Note 596 — Chapter V · THE DIFFERENCING ELEMENTS OF COMMUNAL POETRY (continued 2)

As the clan or horde had its song of triumph, and this is echoed and prolonged in “national” songs like the Marseillaise, or, better, the Ça ira, so the clan grief can expand into a national lament. Something of this sort is found in that wail over the downfall of their power sung by the Moors in Spain and so potent to stir the heart that it was forbidden by government; its refrain, Woe is me, Alhama, has all the iterated passion of grief that one finds in the primitive vocero. Then there is the song or psalm of the captives in Babylon,—and the list could be extended indefinitely.