Fjäriln vingad syns på Haga


Fjäril'n vingad syns på Haga is one of Carl Michael Bellman's collection of songs called Fredmans sånger, published in 1791, where it is No. 64. The song describes Haga Park, the attractive natural setting of King Gustav III's never-completed Haga Palace just north of Stockholm. An earlier version of the song was a verse petition to obtain a job for Bellman's wife. The composition is one of the most popular of Bellman's songs, being known by many Swedes by heart. It has been recorded many times from 1904 onwards, and translated into English verse at least four times.

Song

Music and verse form

Fjäriln vingad is in time and is marked Andante. The rhyming pattern is the alternating ABAB-CDCD. Richard Engländer writes that unlike in Bellman's parody songs, the melody is of his own composition.

Lyrics

The song, Bellman's best known, is dedicated to Captain, who at the time was Bellman's landlord in Klarabergsgatan, Stockholm. Bellman's biographer Lars Lönnroth states that it was originally a verse petition to baron Gustaf Mauritz Armfelt to get a job for Bellman's wife Lovisa in Haga Palace, and describes the composition as a "royalistic praise text". It was written in 1770 or 1771. The later version of the song omits the Lovisa petition, and describes Haga Park, the attractive natural setting of King Gustav III's never-completed Haga Palace just north of Stockholm.
Carl Michael Bellman, 1791Henry Grafton Chapman, 1904Charles Wharton Stork, 1917Hendrik Willem van Loon, 1939Paul Britten Austin, 1977
Fjäriln vingad syns på Haga
mellan dimmors frost och dun
sig sitt gröna skjul tillaga
och i blomman sin paulun.
Minsta kräk i kärr och syra,
nyss av solens värma väckt,
till en ny högtidlig yra
eldas vid sefirens fläkt.		O, a butterfly at Haga,
In the frosty mist was seen,
As it sought a flow'ry parlor,
Where to make its nest of green.
Thus the tiniest of creatures
With the sun's bright warmth awakes
To a new-found day of rapture,
In the wind its joy it takes.		Butterflies to Haga faring,
When the frosts and fogs are spent,
Find the woods their home preparing,
Flower-enwrought their pleasure-tent.
Insects from their winter trances
Newly wakened by the sun
O'er the marsh hold festal dances
And along the dock-leaves run.		Butterflies at Haga soaring,
Through the fog and dewy mists,
Find the trees welcome outpouring,
And the flow'rs in faithful tryst.
Ev'ry insect, long been sleeping,
By the sun's new warmth now wakes;
While the spring's bright flame comes sweeping,
And the earth new beauty takes.		O'er the misty park of Haga
In the frosty morning air,
To her green and fragile dwelling
See the butterfly repair.
E'en the least of tiny creatures,
By the sun and zephyrs warm'd,
Wakes to new and solemn raptures
In a bed of flowers form'd.

Reception and legacy

Fjäriln vingad remains popular in Sweden, and is one of the best-known and most often sung of Bellman's songs. It is included in a list of songs that "nearly all can sing unaided". A chime of bells in Solna, near the Haga park described in the song, rings out the melody every hour.
An early recording was made by Gustaf Adolf Lund in Stockholm in 1904. Johanna Grüssner and Mika Pohjola recorded it in a medley with "Glimmande nymf" on their song album Nu blir sommar in 2006.
The song has been translated into English by Henry Grafton Chapman III, Charles Wharton Stork, Helen Asbury, Noel Wirén, and Paul Britten Austin. It has been recorded in English by William Clauson, Martin Best, Barbro Strid, and Martin Bagge.