In another thread, Richard says,

I read a book some years ago which gave an interpretation of most of the old British nursery rhymes. It was interesting how many of them (if the author is to be believed) originally had a far from innocent origin.

And Kalleh gives one example:

Little Jack Horner, / Sat in a corner; / Eating a Christmas pie,
He stuck in his thumb, / And pulled out a plum, / And said, "What a good boy am I"

This refers to a historical fact. Jack Horner was a messenger entrusted to deliver a bundle of deeds to church property that Henry VIII had seized. Such a collection of items was called a 'pie'. He stole one of them, and did not get caught. The property is still in the possession of his descendants.

In the imortal words of Oliver Twist, "Please, sir, can I have some more [examples]?"

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Ring around the rosey is supposed to be about death during the bubonic plague.

I'd heard about Ring Around the Rosey . . . but not the others. I'm going to do a little book research and get back to this one.

Ring around the rosey

Really, jheem? I hadn't known that! How macabre! I am anxious to learn more about these, too.

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I'm going to do a little book research and get back to this one.

Start with Iona and Peter Opie. Bruno Bettelheim's The Uses of Enchantment may have been the source of the supposed sexual nature of fairy tales and nursery rhymes.

Oh yes, I read Bettelheim years ago. That's something I need to look into again. I got a few books on the topic today, but need to work down the stack of "must reads" a bit to get to them. Don't think this is over yet!

Hey, I found the perfect site for this thread. How interesting! They actually say 2 lullabies ('Bye, baby bunting' & 'Bye baby bumpkin') were sung in order to intimidate the child and/or to be used as an outlet for the emotions of the parent or nurse.

Some rhymes had political meanings. Humpty in Humpty Dumpty apparently was King Richard III, and 'Baa, Baa, Black Sheep' was said to have been written to protest against an export tax imposed in 1275 in Britain.

I couldn't find validation of this, but I also have heard that 'A Froggie would a-wooing go...'
is allegedly based on the effort of a French minor prince to have a marriage arranged with a popular British princess...and then getting his efforts scornfully rejected.

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Reviving a thread...
I heard an excellent program today on NPR where Chris Roberts, author of Heavy Words Lightly Thrown: The Reason Behind the Rhyme, was interviewed. Here is the transcript of the interview, but I couldn't access it from my computer. I hope you can. I believe the author has a new book coming out, again analyzing nursery rhymes, if I heard correctly.

I read this recently, which seemed rather apt for this thread.

Sorry, wordnerd, I couldn't bear seeing the typo in the thread title any longer, so I've edited it to correct it.

Thanks, Arnie.

Yes, Cat, that is exactly what Roberts was saying. I finally was able to access the transcript, and I was wrong; he was referring to the book that he had written, not about a new one. He says that nursery rhymes are about sex, death and cruelty. Ding dong bell; Pussy in the well of course is about a cat that a boy threw into the well. And Goosey Gander refers to sex. In the 16th and 17th century "goose" meant "prostitute."

Cat, I wish I had read that article before taking my son to see that movie! I didn't read up on it, and Simon was really scared! It was very scary in some parts, I think. That's what I get for not doing my research, I guess.

Which one was the linguist, again? Matt Damon or Heath Ledger?

Well, Heath Ledger played thge character Jake Grimm, and Jakob Grimm is the brother who formulated Grimm's Law about sound change.

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Cat, I wish I had read that article before taking my son to see that movie!

That reminds me of when we took our 14-year-old daughter (the lawyer now) to "The Crying Game." It was billed as a great documentary on the IRA, and we thought it would be a wonderful "learning experience."

Well...it was...only not exactly how we'd thought it would be!