi] Inglis Gundry, Canow Kernow, (St Ives, Fed Old Cornwall Societies & Soundpost Publications, 1966 ), p.28.

[xii] Merv Davey, Ed. Kenewgh! Sing!, (St Agnes, Federations of Old Cornwall Societies, 2019).