Abdul abulbul amir peter skellern biography

music-hall song by Percy French

"Abdul Abulbul Amir" is the most common name for a music-hall song written in (during the Russo-Turkish War) under the title "Abdulla Bulbul Ameer" by Irish songwriter Percy French, and subsequently altered and popularized by a variety of other writers and performers.

It tells the story of two valiant heroes—the titular Abdulla, fighting for the Turks, and his foe, Ivan Skavinsky Skavar (originally named Ivan Potschjinsky Skidar in French's version), a Russian warrior—who encounter each other, engage in verbal boasting, and are drawn into a duel in which both perish.

Percy French wrote the song in for a smoking concert while studying at Trinity College Dublin. It was likely a comic opera spoof. "Pot Skivers" were the chambermaids at the college, thus Ivan "Potschjinski" Skivar would be a less than noble prince, and as Bulbul is an Arabic dialectic name of the nightingale, Abdul was thus a foppish "nightingale" amir (prince)