Cover art for A Pict Song by Billy Bragg

A Pict Song

Sep. 10, 19961 viewer

A Pict Song Lyrics

Rome never looks where she treads
Always her heavy hooves fall
On our stomachs, our hearts and our heads
And Rome never hears when we bawl

Her sentries pass on -- that is all
And we gather behind them in hordes
And plot to reconquer the Wall
With only our tongues for our swords

For we are the little folk -- we!
Too little to love or to hate
Leave us alone and you'll see
That we can bring down the state

Mistletoe killing an oak
Rats gnawing cables in two
Moths making holes in a cloak
How they must love what they do!

Yes -- and we little folk too
We are as busy as they
Working our works out of view
Watch, and you'll see it some day

No indeed! We are not strong
But we know of Peoples that are
Yes and we'll guide them along
To smash and destroy you in war
We shall be slaves just the same?
Yes, we have always been slaves
But you -- you will die of the shame
And then we will dance on your graves

We are the worm in the wood!
We are the rot at the root!
We are the taint in the blood!
We are the thorn in the foot!

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Genius Annotation

“A Pict Song” was written by English poet, writer, journalist Rudyard Kipling. First published in his short story fantasy collection Puck of Pook’s Hill in 1906. The song tells how the Picts, a group of Celtic-speaking peoples who lived in what is now eastern and northern Scotland in the Late British Iron Age and Early Medieval periods, will eventually win over the Romans even after being defeated by them multiple times.

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Release Date
September 10, 1996
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