Where Do Nursery Rhymes & Fairy Tales Originate From ?

[Apple Sky]

It fascinates me as the where nursery rhymes & fairy tales originated from as some of them are so sinister & to think that we actually sang & read these. such as 'orange & lemons' how gruesome.
Thanks to @David Lamb we now know where 'Twinkle Twinkle little star'' originated from.

Orange & Lemons

The curious and spectacularly dark end lines: “here comes the candle to light you to bed, here comes the chopper to chop off your head…” probably refers to practices at Newgate prison.

The gaol stood on the current site of the Old Bailey, next to St Sepulchre’s church (the bells of Old Bailey in the rhyme). The sound of that church’s “great” tenor bell striking 9am on a Monday morning would signal the start of any hangings due to take place that week.
The prisoners on death row were visited the night before by the bell man of St Sepulchre, who would hold a candle in one hand and ring the execution bell in the other. He would then recite a poem;

All you that in the condemned hole do lie,
Prepare you for tomorrow you shall die,
Examine all yourselves, in time repent
That you may not be to eternal flames be sent
And when St Sepulchre’s bell in the morning tolls
The lord above have mercy on your souls.

 

[Lost4words]

Lots i used to sing as a kid would be extremely offensive these days. Times change.....society changes...

 

[David Lamb]

It fascinates me as the where nursery rhymes & fairy tales originated from as some of them are so sinister & to think that we actually sang & read these. such as 'orange & lemons' how gruesome.
Thanks to @David Lamb we now know where 'Twinkle Twinkle little star'' originated from.

Orange & Lemons

The curious and spectacularly dark end lines: “here comes the candle to light you to bed, here comes the chopper to chop off your head…” probably refers to practices at Newgate prison.

The gaol stood on the current site of the Old Bailey, next to St Sepulchre’s church (the bells of Old Bailey in the rhyme). The sound of that church’s “great” tenor bell striking 9am on a Monday morning would signal the start of any hangings due to take place that week.
The prisoners on death row were visited the night before by the bell man of St Sepulchre, who would hold a candle in one hand and ring the execution bell in the other. He would then recite a poem;

All you that in the condemned hole do lie,
Prepare you for tomorrow you shall die,
Examine all yourselves, in time repent
That you may not be to eternal flames be sent
And when St Sepulchre’s bell in the morning tolls
The lord above have mercy on your souls.

"Ring a ring a roses" comes from the Great Plague. "Humpty Dumpty" is based on a massive canon used in the (English) Civil War. "Pop Goes the Weasel" is based on terms to do with pawnbroking and Cockney rhyming slang.

 

[Larniavc]

I like how fairy tales are actually pretty grimm (yes I said it) if you look at the older versions.

Morality tales can often be quite macabre.

 

[Apple Sky]

I like how fairy tales are actually pretty grimm (yes I said it) if you look at the older versions.

Morality tales can often be quite macabre.

Yes & it is interesting to know where they originated from & why.

 

[bèlla]

I like how fairy tales are actually pretty grimm (yes I said it) if you look at the older versions.

Morality tales can often be quite macabre.

Yeah, I remember the first time I read the Original Brothers Grimm. I never looked at them the same.

~bella

 

[BNR32FAN]

It fascinates me as the where nursery rhymes & fairy tales originated from as some of them are so sinister & to think that we actually sang & read these. such as 'orange & lemons' how gruesome.
Thanks to @David Lamb we now know where 'Twinkle Twinkle little star'' originated from.

Orange & Lemons

The curious and spectacularly dark end lines: “here comes the candle to light you to bed, here comes the chopper to chop off your head…” probably refers to practices at Newgate prison.

The gaol stood on the current site of the Old Bailey, next to St Sepulchre’s church (the bells of Old Bailey in the rhyme). The sound of that church’s “great” tenor bell striking 9am on a Monday morning would signal the start of any hangings due to take place that week.
The prisoners on death row were visited the night before by the bell man of St Sepulchre, who would hold a candle in one hand and ring the execution bell in the other. He would then recite a poem;

All you that in the condemned hole do lie,
Prepare you for tomorrow you shall die,
Examine all yourselves, in time repent
That you may not be to eternal flames be sent
And when St Sepulchre’s bell in the morning tolls
The lord above have mercy on your souls.

I always thought Rockabye Baby paints a horrific image and still don’t understand how anyone could think it would be a nice song to sing to children.

 

[Apple Sky]

Lots i used to sing as a kid would be extremely offensive these days. Times change.....society changes...

They certainly do & I think it's rather silly all this woke business.
Preschool teachers are being instructed not to teach or allow children sing classic nursery rhymes. Baa Baa Black Sheep, for example, is at the top of the list because the words are considered to be racially insensitive.

 

[RDKirk]

They certainly do & I think it's rather silly all this woke business.
Preschool teachers are being instructed not to teach or allow children sing classic nursery rhymes. Baa Baa Black Sheep, for example, is at the top of the list because the words are considered to be racially insensitive.

Except it isn't. It originated with almost zero change from an English jingle of the early 1700s. It has nothing to do with race or slaves or even America. Everything in it refers to English culture.

 

[Apple Sky]

Woke gone mad;


A primary school banned the word “gay” from old songs and carols and students were instructed to sing, “Fun your life must be”, instead.

In 2009 the Birmingham council took creative license to change the ending of Humpty Dumpty from “couldn’t put Humpty together again” to “made Humpty happy again.”

Passages have been removed from Enid Blyton books because of perceived homosexual undertones between Noddy and Big Ears not to mention Golly.

 

[Lost4words]

They certainly do & I think it's rather silly all this woke business.
Preschool teachers are being instructed not to teach or allow children sing classic nursery rhymes. Baa Baa Black Sheep, for example, is at the top of the list because the words are considered to be racially insensitive.

Totally agree with you...

 

[Apple Sky]

Jack Be Nimble

The rhyme was apparently based on an English pirate, 'Black Jack Smatt'. Black Jack was said to be able to escape from capture whenever under threat.

 

[Apple Sky]

My favorite fairy tale has to be 'Jack and the beanstalk'.

Some think that this story could have originated millennia ago (4500 BC to 2500 BC) where the giant is named Gogmagog.

 

[Larniavc]

I always thought Rockabye Baby paints a horrific image and still don’t understand how anyone could think it would be a nice song to sing to children.

I hate nursery rhymes. They always give me the image of someone trying to comfort a dying child.

 

[Larniavc]

They certainly do & I think it's rather silly all this woke business.
Preschool teachers are being instructed not to teach or allow children sing classic nursery rhymes. Baa Baa Black Sheep, for example, is at the top of the list because the words are considered to be racially insensitive.

Agreed. But what about eeny meany myni mo? Is that racially insensitive?

 

[Larniavc]

Woke gone mad;


A primary school banned the word “gay” from old songs and carols and students were instructed to sing, “Fun your life must be”, instead.

In 2009 the Birmingham council took creative license to change the ending of Humpty Dumpty from “couldn’t put Humpty together again” to “made Humpty happy again.”

Passages have been removed from Enid Blyton books because of perceived homosexual undertones between Noddy and Big Ears not to mention Golly.

Nuance is the important word here (granted nuance often means ‘what I reckon’).

 

[Larniavc]

My favorite fairy tale has to be 'Jack and the beanstalk'.

Some think that this story could have originated millennia ago (4500 BC to 2500 BC) where the giant is named Gogmagog.

Gogmagog was from the Roman occupation of Briton.

The story does go back millennia though.

“According to researchers at Durham University and the Universidade Nova de Lisboa, the tale type (AT 328, The Boy Steals Ogre's Treasure) to which the Jack story belongs may have had a Proto-Indo-European language (PIE) origin (the same tale also has Proto-Indo-Iranian variants),[10] and so some think that the story would have originated millennia ago (4500 BC to 2500 BC).[7]”

 

[Apple Sky]

Agreed. But what about eeny meany myni mo? Is that racially insensitive?

I can understand them wanting to ban this.

 

[Apple Sky]

Gogmagog was from the Roman occupation of Briton.

The story does go back millennia though

Yes, quite a way back, my reckoning before the deluge.