The Twa Corbies by Anonymous

"The Twa Corbies" ("The Two Crows") is an old and anonymous poem, anonymous in the truest sense of the word, meaning that its author was not trying to hide his or her identity. Instead, the author's name was never recorded and will simply never be known. It seems likely to me that, being a traditional ballad, "The Twa Corbies" is not in its present form the work of just one person but the result of being passed on from one to another. Call it a case of transcription error except that no one knows what was the best version of the poem. Maybe we have the best version after all.

From the Wikipedia article "The Three Ravens":

Written in the Scots language, there is no record of how early "The Twa Corbies" [was] first performed. [Francis James] Child (I, 253) quotes [sic] a letter from Charles Kirkpatrick Sharpe to Walter Scott (August 8, 1802): "The song of 'The Twa Corbies' was given to me by Miss Erskine of Alva (now Mrs Kerr), who, I think, said that she had written it down from the recitation of an old woman at Alva." [W]hich [evidence] indicates it was already known in Scotland at that date. It was first published in Walter Scott's Minstrelsy in 1812.

(Boldface added.)

"The Twa Corbies" was reprinted a century later in Ballads Weird and Wonderful (1912), illustrated by Vernon Hill (1887-1972). Maybe that was the source for its reprinting in Weird Tales in February 1926.

Below is an illustration for "The Twa Corbies," made by Arthur Rackham (1867-1939). Below that is a reproduction of the original page from the February 1926 issue of Weird Tales.

It's a grim and bitter and ironic poem. It appears to have been based on an earlier ballad, "The Three Ravens," from 1611 or before.

Original text copyright 2022, 2023 Terence E. Hanley