"Samson af hendelse Gasa besøgte"

Catchy tune on Kingoløg CD by jazz artist Kristian Blak of the Faroe Islands called "Samson af Hændelse Gasa Besøgte." The CD is a suite "based on traditional Kingo-hymns afrom the Faroe Islands," but this one doesn't sound like Kingo.

Maybe that's because it isn't.

I haven't tracked it down yet, and it may turn out to be by Kingo. When I Googled it, I found the title by a contemporary of Kingo's named Petter Dass, a parish priest in Nordland, in the north of Norway, who would have attended university in Copenhagen at the same time as Kingo and who wrote songs on the bible and Luther's catechism. This one is pretty racy ... the title means something like "Samson visited the fleshpots of Gaza." Was sung to the tune of another song, "Kommer I cimbriske helte." It's listed in a Swedish data base, the Song and Tune Catalogue of Svenskt visarkiv – The Centre for Swedish Folk Music and Jazz Research as "Kommer I cimbriske helte med ære" ... the Google translation calls it a "16. og 17. århundredes verldslige danske visesang ... 16th og 17th århundredes worldly wise Danish song" ... no other info

Dagbladet has the text and bio with links in its Kultur diktbasen (culture - poetry) data base. It goes on for quite some length. The first stanza is:

Petter Dass
SAMSONS ANDEN HISTORIE


Mel.: Kommer I Cimbriske Helte etc.


Samson af hendelse Gasa besøgte,
Fandt der en Hore til hvilken hand gaar,
Da de Gesiter fik høre det Rygte
Komme de sammen som Ulven om Faar,
Lader med Krigsfolcket Staden omringe,
Meente de hannem ret visselig finge.

* * *

It's also available on the University of Oslo website at http://www.dokpro.uio.no/litteratur/dass/pd2.txt
[several further pages. Click here for info on the documentation Project of the University of Oslo.