Music by Czesław Niemen, arrangement and vocals by Farya Faraji. The history behind this piece is interesting: it's often mistakenly presented as an actual medieval piece of music, but it isn't, it's a modern song written and performed by legendary Polish rock-star Czesław Niemen (February 16, 1939 – January 17, 2004). The lyrics and subject matter however, are medieval, mostly the latter. The literal lyrics heard here are not actually from the Middle-Ages as they are in Modern Polish, but they are a modern Polish translation of a medieval text written in Latin by a Gall Anonim, an unknown writer who was probably a foreigner in Poland (hence the term Gall. meaning Gallus, "from Gaul," which might indicate he was from France). Gallus Anonimus is regarded as the first historian to have described the history of Poland, and he did so in the work "Gesta principum Polonorum," (Deeds of the Princes of the Poles).
This part of the text, that Niemen translated into Modern Polish, deals with the reign of Bolesław III Krzywousty (the Wrymouth), who lived from August 20, 1086 to October 28, 1138. His predecessors had lost much of the territory of the Polish principality, especially those leading to the Baltic Sea. Bolesław, however, managed to reconquer those lands, and consequently, the text praises the current generation of Poles, who claim that they feast on the purest fish from the "ocean," whilst their forefathers made do with polluted fish and deer from the rivers and lakes.
My arrangement is meant to evoke Medieval Poland’s, hence the use of the bagpipe, hurdy-gurdy, the hammered dulcimer and the jaw harp, instruments that were central to Polish music up until the 1800’s.
Original Latin text by Gallus Anonimus:
Pisces salsos et foetentes apportabant alii,
Palpitantes et recentes nunc apportant filii.
Civitates invadebant patres nostri primitus,
Hii procellas non verentur neque maris sonitus,
Agitabant patres nostri cervos, apros, capreas,
Hii venantur monstra maris et opes aequoreas.
Song's lyrics in Modern Polish by Czesław Niemen:
Naszym przodkom wystarczały ryby słone i cuchnące
My po świeże przychodzimy, w oceanie pluskające !
Ojcom naszym wystarczało, jeśli grodów dobywali
A nas burza nie odstrasza, ni szum groźny morskiej fali;
Nasi ojce na jelenia urządzali polowanie -
A my skarby i potwory łowim, skryte w oceanie !
English translation:
Our fathers were pleased with noisome fish,
We hunt fish unsullied, splashing in the ocean,
Our fathers were proud with the forts they conquered,
Us, neither thunder drives away, nor the noise of large waves threaten,
Our fathers, hunting deer they went,
We hunt troves and monsters, hidden in the ocean!
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