Question:

Is Nursery Rhime "Ring-a-Round-The-Rosies" is appropriate as this actually refers to the Black Death ?

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Is this appropriate rhyme for Children ?

The children's' nursery rhyme 'Ring-a-Round-The-Rosies' actually refers to the Black Death which killed about 30 million people in the fourteenth-century.

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  1. Yes, along with other rhymes, they are used to teach kids something in a playful way. Without the rhyme how would kids of known the signs/symptoms of plague.


  2. as well as the responses below, keep in mind that many nursery rhymes aren't as innocent as you would expect a children's song to be. Examples, humpty dumpty fell off a wall and broke, jack got a concussion, a baby fell out of a tree (although my children know the rest of that nursery rhyme as "the baby won't fall, as mummy will catch him/her for she is so tall" lol), 5 ducks ran away from their mum, etc etc

  3. yes,

    it is true

  4. I knew things when I was small.  I'm fine and I was fine.

  5. Probably not, but it is enjoyed by children all around the world.  If you are so uncomfortable with the meaning and words change the words to:  The cows are in the meadows eating butter cups ashes, ashes we all stand up

  6. i guess the whole point of the nursery rhyme was to play with the imaginations of children and let them cope in their own way the seriousness of the black death.. back in those days, when we used to sing that song and go round and round in a circle, we didn't know any better. but as we grow up and we learn that such a massive event (the black death, as you said, killed 30 million people) could be condensed into this simple rhyme, we begin to get curious and open up doors that we may have otherwise neglected. the first time that i ever got news that the nursery rhyme was centered around the black death was when i was around 11. i read a lot, and i looked it up. you couldn't imagine the amount of curiosity that i was filled with afterwards. i began madly searching for more rhymes that may have deeper significance, and went back to lewis carroll. god, that was an adventure.

    anyway, i think that in this day and age, children's curiosity needs to be evoked in ways that are ingenious. one simple way is by telling them a nursery rhyme. "ring-around-the-rosies" is actually a good place to start.

    thanks for asking this question. i enjoyed reminiscing and answering it for you.

  7. Actually that's an urban myth

    http://www.snopes.com/language/literary/...

  8. yes it is,

    "pocket full of posies" was a flower they but in their pockets and was used to mask the smell of rotting flesh,

    "ashes" was symbolic of the flesh deteryorating due to the effects of the plague, and

    "we all fall down" was symbolic of death.

    harsh but true.

  9. the point is common usage if everybody uses it as a happy rhyme why bring up the hidden meaning

  10. The poem didnt occur before 1881 an according to Iona and Peter Opie (authors of the oxford dictionary of nursery Rhymes) this was only one version of the song and other common versions say the children bow down, still other versions have a second verse where the children jump up again. There is no proof that this is actually about the plague, and even if it was it's not going to hurt them. Children have been playing it for over 200 years, if anything it is likely to interest them in the plague, if you decide this is inappropriate then where are you going to draw the line?

    Lucy locket lost her pocket ~ about adultery.

    what about all the violence in fairytales, cinderella for example. sure its been disney-ified but its still a story of abuse and neglect.

  11. yes because it is also agood way to strat to educate the kids and tell them the origins of teh game s and songs they sing or do

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