Nursery Rhyme Origins - Jack and Jill

Another nursery rhyme post to get me back into the swing of posting! The other day my partner and I were discussing Jack and Jill and what some of the elements of the rhyme might mean so I thought I would break it down for you (and him!)

Firstly, let’s look at the lyrics:

 Jack and Jill went up the hill to fetch a pail of water

Jack fell down and broke his crown

And jill came tumbling after.

Up Jack got and home did trot as fast as he could caper

And went to bed to mend his head

With vinegar and brown paper.

 

Now, anyone who has read my other nursery rhyme analysis (which is available here!) will know that often rhymes like this are metaphorical and tend to relate to real people or events.

 I’ll start with a bit of language analysis. Let’s first look at the word “Crown” – most people accept that Jack’s broken crown is in fact the top of his head and that is perfectly plausible in the circumstances, especially with the final lines to “mend his head”, so that is the most likely usage here. There is a theory circulating online, however, that the word crown might be more literal! This theory states that Jack and Jill were in fact the poor deposed and executed monarchs Louis XViii and his infamous queen Marie Antoinette! This seems to be a common theme from what I have seen online, and certainly it seems to fit the bill – he fell and lost his crown and she came tumbling after. It certainly could be describing those events. The extra evidence of this given is that most people cite the first publication of the rhyme to be in 1795, two years after the pair fell to the guillotine… HOWEVER, this does not check out and this rumour seems to have become an easily passed on myth! From my research I have found a copy in 1777,[1] and previous to that in 1765! So Jack and Jill is categorically NOT about the French royalty of the revolution! Myth busted!

Printed in a 1777 songbook - see footnote 1

So, how old is Jack and Jill? That is the next question! The first full publication of the rhyme I can find is currently 1765, however, I have found references to Jack and Jill earlier! In 1744, an epic poem about the English Revolution cites:

 “Our Merry Pipes, for Trumpet’s shrill,

Our tabers changed to drums

Princes are braved by Jack and Jill,

Wat Tiller and Tom Thumb!”[2]

This rhyme was said to date from 1661. Now, to complicate matters, it is true that the phrase “Jack and Jill” was often used to generally describe and man and woman, often married (as early as Shakespeare), however it is what it is accompanied by in this rhyme that caught my attention. Tom Thumb for example being a creature of English Folklore. (Conversely, however, Wat Tiller / Tyler was a real man who fought a rebellion against the crown in 1377, however – like “Robin Hood” figures, his deeds are often remembered with folklore-like twists of nostalgia and hero-worship). With the extra addition that this verse speaks of music changing from merry to battle, and with reference to old customs, could Jack and Jill actually be some lost element of English folklore?

This theory goes back further too! With a reference from the 1690s which refers to Jack and Jill as a children’s story! [3]

For my part, I would as soon commend the children's stories of Tom Thumb - and of Jack and Jill

 - See footnote 3!

 With this in mind, let’s have a look at any theories which are said to originate prior to this!

 “Jack and Jill Hill” in somerset is supposed to the actual hill from the rhyme and gives a local folklore tale to explain it. This hill in the 1805 original ordinance survey maps is actually entitled “Bram Hill”[4]. The tale told is a simple one, that a woman – Gill - was pregnant and that her husband fell and died on Bram hill.[5] The grief-stricken woman also died soon after and so her child was brought up by the villagers, thus leading to the common usage of the surname Gilson in that area. The evidence added is that in the 1765 Mother Goose version of the rhyme, the spelling is “Gill” rather than Jill.  This was supposed to have happened in 1697 however and so at once, this falls after the first mentions we have heard of Jack and Jill as a “children’s story”.  This research also ties in with an earlier assumption made by Opie and Opie that the form of the rhyme and the words used are from the seventeenth century (1600s) at least.[6]

 There is of course, the possibility that the rhyme originated here using references to a previous children’s story which would explain the links made here. However, I find this to be somewhat charming, but unlikely.

One final set of theories is that the rhyme has Tudor or Stuart Origin.  Some say it was to do with the execution of two noblemen, another that it was more to do with changes to the size of measures for tax purposes (As in, a tax bill was blocked so instead of raising taxes, the monarch – Charles I – reduced the size of the measure instead) involving the archaic measurements of a Jack (Or Jigger) and a Gill.

To conclude. As ever with this type of thing, we never can know for sure the origins of this rhyme, however, my money is on it being an old lost piece of folklore – a “children’s” story which over the years was morphed into the rhyme as we know it today. I can tell you for certain that it was not about Marie Antoinette and her unlucky husband, and it seems unlikely that it was about Gill of Somerset and her untimely demise.

 

 

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[1] John Arnold, The Essex Harmony ... Vol.ii. The Second Edition with large Additions, 1777 (London: J Buckland Printers), p.130

[2] I have modified the language used to make it accessible for the non-historians out there! If you would like to see it in its original form, see Harleian Miscellany, Or a Collection of Scarce, Curious, and rare pamphlets and tracts, 1744, Volume 2, Page 508, (available free to read on google books.)

[3] Vindiciæ Anti-Baxterianæ: or, Some Animadversions on a book, intituled the life of Mr Rihard Baxter, 1696, (London, Richard Standfast Dist), p.202.

[4] As can be seen here: https://tinyurl.com/5n6s82nn

[5] This theory is available to read in many blogs and websites, an example is: https://www.theimportanceofbeingtrivial.com/where-jack-and-jill-really-did-go-up-the-hill.html

[6] Opie and Opie, The Oxford Dictionary of Nursery Rhymes (London: )p.