My 3 year old daughter has fallen in love with a book with a hundred nursery rhymes in it – aptly named 100 Nursery Rhymes. Every evening she forces me to sing each and every one. This isn’t really a problem as I love singing and will happily sing songs for her all evening, but of the hundred rhymes I know the melody to perhaps five – and I’m sure that some of them aren’t even supposed to be sung. My daughter couldn’t care less so she forces me to sing rhyme after rhyme and after a while they all start sounding like “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star”. As I sing all these song, trying desperately to twist the words to fit with a familiar melody, I notice how nonsensical some of them seem; especially so when fitting it all to one melody. Take the old classic “Ring-a-Ring o'Rosies” here turned into a six line opus, when the original only has four (her shown in italics): Ring-a-Ring o'Rosie-rose
A Pocket full of Posie-pose
A-tishoo! A-tishoo! A-thisie yum!
Spank-alicious Commie Scum
Spreading plague like candy canes
A-tishi-oo! We all fall Down! (And if you are wondering about the plague comment in there, it is a story telling technique called foreshadowing. It is used in only the most highly advanced literary prose.) This made me a bit curious. What do all these rhymes mean? 10 minutes later I’ve read up on the matter and now know that I’ve been singing about: - adulterers - Georgie Porgie
- wars - Grand Old Duke of York
- plague - Ring-a-Ring o’Rosie
- Torture - Mary Mary Quite Contrary
- and so on
Especially the mangled “Ring-a-Ring o’Rosie” caught my interest as it was describing the bubonic plague of the seventeenth century. Ring-a-Ring o'Rosies
refers to the rose like welts that appear at the early stages of the plague.
A Pocket full of Posies
refers to the habit to carry sweet smelling herbs and flowers as it was believed that the plague was spread by bad smells.
"A-tishoo! A-tishoo!"
One of the early signs of the plague was sneezing.
We all fall Down!
Well, that one I don’t need to explain I think… Finally it is all explained and I was happy…until I found another website stating that the above explanation was a fabrication in a book about the plague published in 1961 and that the first knowledge of this rhyme was in 1883! And now I wasn’t happy anymore. Damn all the people who feel the need to destroy a perfectly good explanation just because it may be untrue! I prefer a fascinating lie to a boring truth any day. Thank you very much!
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