Hey /lit/, I've got a meaning-oriented question to English native speakers.
I'm trying to translate a folk song ('Jesse James'), and I stumbled upon a line, whose meaning I find hinky.
It goes: 'And he came from a solitary race.'
Is 'solitary race' an idiom, or does it just mean that he was a loner?
>>7850510
Moreover, if the line is not enough, here's the whole verse:
Now Jesse went to rest with his hand on his breast,
The devil will be upon his knee.
He was born one day in the County Clay,
And he came from a solitary race.
>>7850510
>does it just mean that he was a loner?
Yeah. Archaic use of "race", was common just to mean "solitary kind/sort"
>>7850522
Thank you!
>>7850522
That doesn't mean what OP is saying. It speaks more to his kin/countrymen than just to his own personal traits.
