Vengas en bonhora

Jerusalem National Sound Archives placement: Y5434/1
Referenced and notated in: Romancero Sefardi de Oriente, pg. 74, Editorial Alpuerto, 2010 Susana Weich-Shahak.

Blancaflor and Filomena [The seducer of her sister-in-law] (6) (F 1) According to Ovideo, Progne asks her husband Itys to bring her her sister Filomela. Itys brings her but demands love for her and when Filomela rejects him, he cuts out her tongue and locks her up. Our version begins in media res, with the dialogue between the mother-in-law and her son-in-law who comes to take his sister-in-law Felismena (Filomena) for the birth of his wife Blancaflor. It is one of the romances noted by Díaz-Plaja (1934: No. 10). It is a romance distributed throughout Spain, as evidenced by its documentation in Cáceres by Schindler in 1928 (No. 249).

Text:
- Vengás en bonhora, mi yerno,   vengas en bonhora, mi rey,
¿dónde dejates a mi hija,   en civdades ajenas?
- La dejí preñada en ocho,   vin’ a tomalda a ella,
si ella no puede venir,   demeldá a Filismena.
- A Filismena vo la do como   una ‘rmana vuestra. –
Ya se viste y ya se arma, ya se va para onde la hermana.
Siete civdades camina,  siete linguas se ambezó
a la lengua de al cabo  del caballo abajo la echó.
Con querer y non querer,  una noche durmió con él.
Malhania tripa de madre,  qu’ aquí sola la dejó.
Por ahí pasó un viejecico,  de ella s’ amansiyó:
Malahania tripa de madre  qu’ a su hija la fió,
malhania vos, caballero,  qu’ aquí sola la dejó.


Translation:
- Come at a good hour, my son-in-law, come at a good hour, my king,
where did you leave my daughter,   in foreign cities?
- I left you pregnant for eight (months), I came to take you,
if you cannot come, give me Filismena instead.
- To Filismena I give you as a sister of yours.
Now she dresses and arms herself, now she goes to where her sister is.
She walks through seven cities, she learned seven languages,
during the last language from the horse he threw her down.
With wanting and not wanting,  one night she slept with him.
Cursed be a mother’s womb, that here alone left her.
A little old man passed by, he took pity on her:
Cursed be a mother’s womb that entrusted her daughter,
cursed be you, knight, that you left her here alone.