Wall humpty dumpty
What are the origins of ‘Humpty Dumpty Sat on a Wall’, and what do the lyrics mean?
30 July 2021, 09:40
What are the origins of ‘Humpty Dumpty Sat on a Wall’, and what do the lyrics mean? Picture: AlamyBy Rosie Pentreath
@rosiepentreath
We explore the origins, history and lyrics of one of the most popular children’s songs in the English-speaking world.
Humpy Dumpty sat on the wall is one of the nation’s most enduringly popular nursery rhymes.
But who was Humpty Dumpty? What brought him to that wall? And how did he fall off?
We unpack the origins, history, lyrics and meaning of one of the most well-known children’s songs in the English-speaking world.
Read more: ‘Old MacDonald Had a Farm’ reworked in the style of Beethoven is a stroke of genius
What are the origins of ‘Humpty Dumpty Sat on a Wall’?
In 1870, a chap called James William Elliott included ‘Humpty Dumpty’ when he collected together a load of English nursery rhymes and songs, set them to music, and published them in a volume called Mother Goose’s Nursery Rhymes and Nursery Songs Set to Music, with beautiful engravings by London engravers, The Brothers Dalziel.
Before that, the rhyme can be traced back to the 18th century, and variations in lyrics (see below) have been recorded over time. It’s not clear who originally conceived the four-line poem.
Who was Humpty Dumpty?
Humpty Dumpty is the protagonist of the English nursery rhyme, ‘Humpty Dumpty Sat on a Wall’.
Perhaps due to his fragility revealed in the fall, he has often been portrayed as an egg – including by actor George L. Fox in his Broadway pantomime Humpty Dumpty, and by Lewis Caroll in his weird and wonderful Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland.
Read more: There are lyrics to ‘Happy Birthday’ that you literally never knew about
What is the meaning behind the nursery rhyme?
There are other theories around the meaning of ‘Humpty Dumpty’. Some historians believe Humpty Dumpty was simply a device for a riddle around breakable things.
Others have suggested that Humpty Dumpty is King Richard III of England, who is supposed to have been humpbacked and who was defeated at the Battle of Bosworth Field in 1485.
We could assume Humpty Dumpty is the King, the wall is his reign and fight to preserve power, the fall is his defeat, and ‘All the king’s horses and all the king’s men’ the army that failed to prevail.
Another theory is that Humpty is actually a cannon. During the English Civil War, history says, a one-eyed gunner named Thompson managed to get a cannon – colloquially called ‘Humpty Dumpty’, to the top of the tower of St Mary at the Walls church and wreak untold destruction on the forces below, before return cannon fire dislodged the pair of them. Hence “had a great fall”.
Alice meets Humpty Dumpty. Picture: AlamyA professor David Daube once had a fourth theory to add. In 1956, he posited that ‘Humpty Dumpty’ might have been reference to an armoured siege engine that was deployed unsuccessfully in the 1643 Siege of Gloucester during the English Civil War.
This one was soon dismissed as a bit of a spoof by academics – but not before English composer Richard Rodney Bennett took the plot and ran with it for his children’s opera, All the King's Men.
Interestingly, Francis Grose’s Classical Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue from 1785 – we’re totally imagining this as the Urban Dictionary of its time – defines ‘Humpty Dumpty’ as “a short clumsy person of either sex; also ale boiled with brandy”, so the rhyme could have derived from either meaning.
Although – we have a bit of a chicken or the egg dilemma here: what came first? ‘Humpty Dumpty’ the Grose definition as chicken, or ‘Humpty Dumpty’ the egg? Take a look at the lyrics, and see what you think...
Humpty Dumpty Sat on a Wall – full lyrics
Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall.
Humpty Dumpty had a great fall.
All the king’s horses and all the king’s men,
Couldn’t put Humpty together again.
Humpty Dumpty – oldest known lyrics (1797)
Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall,
Humpty Dumpty had a great fall.
Four-score Men and Four-score more,
Could not make Humpty Dumpty where he was before.
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Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall,
Humpty Dumpty had a great fall;
All the king's horses and all the king's men
Couldn't put Humpty together again.
Humpty Dumpty sat on the wall.
Humpty Dumpty collapsed in his sleep.
All the king's cavalry, all the king's men
Humpty can't, Dumpty can't,
0004Humpty Dumpty collect!
(Translated by Samuil Marshak)
Everyone, I think, is well aware of this rhyme, which gained worldwide fame thanks to Lewis Carroll’s book “Through the Looking-Glass” published in 1871, where Humpty Dumpty looks like an egg ...
Lewis Carroll
At first glance, it may seem that English children's chants are completely meaningless and are composed for the sole purpose of introducing children to rhyme and rhythm.
But is it true?
There are quite a lot of assumptions about when this rhyme appeared and what or who Humpty Dumpty is. In the 15th century, the phrase Humpty Dumpty was used to refer to large people.
At the same time, large size probably meant not only the volume of the body, but also the position in society. In this regard, some believe that the poem may be about a high-ranking gentleman who suddenly lost everything, including his life. For example, about King Richard III, who in 1485 fell on the battlefield at the Battle of Bosworth, as a result of which the Tudor dynasty ended up on the English throne.
Death of Richard III, 18th century
Or Cardinal Thomas Wolsey, who was commissioned by His Majesty Henry VIII to settle his divorce from Catherine of Aragon. This most influential and powerful man, due to historical circumstances, did not cope with the task, for which he fell out of favor and could have parted with his head if he had not died suddenly.
Thomas Wolsey and Henry VIII
Or about King Charles I, who by his stubbornness provoked a civil war, was defeated in it and in 1649year was executed.
Execution of Charles I
However, the most popular theory is still connected not with a man, but with a cannon used by the royal troops during the civil war of 1642-1649. In June 1648, the Parliamentarians besieged the walled town of Colchester. The royalists settled in it installed a powerful gun on the tower of St. Mary. Gunner One-Eyed Jack Thompson fired several shots and inflicted significant damage on the "roundheads" (as the supporters of Parliament were called). The attackers began to shoot at the tower and hit. The Humpty Dumpty cannon fell off the wall and it was no longer possible to pick it up.
But personally I find the most interesting hypothesis of the writer Lucinda Brant. The point here is this. The English King George III (r. 1760-1820) was mentally unstable. Contemporaries claimed that the cause of his illness was rampant harmful humors. Today, doctors are inclined either to porphyria (a violation of the pigment substance - accompanied by mental disorders), or to poisoning with arsenic contained in cosmetics (in 2005 they analyzed a hair from his head and found a high concentration of this poison).
George III
In November 1788, the sovereign became insane. According to eyewitnesses, George could hoarsely carry nonsense for several hours. There is also information (not confirmed) that once he approached a tree, grabbed a branch and began to shake it, believing that he was shaking hands with his Prussian colleague. And on November 5, 1788, His Majesty attacked George, Prince of Wales, trying to smash his head against the wall. Witnesses report that at that moment foam was coming from the sovereign's mouth, and his eyes were bloodshot.
The monarch was treated mercilessly - in the spirit of the times. With the permission of Queen Charlotte, they put a straitjacket on him and began to expel bad humors, that is, they did bloodletting, gave laxatives and emetics, put drawing poultices and even beat, which was considered a very effective way to cleanse the patient of harmful "juices". However, despite the efforts of doctors in February 1789, the king came to his senses and ruled the country for another 20 years, although the attacks were repeated twice during this time.
But in 1810, when he was already practically blind (due to cataracts), crippled by rheumatism and exhausted by a disorder of the nervous system, his beloved daughter Amelia died, which completely finished off the old man. At the end of 1811, he completely lost his mind and spent the rest of his life (until 1820) at Windsor Castle, and for all these ten years the duties of the sovereign were performed by his son George.
Treatment of King George (?)
So, the poem first appeared in print in 1797 in Juvenile Amusements. The text was:
Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall,
Humpty Dumpty had a great fall.
Four-score Men and Four-score more,
Could not make Humpty Dumpty where he was before.
As you can see, the last two lines differ from the modern version and are literally translated as follows: 80 people and 80 more cannot return Humpty Dumpty to his former position.
But the next publication came just in 1810, when the unfortunate king was on the verge of final insanity. This time the text has changed a bit:
Humpty Dumpty sate on a wall,
Humpty Dumpty had a great fall,
Threescore men and threescore more,
Cannot place Humpty dumpty as he was before.
That is 60 people and 60 more. Why the publisher decided to reduce the number of people, I don't know. But something else is important here. According to Lucinda Brant, Humpty Dumpty in this case could mean George III, who could no longer be helped by anyone.
Humpty Dumpty, 1915
Conclusion
Finally, I want to offer my theory. According to the OED (Oxford English Dictionary), in the 17th century Humpty Dumpty was a brandy-flavored fortified ale. And in the 18th century, a clumsy person could get such a nickname.
And maybe one day some clumsy gentleman, having drunk Humpty Dumpty, dropped an egg and, looking at the squirrels and yolk spread on the floor, composed this rhyme to the joy of the children ...
That's all. Good luck!
(С) Denis Kokorin
____________________________________
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The history of the character. Humpty Dumpty
Direct knowledge of history
In front of you is an illustration by William Wallace Danslow. By what name do we know the one who is depicted on it?
Answer: Humpty Dumpty.
Credit: Humpty-Dumpty.
Comment: This is what the illustrator thought Humpty Dumpty looked like after he fell.
For example, referring to the cavalry, army and others:
Listen to the beginning of a very free translation of this text into Ukrainian: "Cossack Mamai galloping across the Danube, The kind gepnuvsya so, scho lusnuv get out to the edge.
The whole film of Doroshenko, Mustache Viysko Morozenka, No Cossack brothers, no father, no mother Mamai can’t buy zibrati before. Name the person referred to in the classical translation of this text into Russian.
Answer: Humpty Dumpty.
Comment: Marshak's translation:
Humpty Dumpty sat on the wall. Humpty Dumpty collapsed in his sleep. All the king's cavalry, all the king's men...
In the Tower of London, they say that the English King Richard III came to power by killing his two young nephews - heirs to the throne. The people did not like him for his cruelty and outward ugliness. He died during the battle, defending the right to the throne - both his legs were cut off in the thick of the battle, so that none of his troops could help him at the right time. How in Russian does the nickname given to him by the people after these events sound?
Answer: Humpty Dumpty.
Source: Tour of the Tower of London.
For example, with a hint of a wall
Shortly before the stock market crash in 2008, The New Yorker magazine depicted HIM sitting on the eaves of a building on Wall Street. Name HIM.
Answer: Humpty Dumpty.
Credit: Humpty-Dumpty.
Comment: Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall, Humpty Dumpty had a great fall. (Humpty Dumpty sat on the wall, Humpty Dumpty fell down in his sleep). "Wall" - "wall".
Source: The New Yorker, February 4, 2008.
According to historical sources, the SECOND was sometimes used in the construction of the FIRST. According to the literary source, on the FIRST there was someone similar to the SECOND. And what was his name?
Answer: Humpty Dumpty.
Credit: Humpty Dumpty.
Comment: FIRST - walls, SECOND - eggs; when building especially strong walls, eggs were sometimes used to mix the mortar; Humpty Dumpty, who Alice thought looked like an egg, sat on the wall.
Source: 1. http://www.stroinauka.ru/d26dr7003m428.html
2. L. Carroll. Alice in the Wonderland.
With a direct hint of the fall
Both had a great influence on the actions of the armed forces of their countries for some time. Both occupied a high position, which they later lost. Even the historical homeland of these two is almost the same; True, there are different versions about the origin of one, and the city where the ancestors of the other lived is known for sure. And, finally, these two are united by the requirement to abuse the gift of speech. Name both.
Answer: Humpty Dumpty, Barclay de Tolly
Comment: Barclay de Tolly was a Scot by origin, his ancestors lived in the town of Tolly. In 1812, he was the commander-in-chief of the Russian army and received the nickname "Chatty-yes-only." Humpty Dumpty is a character in English folklore; for versions of its origin, see 4 and 5. These two are united by the imperative mood of the verb "talk".
Source: 1. Lev Uspensky "You and your name" Volgograd 1994 p.224 (chapter "Something else about surnames", distortion of the surname of Barclay de Tolly)
2. http://www.tartans.com/clans/Barclay/barclay.html (origin of Barclay de Tolly )
Through the Looking Glass
He is the subject of Lewis Carroll's book "Through the Looking-Glass", where he looks like a large humanoid egg with a tie. Appears on the sixth chess cell in the Looking Glass. Alice finds him in the shop of the Sheep that the White Queen has turned into. Humpty Dumpty transforms from an ordinary egg that Alice bought. He sits in Turkish on a high wall and acts as a sage through the mirror, who helps Alice to comprehend the meaning of the words from the poem about Jabberwocky. Humpty Dumpty insists that every name must mean something.
In addition, he claims that words have the meaning that he himself gives them. Behind this statement are the disputes of mathematicians of that time, what is raising to a negative power, etc.
Carroll the mathematician was of the position that one should not look for what the mathematical concept "really" is, but give a definition. This point of view eventually prevailed.
He has a special affinity for the King, receives gifts from him for his "non-birthday" (that is, all other days of the year except one). After the fall of Humpty Dumpty, the White King sends "all the king's cavalry, all the king's men" ( English all the King's horses and all the King's men) in order to collect it.
Character story
Possibly, the poem "Humpty Dumpty" was dedicated to King Richard III, who actually fell off the wall during the battle of 1485.
Initially, the verse about Humpty Dumpty was included in the Tales of Mother Goose. In modern English, the word "humpty dumpty" (humpty dumpty) has two meanings: "fatty-shorty" and "a thing that has fallen or broken and unrepairable."
Historically, the Humpty Dumpty is believed to have been a large fortress weapon.
The story is connected with the events of the English Civil War (1642-1649), which took place during the siege of the city of Colchester by supporters of Oliver Cromwell in the summer of 1648. The Royalists heavily fortified Colchester. A huge cannon, colloquially called "Humpty-Dumpty" ("Humpty Dumpty"), was mounted on a wall next to St. Mary's Church. During the siege, the parliamentarians managed to damage the wall below the Humpty Dumpty with a cannon shot, and the gun fell to the ground. The royalists tried to install "Humpty Dumpty" on another part of the wall. However, the cannon was so heavy that "all the king's men and all the king's horses were unable to lift it again." As a result, the royalist forces were severely undermined and the strategically important Colchester fell after an 11-week siege.
Saying goodbye to Alice, Humpty Dumpty says that the next time they meet, he won't recognize her because he can't tell her face from other people's faces. Thus, Lewis Carroll gives one of the first descriptions of prosopagnosia - a mental disorder, expressed in the inability to recognize faces.
Informally, this disorder is sometimes referred to as "Humpty Dumpty Syndrome".
In Kurt Vonnegut's Cat's Cradle, this famous verse was chosen by the translators as a demonstration of the dialect. In the original, the demonstration is made over the verse "Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star", little known to the Russian reader.
R.P. chose a line from a poem about Humpty Dumpty. Warren as the title for his famous novel All the King's Men.
The character is not currently forgotten. His image was used in the Kinder Surprise commercial
Movies
- In the animated film Puss in Boots (2011), Humpty "Alexander" Dumpty is a friend of Puss in Boots. They were both orphans in an orphanage.
- In the same year, Humpty Dumpty appears as one of the main characters in the Oscar-winning cartoon "
As you may have noticed, the children's poem "Humpty Dumpty" does not say anywhere who this very Humpty was, although he is often represented as an egg in illustrations in books for kids.
The version of the rhyme that most children today know by heart is as follows:
Humpty Dumpty was sitting on the wall,
Humpty Dumpty fell off in his sleep.
And all the king's cavalry
And all the king's men
Can't Humpty
Can't Dumpty
Humpty Dumpty0002 Humpty Dumpty,
Humpty Dumpty collect!
The first known publication about this hero was Samuel Arnold's 1797 children's book. In his version, the last lines should read "more than eighty men cannot put Humpty Dumpty back where he was before." Over the next century, the rhyme appeared in numerous books with various variations on the theme of who collected the hapless character.
Interestingly, all of these publications did not use the name "Humpty Dumpty". According to the Oxford English Dictionary, the term "Humpty Dumpty" was first used in the 17th century to refer to brandy and ale. In the 1700s, the word was also used to describe a clumsy person. In addition, it was synonymous with a drunkard or a frequenter of drinking establishments, perhaps because the person to whom this nickname was attached drank a drink of the same name.
Since the popular nursery rhyme does not contain any information about a bottle of alcohol, and also does not introduce us to a lover to sit in a bar with a glass of strong drink, scientists believe that the famous rhyme was a simple riddle. The answer to it, of course, was “an egg”, since it is this object that, if it falls from a height, will break and even the largest number of people will not be able to collect it. Today, this answer is well known, so the character of Humpty Dumpty began to be depicted as an egg, and this riddle has become a common entertaining story for kids.
Because of this transition from "mystery" to "story", many people believe that there is a mysterious and yet unsolved meaning behind the plot of this poem. In this case, we could heed the advice of Humpty Dumpty himself in Lewis Carroll's Through the Looking-Glass: "When I use a word, it only means what I want it to mean, no more, no less." People will always attribute more meaning to poems than their author intended.
Rhymes of this kind were usually associated with historical events, but sometimes it is difficult to prove that the images in children's folklore tell about historical places and personalities. Most modern rhymes were created with the intention of being silly, repetitive, and funny for the entertainment of children, and not because of the historical significance of the events described in them (take, for example, "Patty patties" or "Geese, geese, ha-ha-ha ").
Two of the most popular theories about Humpty Dumpty's biography refer to two separate historical events. The first is the fall of the English city of Colchester. During the Civil War in 1648 Colchester was under siege. Supposedly, a man named Jack Thompson was on the wall with a cannon nicknamed "Humpty Dumpty". Thompson managed to do a good job of hurting the advancing Parliamentary troops until his cannon was blown off the wall and fell to the ground. Given the gun's size and weight, the dozens of men who tried to lift it back into place were unable to do so.
In the end, Colchester was forced to open their gates and surrender. But more than a hundred years passed between the siege of the city and the first mention of Humpty Dumpty in literature, so the connection between these two events can be questioned.
The second popular theory is that Richard III was called Humpty Dumpty. The people called him the "humpbacked king", although the latest data showed that Shakespeare greatly exaggerated this physical defect of the royal person, and Richard had only a slight scoliosis, which made his right shoulder slightly higher than the left.
But back to our theories. Everyone knows that in 1485 Richard III fought at the Battle of Bosworth. In this variation on "Humpty Dumpty's" origin, it was said that either his horse was called "the wall" or his warriors who abandoned him on the battlefield. In any case, whether the king fell off his horse or became an easy target for the enemy, he died, so "no one could collect him." There are gaps in this theory.
For example, the nickname "hunchbacked" did not exist until the 18th century, and the recently found well-preserved remains of the king indicate that the king died from a blow to the head with a heavy object. Apart from pure speculation, as in the previous version of the legend of the siege of Colchester, there is no historical evidence of Richard's involvement in the name of Humpty Dumpty. Which of the two theories to believe is up to you.
Humpty Dumpty ) — character of many classic English nursery rhymes, very well known in English speaking world. Is the hero of the book Lewis Carroll " Alice Through the Looking Glass 'where looks great a humanoid egg tie . Appears on the sixth chess cell in the Looking Glass. Alice finds him in the shop of the Sheep that the White Queen has turned into. Humpty Dumpty transforms from an ordinary egg that Alice bought. He sits in Turkish on a high wall and acts as a sage through the mirror, who helps Alice to comprehend the meaning of the words from the poem about Jabberwocky.
Humpty Dumpty insists that every name must mean something. In addition, he claims that words have the meaning that he himself gives them. Behind this statement are the disputes of mathematicians of that time, what is raising to a negative power, etc. Carroll the mathematician was of the position that one should not look for what the mathematical concept "really" is, but give a definition. This point of view eventually prevailed.
He has a special affinity for the King, receives gifts from him on his "unbirthday" (that is, all other days of the year except one). After the fall of Humpty Dumpty, the White King sends "all the king's cavalry, all the king's men" (eng. all the King's horses and all the King's men ) in order to assemble it.
Saying goodbye to Alice, Humpty Dumpty says that the next time they meet, he won't recognize her, because he can't distinguish her face from the faces of other people. Thus, Lewis Carroll gives one of the first descriptions of prosopagnosia - a mental disorder, expressed in the inability to recognize faces.
Informally, this disorder is sometimes referred to as "Humpty Dumpty Syndrome." Perhaps the rhyme "Humpty Dumpty" was dedicated to the king To Richard III, who actually fell off the wall during the battle of 1485. Historically, the Humpty Dumpty is believed to have been a large fortification weapon. His story is connected with the events English Civil War (1642-1649)) that occurred during the siege by supporters Cromwell city Colchester in the summer of 1648. The Royalists heavily fortified Colchester. A huge cannon, colloquially called "Humpty-Dumpty" ("Humpty Dumpty"), was mounted on a wall next to St. Mary's Church. During the siege the parliamentarians managed to damage the wall below the Humpty Dumpty with a cannon shot, and the gun fell to the ground. The royalists tried to install "Humpty Dumpty" on another part of the wall. However, the cannon was so heavy that "all the king's men and all the king's horses were unable to lift it again." As a result, the royalist forces were severely undermined and the strategically important Colchester fell after an 11-week siege.
