AN: I think I've been reading too many footnoted "official introductions" and Very Old Books. This is a rather scholarly paper, in which I have presented all (well, almost all) my speculations on the Northern Giants, couched them in pretty language, and committed myself to absolutely none of them. :-) There are footnotes at the bottom. Some of them will help this make sense, some are intended to make you laugh. Do read them, please.

The inspiration for this came from Lewis's "Narnian Suite" on pp 6 and 7 of his Poems, which simply begged to be written into a story. I thought about a series of vignettes-all the times the song was sung throughout history, but the aforementioned Very Old Books were working in my brain, and this was the result. Please let me know what you think!

Dedicated to WillowDryad, for all her support and encouragement when I was depressed about my writing.

ETA 12-5-11: I showed this introduction to my dad. He smiled, chuckled, and then said, "You used 'elucidation' wrongly," and I said, "Oh. Goodness, I did." Comes from having an editor for a father. :-) Duly noted, Dad, and corrected to "enlightenment." Because even I don't know how to elucidate scholars.

Disclaimer: The author has no pretensions of being, nor does he strive to appear as, the official court chronicler, but has written this humble paper for the enlightenment of fellow scholars of Narnian history and music.

"The children felt, 'This is really Narnia at last.' Even Tirian's heart grew lighter as he walked ahead of them, humming an old Narnian marching song which had the refrain:
'Ho, rumble, rumble, rumble,
Rumble drum belaboured.'"
C. S. Lewis, The Last Battle

The original title of this rousing march (1) has been lost. It appears in the earliest surviving copies under the title, "March for Drum, Trumpet, and Twenty-one Giants," and is generally referred to as the "old Narnian marching song," and is known for being the song sung by King Tirian in the Last Days as the King, along with Lord Eustace Dawntreader, Lady Jill of the Signs, Poggin the Loyal Dwarf, Puzzle the Donkey, and Jewel the Unicorn were marching for Cair Paravel with hope of meeting reinforcements under Roonwit the Centaur. (This was in the lull before the last battle, before Farsight the Eagle brought the word that Paravel had fallen to the Calormenes.)

It is not known precisely how old the song is, though it is definitely of Giantish origin, and it is impossible to trace its history without a considerable discussion of the Northern Giants. Scholars believe the song to have been originally penned by the ancient King of the Giant City near Harfang, sometimes called the City Ruinous, or by a musician in that king's court. This king is sometimes identified with Father Time, who is known to have once been a great king, though any dating for the reigns of either the Giantish King or of Father Time is, of course, purely speculative. It is thought to have been a very popular song among the Giants of Ettinsmoor in the days of Peter the Magnificent and his fellow sovereigns.

In those days, of course, Ettinsmoor was rather more populous, for after the end of the Winter, many Giants of the Far North migrated southward in search of greener hunting grounds and choicier territories. We may be glad that the ancient supporters of the dread Witch had little liking for Marsh-Wiggle, or the marshes would likely have been entirely depopulated before King Peter's army could march north. It is unknown to this scholar whether the Giant Bridge on the northern border of Ettinsmoor, from which the Giant Road runs northward, date from the postwintric period or earlier. Both were presumeably built to facilitate communication between the Giant population in Ettinsmoor and that farther north at Harfang Castle and the City Ruinous, but exact motives cannot be ascribed without a more precise understanding of Giantish history (2).

In the absence of fuller records, the movement of this song into Narnia is contested. Some say it as brought back by the High King Peter after his last, conclusive victory against the giants, in which their population was so decimated and the remnant driven so far into the North, beyond the bridge, that they did not recover for hundreds of years (3). Others prefer to think that this particular marching song was already known to the good Narnian Giants by this time. Certainly, the idea that the six giants in the Battle of Anvard (which was fought in the fourteenth year of Peter the Magnificent, the same year as his decisive victory against the Giants) may have sung the first lines: "With stumping stride in pomp and pride / We come to thump and floor ye," as they donned their war boots and marched into battle, is appealing. We await discovery of more complete sources to adopt a particular view.

After the end of the Golden Age, the knowledge of the song faded away among the Narnians and was lost entirely with Caspian the Conqueror and the Telmarine Invasion of 1998. It was preserved only among the Giants of the North and by the four Pevensie Sovereigns in their strange world. In 2303, the four Sovereigns returned, and the High King led the Old Narnians in the War of Deliverance. Some of the Beasts claim to remember the High King whistling a stanza as he armed himself for the trial by combat with Miraz the Usurper, and it is safe to assume that the Narnian army heard the song during Caspian X's 2304 Northern campaign against the Giants, who by this time had wholly abandoned their ancient city in favor of more fertile southern lands. The Chronicler records King Caspian as saying that he had "[given] those troublesome giants on the frontier such a good beating . . . that they pay us tribute now." This tribute likely came mainly from the Giants of Western Ettinsmoor, which are thought to have been rather more intelligent than those of Eastern Ettinsmoor, but the only surviving accounts of travel in the moors unfortunately say nothing on this matter.

In the Fifth Age of Narnian History (4), after the War of Deliverance, there are few recorded battles. The song survived mainly as a Narnian marching song, popular among the good Narnian giants and living on at court as a hunting song and as one of the traditional chants revived by Caspian the Restorer. It is entirely possible that the Lord Eustace and Lady Jill heard it sung by the minstrels on their night at Cair Paravel before setting out on their quest; the records do mention "trumpeters and kettledrums" among the musicians. It is also thought by Mr. N. Clewe that the Giants of Harfang retained use of the theme as a hunting trumpet-call, and that the Lord and Lady likely heard it at Harfang. If this was indeed so, then it would support Mr. Clewe's hypothesis (5) that the Chronicler's inclusion of the song in his account of the Last Days was intended to call to mind not only "all the happy years" of Narnian history, but also to presage the bleaker times ahead by reminding the reader of the precarious hours in and near escape from Harfang and the impending Autumn Feast.

The reader interested in this theory should examine Mr. Clewe's treatise, which also discusses the role of the Dwarfs in the Battle of Stable Hill, which (he asserts) the Chronicler foreshadowed in the marching song sung by the Dwarfs after they rejected Aslan, particularly in its second verse, third and fourth lines: "But a little shrub has prickles, and they'll soon be in a pickle if / A scud of dwarfish archery has crippled all their cavalry."

But on such topics this author will declare no further opinion, but directs his readers to the official Chronicles and the original texts of the two songs as recorded by the Chronicler.

(1) Knowledge of traditional Narnian music has been so far forgotten that few or none of my readers may indeed know this song, and in that case, a reproduction of the lyrics, to which reference may be made, will not be unacceptable. They are recorded by the Chronicler as follows, and may be found on page seven of his Poems:

With stumping stride in pomp and pride
We come to thump and floor ye;
We'll bump your lumpish heads to-day
And tramp your ramparts into clay,
And as we stamp and romp and play
Our trump'll blow before us—
Oh tramp it, tramp it, tramp it, trumpet
Trumpet blow before us!

We'll grind and break and bind and take
And plunder ye and pound ye!
With trundled rocks and bludgeon blow,
You dunderheads, we'll dint ye so
You'll blunder and run blind, as though
By thunder stunned around us—
By thunder, thunder, thunder, thunder
Thunder stunned around us!

Ho! tremble town and tumble down
And crumble shield and sabre!
Your kings will mumble and look pale,
Your horses stumble or turn tail,
Your skimble-scamble counsels fail,
So rumble drum belaboured—
Ho, rumble, rumble, rumble, rumble
Rumble drum belaboured!

(2) The lack of the (reported to be brilliant) lost treatise, The Rise and Fall of the Northern Giants, written by Lord Digory of the Apple, is felt keenly by all scholars of history. The author has searched all the libraries in vain, and would welcome correspondence from any in possession of extant copies or fragments of any of the Lord Digory's works.

(3) There is understood to have been a detailed discussion of the Witch of Underland's purported role in the Giantish revival which led to Caspian X's 2304 campaign in Appendix B of the Lord Digory's treatise.

(4) According to the divisions, traditionally ascribed to Lord Digory, whereby Narnian history is divided into the First Age (under Frank's line), the Winter, the Golden Age, the Third Age (rulers unknown, some records include Swanwhite), the Fourth Age or Age of the Telmarines, and the Fifth Age (in which Narnia remained under the Caspiad dynasty, but with the restoration of the Old Order).

(5) Of which a brief summary follows; see "The Hidden Meanings of Songs in the Last Chronicle," by N. Clewe for fuller treatment.