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Children’s Songs
Hickory, dickory, dock (Traditional)
From “A Song-book of Folk and Pop Music” by Mario Papa & Giuliano Iantorno,
Zanichelli Editore, Bologna, 1977
Hickory, dickory, dock,
The mouse ran up the dock.
The dock struck one,
The mouse ran down,
Hickory, dickory, dock.
Ring a ring of roses
(Traditional)
Ring a ring of roses
A pocket full of posies’
A-tishoo, a-tishoo z
We all fall down.
1. Posies: a little bunch of flowers
2. A-tishoo: the sound of a sneeze
Sing a song of sixpence
(Traditional)
Sing a song of sixpence
A pocket full of rye,
Four and twenty blackbirds
Baked in the pie.
When the pie was opened,
The birds began to sing,
Oh, wasn’t that a dainty dish
To put before the king.
The king was in his counting house,
Counting out his money.
The queen was in the parlour,
Eating bread and honey.
The maid was in the garden,
Hanging out the clothes,
When down came a blackbird
And pecked off her nose.
Nursery rhymes
Many nursery rhymes are sung and have thus been included in the repertoire of folk singers. They are distinguished from ballads, love songs and work songs by their humourous and nonsensìcal contents. Their origin is as ancient as it is obscure.
Some, líke ‘Hickory, Dickory, Dock ‘, are counting rhymes; others, such as `I gave my love a cherry that has no bone ‘, are riddles; some are lullabies. Some, like `Sing a song of sixpence ‘, which is supposed to allude to the dissolution of the monasteries by Henry VIII, contain political satire in a veiled form. ‘Ring a ring of roses ‘, the English variety of ‘Giro giro tondo ‘, is popularly thought to allude to the Great Plague, the roses being the first signs of the illness, ‘ we all fall down ‘ the inevitable conclusion.
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