The earliest surviving record of the piece preserves only the lyrics and is untitled.
It has survived in altered form in the folk tradition as the Christmas carol "Down In Yon Forest".
While a number of different interpretations have been offered over time, Eamon Duffy writes that "there can be no question whatever" that the carol's "strange cluster of images" are derived "directly from the cult of the Easter sepulchre, with its Crucifix, Host, and embroidered hangings, and the watchers kneeling around it day and night.
"[3] One theory about the meaning of the carol is that it is concerned with the legend of the Holy Grail.
Christ is most probably represented as a knight as he is battling sin and evil by his continual pain.
The "orchard brown" to which the knight was conveyed becomes, in this reading, the "orchard" of wooden crosses that covered the hill of Golgotha/Calvary where Christ - along with many others - was crucified, while the "hall... hanged with purpill and pall" could be a representation of the tomb in which Christ was placed after Crucifixion.
This allegorical interpretation would tie in with the seven stanzas possibly representing the Seven Deadly Sins.
Richard Greene theorized in 1960 that the song refers "to the displacement of Queen Catherine of Aragon by Anne Boleyn in the affections of King Henry VIII", because the falcon was Anne's heraldic badge.
Recordings of the Britten setting (or adaptations of it) include: In 2007 it[clarification needed] was sung in Season 1, Episode 2 of the drama on Showtime, The Tudors.
& by þat beddis side þer stondith a ston, “Corpus Christi” wretyn þer-on.
And by that bed’s side there stands a stone, "The Body of Christ" written thereon.