What is the explanation for the inconsistencies in The Bonny Swans?
Many Old Ways members have commented on, and wondered about the reasons behind, the inconsistencies present in the song The Bonny Swans (from the mask and mirror), specifically why the father in the song starts out as a farmer and ends up as a king, and why there are three daughters at the beginning of song and only two referred to at the end. Loreena spoke to this point during a radio interview on the Seattle program New Sounds. She says that this is “a reflection of the Celt’s flight of fancy where it doesn’t make a lot of sense” and adds “it’s the way the Celts didn’t really make a distinction between this world and the next and their own flight of imagination took reign.
