Never Draw Down Celtic Ire

Never Drawn Down Deltic Ire

At a bardic workshop in Albany, someone performed a very nice piece she had written about Boudicca's revolt against the Romans, and someone else gave a beautiful rendition of “Fruit of the Yew.” This and other conversations led to someone to quip, “Don't piss off the Celts,” and I thought a song to that effect would be nice. I happened to remember a song called Never Set the Cat on Fire, and things went downhill from there...

Originally I'd intended to write about several different instances of “Don't piss of the Celts.” For example, the invasion of the Cimbri; Boudicca's revolt; the Norman invasion of Wales; and whatever others I could dig up. But when I actually looked up Never Set the Cat on Fire, I discovered that the title topic only appears in the first verse, and the chorus; the rest of the song is “What Not To Do on a Spaceship.” So the song morphed into the following, about different events that ended badly for one side or the other. As usual, footnotes at the end...

Boudicca was dispossessed Her daughters were defiled. The Romans thought that they could rest, The Iceni they went wild. They burned some cities to the ground, Put eighty thousand Romans down, No never bring on Celtic ire. Chorus And mind your manners, As circumstances may require And never bring on Celtic ire. Chorus Keep all treaties honestly To Visigoths and Vandals. Or else they'll send their cavalry Against your men in sandals As Valens found to his dismay A man on horseback's hard to slay Oh keep all treaties honestly ChorusVikings may burn Paris down, But don't make them swear fealty. For soon they'll take the English crown (those younger sons are sneaky). Then Sicily they soon will take And make the Med a Norman Lake Oh don't make them swear fealty. Chorus Don't invade the Welshman's land He cares not for your vowels. And if you try to take a stand, You'll get naught but some scowls. And though your chain mail has its roles To yardlong arrows it's just holes Oh don't invade the Welshman's land. Chorus Don't abuse a diplomat He's sure to tell his master And if he wears a Mongol hat, You'll face a real disaster. A horde of horsemen in a thrice Will come on by to say "Play nice!" Oh don't abuse a diplomat ChorusDon't recruit those Christian lads For bureaucrats and soldiers For Janissaries can be cads, They'll soon usurp your powers They'll lock you in the harem---wait, I guess that's not too bad a fate, Oh go recruit those Christian lads. Chorus

Footnotes

1. I wrote this verse en route to the Bardic workshop on February 20, 2008, which turned out to be a rather amazing one for reasons discussed elsewhere. The Viking sailed up the Seine and sacked Paris. In exchange for not raiding Paris again, Rollo agreed to the fief of Normandy in 966.
2. The Norman invasion, of course. Technically, William was a bastard, not a younger son, but there are enough Norman younger sons who went off and carved out fiefdoms that the sentence is true enough.
3. This verse was also written en route to the workshop of February 20.

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