There are many popular songs for children. Who can forget or avoid the jolly ‘Wheels on
the Bus’ so beloved of toddlers?
But nursery rhymes are part of British history;
they have hidden meanings in many instances and romantic, occasionally dark origins.
‘Rock-a-bye Baby’. This gentle lullaby is designed to
send wee ones peacefully into slumber - and providing they don’t know the deeper meaning - and what baby does, it will.
Rock-a-by Baby on the tree top
When the wind blows the cradle will rock
When the bough breaks, the cradle will fall
Down will come baby, cradle and all
Leaving aside the sheer foolishness of placing a crib
in a tree, especially outside during unpredictable weather, I found this rhyme
ideal for soothing my son.
No matter that
ten minutes later, as I prepared to
leave his room, make myself a cup of tea and do a week’s ironing, he woke, stood up in
his cot and wanted to play.
Rheia was the wife of Kronos who’d been told he
would be overthrown by one of his children. So he killed them as they were
born.
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| Rheia handing over child to Kronos |
When Rheia found she was expecting Zeus, she hid herself away and then, when the baby was born, ‘placed him in a tree cradle, twixt earth and sky’ so he couldn’t be found. As predicted, Zeus grew up to oust his murderous father.
Hey Diddle Diddle was another rhyme my sons loved,
particularly the idea of a cat playing a fiddle.
This too goes back to Greek mythology but can be
seen depicted in medieval scripts too.
It’s memorable in our house for my mother’s version,
which so delighted my 5 year old he abandoned the traditional poem completely.
Hey Diddle
diddle, the cat did a widdle, all over the living room floor
The little
dog laughed to see such fun, so the little cat widdled some more.
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| My grand-dad called me 'Dumpling Dust' |
Diddle, diddle dumpling, my son John
Went to bed with his britches on
One shoe off and one shoe on
Diddle diddle dumpling my son John.
My sons found it quite scandalous that the boy went to bed wearing his britches and a shoe!
“Diddle dumplings!” was apparently a street
traders cry as they sold dumplings.
“Baa, baa black sheep, have you any wool?”.
So much hullabaloo surrounds this rhyme, it’s now almost impossible for adults to see it as a simple poem about sheep.
Once the backbone of English trade, wool and meat production was severely compromised, especially for the subsistence farmer, by the wool tax of 1275 ....but there’s no real evidence this is linked to the rhyme.
In modern times, when the politically correctness
bandwagon trundled over it, the whole
thing deteriorated into unprovable racist nonsense.
A rhyme is what you want it to be.
Goodness knows what the ‘deeper meaning fraternity’ could make of ‘Hot Cross Buns, hot cross buns, one a penny, two a penny, hot cross buns. If you have no daughters, give them to your sons.’
Ride a cock horse, Jack and Jill or Humpty Dumpty, could bring squeals of suprised joy as I pretended to let the baby slip from my knee.
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| Ride a cock horse to Banbury Cross |
As they got older we danced Round the Mulberry Bush, played Ring-a-ringa Rosie, marched to The Grand Old Duke of York and pretended we were teapots.
We didn't see it as bonding, just enjoying being together but that's what it was.
And it's that bond which is now broken: the one which links their children to English heritage.
Children's songs now come from television or Disney films and on one website featuring the top 10 most popular songs for children, only Twinkle, twinkle little Star was listed.
No.1 was 'Bohemian Rhapsody - Muppet version.'
What a shame.
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