Primary Sources
C1 Lost the Only Son C1.13: 31
K1 Cumha an aona Mhichd / Lament for the Only Son K1.34: 83
D2 Cumhadh ’n aon Mhic / The Only Son’s Lament D2.22: 109
JK Cumha an aon Mhich JK.37: 98
Notes on Gaelic Titles
Cumha an Aona Mhic Lost the Only Son C1; Cumhadh ’n aon Mhic / The Only Son’s Lament D1; Cumha an aona Mhichd / Lament for the only Son K1; Cumha an aon Mhich JK. Lament for the only son. There is no tradition to explain the name, but the form in C1, with non-English word order, may suggest a direct translation, perhaps from a song title such as *Call an aonamhich, ‘the loss of the only son’. The MacKay (K1, JK) spellings have preaspirated terminal c, and Angus’s (K1) form is even more precise, with -chd presumably standing for a pronunciation ‘-chk’, as in pìobaireachd. John MacInnes prefers aonamhich as one word though the second a is epenthetic.
Archive Recording
Other Material
William Donaldson’s Set Tunes Notes (2004)