Was there ever a time when humans were not fascinated by the murky, seedy events that lead to crimes, and the people who perpetrate them? The past decade may have spawned a whole genre of true-crime documentaries and podcasts, but for several hundred years before, there was another way in which criminal tales were distributed en masse: murder ballads. 

I was prompted to go digging into the practice of ballad singing after reading that, in the 18th century, it was a culture dominated by women. Online, I found digitised archives (such as the National Library Of Scotland’s Word On The Street) filled with penny broadsides: cheap printed sheets that were peddled and sung outdoors. They covered topics from politics to lost love, but there was one subject that kept cropping up again and again: murder. 

Eighteenth-century murder ballads ranged from tales detailing a crime in a particular region, such as ‘The Gloucestershire Tragedy’, to verses claiming to be the last words of criminals about to be hanged. More than simple cautionary tales or historical accounts, they seemed to chime with our contemporary fascination for exploring crime, for filling in the blanks and trying to explain the ‘whys’.

There is something irresistibly tempting about wanting to probe and pick at a story, to know more about what makes its players tick. That’s what draws one of the principal characters in my latest book, Murder Ballad, to investigate a tale she recognises but doubts the veracity of. But as she discovers, unravelling fact from fiction is not a straightforward business, and can bring its own dark consequences.

Murder Ballad is published by Black & White on Thursday 20 June; Lucy Ribchester talks about the book at St Cecilia’s Hall, Edinburgh, Wednesday 26 June, and The Crown & Kitchen, East Linton, Monday 22 July. Picture: Alex Sharp.