Not only are french Christmas carols odd they are of course rip off of English ones, for example the good old ‘The Twelve Days of Christmas’ or ‘Partridge in a Pear Tree’ becomes ‘La foi de la loi’ or ‘The faith of the law!’But the french have tried to disguise the fact that they have stolen the English Christmas Carol by adding a bizarreness to it and that achieve this by adding words about their favourite past time – eating.
So instead of a ‘The Twelve Days of Christmas’ we have ‘La foi de la loi’ or ‘The faith of the law’ which you will have cleverly noticed has noting to do with food – ah these frenchies are clever and there isn’t a Partridge or a Pear tree in sight.
They sing this little song at Christmas in the west of France and as befits a song about food disguised as a song about the law, the french insists that the song is sung “avec solennite,” (with solemnity) this Cat thinks that that is probably not easy when you look at the words to the 11th verse!
So how do we know that the french stole the song when it has been so heavily disguised – well the tune is a dead give away and I suppose you are going to have to take this honest Cat’s word for that but I can also add that the sequence of the song is the same as in English because although the french do so much that is different from the normal world they haven’t yet managed to count differently to the rest of the world much to their annoyance.
So without further ado let’s strike up the band and sing ‘La foi de la loi,”avec solennite’ of course!
On the first day of Christmas my true love gave to me a good stuffing without bones (it doesn’t quite have the ring of a ‘The Twelve Days of Christmas’/’Partridge in a Pear Tree’ does it?)
Now just add the rest below!
Two breasts of veal,
Three joints of beef,
Four pigs’ trotters,
Five legs of mutton,
Six partridges with cabbage,
Seven spitted rabbits,
Eight plates of salad,
Nine dishes for a chapter of canons,
Ten full casks,
Eleven beautiful full-breasted maidens (would the french know what to do with these?)
Twelve musketeers with their swords
I don’t know about you, but it just doesn’t do it for me! I miss the Lords a Leaping and the Five Gold Rings but then maybe i am old fashioned, still if you are very good and need a laugh let me know and I will tell you all about the very weird Scottish version of this great English Carol ‘strange’ is a word that doesn’t come close to describing it – yes the french and the scots have a lot in common.
Great News
Amazon.com have done what they described as an “emergency restock” so that then now have enough copies my best selling book, they like me are surprised and delighted by just how many people have shown the good taste to buy not only a copy of my masterpiece of a book for themselves but also to buy four or five spare copies to give to treasured friends and relations.
So don’t miss out on having my wonderful book delivered well before the noel day order it now.Yes drop everything – what did you think I meant!
Get your copy or better still copies here Amazon.com and of course you can always get a copy of my perfect book from my www – wickedly wonderful website www.thecatsdiary.com where you can also enjoy a lot of other stuff free online games, jokes, and so much more.
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Funnily enough I knew that the french version was older – I just used a little poetic license to help with the joke – I hope it helped and if anyone doesn’t like it usually a rub or two on the back of their legs and some purrs does the trick!
I would like to wish you a very Happy Christmas and hope that you get everything that you wish for and of course thank you for reading my blog and possibly my masterpiece of feline literature – though of course I am too modest to mention the title here – though oddly enough everywhere else that modesty seems to evaporate.
Actually the French version came 1st apparently. Just type 12 days of Christmas in Wikipedia. Saying the lyrics are better in English, I agree.
Merry Xmas