Votian and ingrian folk songs

Songs

Lennä, lennä, leppälintu

(Fly, Fly, Ladybird)

Naťu Lukina (archive recording)

Mari Kalkun

Download .mp3 file

In Votian

Lennä, lennä, leppälintu,
oomen tuõb sõta,
ai-voi-voi-voi, voi-voi-voi-voi,
oomen tuõb sõta.

Sinuu pää va leikataa,
minuu pää va odd´õtaa,

sinu pää va leikataa,
peenträ välli peitetää,

alõtsõlla katõtaa
ja liivaa päällee mätetää.

Taitaa, taitaa talvi tulõb,
jarvõõ rannad jääzä,

minuu kalliz isub rihenneez,
karvahattu pääzä.

Karalina tšihutti kofia,
kuttsõ minnua joomaa.

Samavara tšihub,
kultõzõd tšažgad lavvall.

In English

Fly, fly, ladybird,
Tomorrow will be war.


Your head will be chopped off,
My head will be saved,

Your head will be cut off,
Hidden between flower beds,

Covered with a glove,
And sunk in the sand.

May be, may be winter will come,
The lakeshores are frozen,

My darling is sitting in the hallway,
Wearing a fur hat.

Karolina made coffee,
Asked me to drink.

The samovar is boiling,
Golden cups laid on the table.

The first part of the dance song consists of verses about ladybird, sung to a dance melody. Often this children’s incantation was recited while holding a ladybird on one’s hand. When the ladybird took off, people predicted from the direction that it took where the war would come. In the song here the ladybird verses are added the chastushkas about a freezing lover and a girlfriend preparing coffee. Nat´u Lukina has sung the mockery Mikkel-Kikkel to the same melody.

T M Naťu (Natalia) Lukina, Jõgõperä (Ariste 1986: 24, Paul Ariste, Igor Tõnurist 1971, RKM, Mgn II 2330 b).

T Olga Ivanova, Mati (Ariste 1960: 24–25).

A Naťu Lukina (Paul Ariste, Igor Tõnurist 1971, RKM, Mgn II 2330 b).

Supporters

Estonian Ministry of Education and Research

Kindred Peoples' Programme IV; IUT 22-4

Tartumaa Central Folklore Association

The Paul Ariste Centre for Indigenous Finno-Ugric Peoples of the University of Tartu

Publishers

MTÜ Rahvalauluselts Hellero, Estonian Folklore Archives of the Estonian Literary Museum, 2015

ISBN 978-9949-544-56-1 (html)

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