THE FRIAR IN THE WELL
The Text is taken from Buchan’s MSS., the Scots version being rather more condensed than the corresponding English broadside. There is a reference to this ballad in Munday’s Downfall of Robert, Earl of Huntington (1598); but earlier still, Skelton hints at it in Colyn Cloute.
The Story can be paralleled in French, Danish, and Persian ballads and tales, but is simple enough to have been invented by almost any people. Compare also the story of The Wright’s Chaste Wife by Adam of Cobsam, E.E.T.S., 1865, ed. F. J. Furnivall.