Enya and her record company were sued for copyright infringement by Sanga Music, Inc. for recording this “traditional†number because she had mistakenly credited this track as a “traditional Shaker hymn,†thus assumed it as public domain. The third verse was, in fact, penned by Doris Plenn in 1956, who learned it from her grandmother, who claimed it had been written in the early days of the Quaker church. Folk legend Pete Seeger helped make the song fairly well-known in the 1950s by publishing it with Plenn’s additional third verse in his folk music magazine Sing Out! (Vol. 7, No 1. 1957), recording it, and mistakenly credited it as a “traditional Quaker hymn†without copyrighting Plenn’s verse, thus presenting the entire song as “public domain.†It was again published by Sanga Music, Inc. in 1964. Its origin and controversial legal status was later clarified and settled in court in 1992: it was neither a traditional Shaker nor Quaker hymn—it’s actually a Sunday School song written by Rev. Robert Lowry that was published in a songbook he edited titled Bright Jewels for the Sunday School (New York: Bigelow & Main, 1869). Because Seeger presented the new verse as being public domain, the court decided that Plenn had lost her rights and Enya could use the verse without paying royalties.

 

Credit for that paragraph goes to Kerrykait at Unity.

I love the lyrics to this song, pity is wasn't an Enya orginal.

ya its a great track and shame it wasnt as such an original