The Cradle in Context

Madonna, in an interview on her story-book for children, The English Roses, was asked what she thought of Enid Blyton. Her response: “Who is Enid Blyton?” sent shock waves through generations the world over. Apart from being ironically amusing to the point of being frightening, this response links itself rather inadvertently to the ongoing debate of whether, Freud aside, there can be something called ‘Children’s Literature’. If so, where exactly do the origins of this genre lie?

Oral Literature as a Chronicle of History:

The original intent of Nursery Rhymes and their origins are significant because they pose a challenge to the creation of generic categories and also because they are intrinsically linked to history. The original versions of these rhymes were the common man’s response to his tyrannical king and his interpretation of the ongoing socio-economic evolutions. Nursery rhymes date back to the oral tradition of folk songs and dances, which originated not in the bedrooms of sleepy children, but far away in bars and taverns. Some of these rhymes which are so commonly known today do in fact, date back to the early 1500’s. Mostly however, they originated in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. At that stage, the concept of ‘Nursery Rhymes’ did not exist. Ballads, proverbs, prayers and even street chanting laid the foundation for the rhymes. Some were even believed to have been a part of rituals and customs. They formed a part of what was ‘adult’ entertainment, with strong political and social reverberations. The only rhymes which were meant for children were the counting rhymes. The fact of the preservation of these rhymes is telling of the perseverance of popular traditions, reinforced by the conservatism of childhood. The term ‘Nursery Rhymes’ as it is known today was first used in 1824 in a Scottish periodical called the Blackwoods Edinburgh Magazine. It was only in 1697, with the publication of the legendary collection of French tales by Charles Perrault, Contes de ma mere l’oye (which translates as The Tales of Mother Goose), that the concept of Nursery Rhymes as we know them today, catapulted to fame. With this, came the ‘domestication’ of the rhymes and the connected figure of Mother Goose. There has been a lot of speculation regarding who she could have been. One theory says that she was actually the biblical Queen of Sheba. Another says that she was Queen Bertha, the mother of the medieval leader Charlemagne, who was nick-named Queen Goose-foot because she was web-footed. People have also christened Elizabeth Vergoose, a woman who lived in colonial times in Boston, ‘Mother Goose’ and above her grave is a monument of the fictional character. British Literary history proposes the idea that the first collection of Nursery Rhymes was A Little Pretty Pocket-Book, published by John Newberry in London in 1744. Not only was this the first publication in Britain to focus on entertainment for children, but it also established Newberry in the genre of Children’s Literature. American Literature attributes the first collection of Nursery Rhymes to John Carnan’s Mother Goose’s Rhymes, which was published in 1780.

Literature is a marker of the culture of a community. It is a product of the memories, or more specifically, it is about how people choose to remember and document facts. In this manner, history and literature share a symbiotic relationship as one dictates how the other progresses. Tracing the history of Nursery Rhymes becomes a sociological study of the manner in which violence and protest can be masked and re-invented by time, so as to divorce it completely from its roots. Ironically, Nursery Rhymes which are so popular today with children were in fact, never intended for them. Instead, on tracing the origins of the rhymes it is disturbing at the very least to discover that they are deeply entrenched in the bloodiest feuds and the most outrageous uprisings in world history. The sixteenth, seventeenth and eighteenth centuries were ages which heralded change and this was a change which was not won on amicable terms. It involved violent uprootings of established societies. Censorship on free speech and expression, a popular means of suppression even in the twentieth century, resulted in people looking for alternative modes of expression. This found voice in ‘coded’ songs of protest which were recast years later as Nursery Rhymes to be taught to unsuspecting children by equally uninitiated parents.

Nursery Rhymes in Their Historical Contexts:

An examination of the specific context of Nursery Rhymes reveals that Ringa Ringa Roses refers to the Black Death of 1347-50 and the Great Plague that swept Europe in the 1600’s. As the rhyme goes, a ‘rosy’ rash and incessant sneezing were the first symptoms of the disease. The ‘ring’ of roses; the circle in which the children dance, is supposed to signify a wreath. The ‘posies’ are the herbs and spices which people carried in their pockets to sweeten the air choked with death. At the end of the rhyme, the children cry out ‘A-tishoo! A-tishoo!’(Which has now been modified to ‘Ashes? Ashes!’ in reference to the burning of the bodies of the victims) before falling to the ground, in an enactment of death. Another claim is that it originates in the religious ban on dancing among the Protestant community on the nineteenth century. This was countered by the emergent trend of ‘play-party’ games, which consisted of songs sung while moving around in a circle (as a substitute to dancing).

Jack and Jill refers to the beheading of King Louis XIV of France and then of course, Marie Antoinette, whom he married in 1770 and proceeded to exercise tremendous control over his decisions, is the Jill who ‘comes tumbling after’. They ‘went up the hill’ in 1774 when they became King and Queen of France. In the mid 1770’s, France was amidst a financial crisis and heavy taxation caused a nationwide renunciation of royal patronage. In order to quell the uprisings, the King ‘fetched a pail of water’ by way of financial and judicial reforms. However, the French bourgeoisie refused to allow the reforms to be implemented and as a result, the Bastille was razed in the July of 1789 and the Royal family imprisoned. ‘Jack fell down’. In 1792, the National Convention declared France a republic. The King was tried for treason and sentenced to death. Louis XIV was guillotined in Paris on 21 January, 1793. ‘And broke his crown’. Marie Antoinette was later sent to the gallows on 16 October, 1793 and ‘Jill came tumbling after’.

Humpty Dumpty was a common ‘nickname’ for people of large proportions in the 1400’s and was specifically used for King Richard III of England. He was killed in the Battle of Bosworth on 22 August, 1485 which was fought against Henry Tudor, the head of the house of Lancaster. The imagery of Humpty Dumpty’s ‘great fall’ derives from murder of the King as he sat atop his horse on Ambion Hill. Another popular version suggests that ‘Humpty Dumpty’ was the name of a powerful cannon during the English Civil War (1642-49). It was mounted atop the St. Mary’s Wall Church in Colchester to defend the city against a siege in the summer of 1648 when it was hit by the enemy and the top was blown off. ‘Humpty Dumpty had a great fall’. All efforts to repair the cannon proved to be futile. ‘All the king’s horses and all the kings men/ Couldn’t put Humpty Dumpty together again’. Yet another legend suggests that the rhyme refers to Charles I of England. He was toppled by a Puritan majority in Parliament (the great fall). The Cavaliers, the king’s army could not restore his power and he was executed by the Roundheads. A fourth story suggests that the rhyme can be linked to the fall of Louis of France before Napoleon when the peasants revolted and beheaded the king.

Mary Mary, Quite Contrary has been interpreted as a representation of the Church of the Virgin Mary, where the nuns are the ‘pretty maids all in a row’. Another reading says that this talks of Mary, Queen of Scots, the Catholic monarch whose lifestyle irked the Protestant ministers. The ‘silver bells and cockle shells’ refer to her penchant for lavish excesses. The garden is a metaphor for Scotland, with her ladies-in-waiting as the ‘pretty maids’. A disagreeable tyrant, the rhyme was supposed to be a codified outcry: ‘Mary Mary quite contrary’ (her tyranny) ‘How does your garden grow?’ A reference to the numerous beheadings of Protestant martyrs. ‘With silver bells and cockle shells’ (Instruments of torture like thumbscrews and iron masks) and ‘Pretty maids all in row’ draws from the popular nicknaming of the guillotine as a ‘maid’. The ‘Mary’ in the rhyme would also be the equally ruthless Mary Tudor who was known as ‘Bloody Mary’ after the numerous Protestants whom she had executed in order to appease the Catholic Church.

There Was an Old Woman who Lived in a Shoe: This popular nursery rhyme portrays the British Parliament as the ‘Old Woman’ who looked after her many colonies (‘she had so many children’) in the far flung British Empire. Problems and uprisings in the colonies (‘she didn’t know what to do’) were the reasons for the ‘whipping of the children’ which alludes to the appointment of the much hated James I to the throne. Another theory is that ‘The Old Woman‘ referred to either King George II or George III, one of which began the tradition of wearing white powdered wigs earning the derogatory title of ‘Old Woman’. The shoe refers to the British Isles and the children were members of Parliament whom the king forced to hold session (put them to bed.) ‘Broth’ and ‘Bread’ in the rhyme might refer to a Prime Minister or two.

London Bridge is falling down, falling down, falling down/ London Bridge is falling down/ My fair lady: The rhyme is a clear reference to the tragedies that occurred on the famous London Bridge, built in 1176 to replace the wooden bridges on the site. The construction took 33 years. The bridge which was constructed had a road 20 feet wide and was 300 yards long. In 1209 it had 20 arches, each 60 feet high and thirty feet high. It had a tower and a gate along with dozens of shops and houses, three to seven stories high. There was even a chapel dedicated to St. Thomas Becket in the middle of the bridge. It was the scene of lavish celebrations and once a tourney was held there. All in all it was a massive and sturdy work of architecture. However, it was struck by tragedy time and again. In 1212 many people died when they were trapped between two fires on the bridge. Often barges would break loose and crash into the structure putting prows through walls of houses. Fire struck again in 1623 and destroyed numerous shops and houses. Yet another fire in 1666 loosened the stonework arches of the bridge weakening its foundations. It was declared a public nuisance and on 4 July, 1823 it was torn down. Thus the tragedy prone structure met its end according to the rhyme… ‘London Bridge is Falling Down’.

Several other historical instances find mention in seemingly innocent nursery rhymes. These include the ever popular Baa baa, Black Sheep which despite its bouncy tone is a lament about the burden of paying taxes. In the Middle Ages a peasant was required to give a third of his income, ‘bags of wool’, to the King, ‘my master’, a third to the nobility, ‘the dame’, leaving only a third for himself, ‘the little boy who lived down the lane’.

The rhyme on Jack Sprat and his wife pokes fun at Charles I of England and his wife Henrietta Maria. When Parliament refused to finance his war with Spain and left him ‘lean’ he in turn dissolved the Parliament and imposed an illegal war tax forcing the common people to house the troops. Thus between him and his wife ‘they licked the platter clean’.

Little Jack Horner refers to the incident where the Bishop of Glastonbury sent his steward, Jack Horner to King Henry VIII with a Christmas gift – a pie in which were hidden the title deeds to twelve manorial estates. On the way Jack opened up the pie and stole the deed to the Manor of Mells, ‘he put in his thumb and took out a plum’. The Horner family resides there to this day.

Therefore

A close reading of the text of Nursery Rhymes alone reveals that they in fact speak of theft, assault, physical danger, anger, hurt and jealousy. Apart from internalizing history in a rather ‘timeless’ fashion, Nursery Rhymes are also larger than life examples of the evolution of the oral literary tradition into print culture, with the passage of time. Deeply rooted in a socio-cultural ethos which spans centuries and countries the world over, Nursery Rhymes are containers of history and evolution, passed down and ingrained in generations via a medium which ensures that they will never be forgotten.