“It may not make sense let it rest!
The tune is the same east or west!
Anyone can sing tis not a test!
Nursery rhymes dem are da best!”
It may be just a couple of years before when the dreaded COVID and the lockdown took its toll. The whole world is still recovering from it though many things we did feels like a distant past!
But (you knew this was coming!); there was another pandemic which not only feels like a story but also has a nursery rhyme dedicated to it!
In spite of the fact that it wiped off more than thirty percentage of the world population!
Intrigued?
read on!
During those once a week period when the assembly would be long and hot; we would all be urged to sing many regional songs!
Some were in hindi while we had songs in many languages like Tamil, Telugu, Punjabi, Marathi and even Assamese!
But apart from the school premises, we rarely used to sing these songs in our homes! The songs sung at home were only the nursery rhymes at the most or some movie song!
Of course the most famous single rhyme even now would be “Twinkle Twinkle little star!”; there was no one who did not know this song!
But then when we cousins used to get together and hold hands and sing; it would always be Ring a ring! Not the Allu Arjun song! But the rhyme!
The words of most of these songs were always jumbled and the way I remember it was completely wrong when I re-read it for my kids!
We used to sing “ring ringa roses pocket full of posses, husha busha we all fall down!” and we used to love falling down!
The actual lyrics are
“Ring-a-ring o’ roses
A pocket full of posies
A-tishoo! A-tishoo!
We all fall down”
Then again the meaning or the words were not important since it was funny just falling down!
Till the ever history buff in me found out that the song is an ode to a plague which actually wiped out a chunk of the world population!
One theory is that the ‘Ring a Ring o Roses, or Ring Around the Rosie’, may be about the 1665 Great Plague of London!
The bubonic plague killed 15% of Britain’s population!
The rosies were the red marks of the bubonic plague, while the posies were the flowers plague doctors used to lessen the stench of death all around!
The ashes were supposed to represent the cremated bodies of those who died from the great plague, and the falling down meant, well, falling down dead.
But (the unexpected but!) it may not be so!
Apparently the first mention of “Ring Around the Rosie” and the plague comes in the middle of the 20th century, 700 years after the bubonic plague!
The origins of the song seem to be in Germany in the late 18th century, with other versions also found in Switzerland and Italy!
“Ring Around the Rosie” doesn’t arrive on British shores until the 1880s, as far as historians can tell!
And England’s last brush with the bubonic plague was in the middle ages in 1665, more than 200 years prior!
Plus there’s the fact that cremating the dead was absolutely forbidden in 14th century England. Even those who died of bubonic plague were buried in accordance with church law!
So the plague theory may not be true!
Another theory put forward is LOVE!
A Protestant dancing ban swept America and England in the 19th century, kind of like a very early “Footloose” situation. If you do not know or have not heard about FOOTLOOSE then I actually feel sad for you!
As a consolation just listen to the song FOOTLOOSE and come back!
But like the kids in that 1980s movie, the kids of a century before would not be tamed or they rebelled like Kevin Bacon!
They instead fashioned “play parties,” where all the children would sing little rhymes in a circle while they moved around. Definitely not dancing, and really for sure not square dancing! A clever way around you see!
The songs, including “Ring Around the Rosie,” were about courtship and crushes! In this particular case, someone stood in the middle of the ring as the rosie, or rosebush, which symbolized love. Other versions — including the Swiss, Dutch and Italian — also mention a rosebush!
While the teenagers defied the dancing bans, their younger siblings would imitate them. So as the fad for play parties fell out of fashion, little kids kept up the tradition of singing songs in circles.
The version of “Ring Around the Rosie” most people are familiar with was first published in Kate Greenaway’s “Mother Goose and the Old Nursery Rhymes,” and that’s the version kids have stuck with for more than 100 years! More than hundred years also was the life and time of birthday celebrity Korom Pulleri Vadhayarillathu Unnikrishnan Namboothiri! Still remember his famous smile!
Now maybe sing rock a bye baby before I research on its origin and spoil it for you!
Shubh ratri!
ramadocblog 