Native American Balladry (Volume I) ; A Descriptive Study and a Bibliographical Syllabus

This is a hardback book. The book is in Very Good+ condition and was likely issued without a dust jacket. The book is in mostly clean, bright condition . There is some light bumping and rubbing to the spine ends of the book covers and corners. The text pages are clean and bright. Just a note, the book is about American Balladry as a whole, NOT about Native-American ballads. "George Malcolm Laws (January 4, 1919 — August 1, 1994) was a scholar of traditional British and American folk song. [1][2]He was best known for his collection of traditional ballads "American Balladry from British Broadsides", published in 1957 by the American Folklore Society. He graduated from the University of Pennsylvania, and joined the English Department Faculty there in 1942. He gives his name to a system of coding ballads; one letter of the alphabet, followed by 2 numbers. For example, "Laws A01" is "Brave Wolfe" also known as "Bold Wolfe" or "The Battle of Quebec". There is no immediately obvious logic, but a broad pattern appears: the letter A is for military songs, the letter D is for nautical songs, the letter F is for murder, and so on. The system is limited to 26 x 99 = 2576 distinct labels, and so tends to bring together similar songs. It is a useful adjunct to Child numbers. He includes many songs that Child excluded, and of course, new ones that were found after Child died. " (from Wikipedia); 298p. pages; Pictured 6/13/26. …