can anyone tell me?

I woke up super early today for some reason or other and was wondering something I've always been curious about. maybe the folks in the uk can help me since I think this childrens rhyme originates in england..... here it is:

mary, mary
quite contrary
how does your garden grow?
with silver bells and cockle shells
and pretty maids all in a row.

so here's my question: what kind of plants or flowers are silver bells, cockle shells, and pretty maids? I'm assuming they are brit country slang for actual plants/flowers. anyone know?

have you ever noticed that the old nursery rhymes are never nice? i think i once read that they were to scare the children so they'd behave.

Pub quiz research is rarely useful, but once in a while someone asks a question about something so obscure, I happen to have looked it up.

allah's link is one proposed meaning, but only one; and in part the website gets it wrong in that a "Maiden" is nothing to do with beheading - as all Iron Maiden fans will know.

There's no record of the verse before the mid 1700s, and when it does appear in print, it's already in general use (as with most nursery rhymes) so there's no authoritative source to define connection to a specific "Mary". As well as a suggestion it's Queen Mary I (aka 'Bloody' Mary) with ironic references to torture of Catholics, there's also early attribution to Mary Queen of Scots, with no such dark meanings, and a few generalized attributions to the Virgin Mary, but nobody will ever know for sure.

Three Blind Mice is however quite strongly referenced in early use to Mary I and the burning of the Protestant Martyrs.

Humpty Dumpty was a cannon used in the English Civil War.

Jack and Jill (of the hill) both died - Jack from a head injury and Jill in childbirth, according to the Somerset village that claims origin to the verse from an incident in 1697.

Ring a Ring o' Roses, which everyone says is about the Great Plague, is not. That link wasn't suggested until the 1950s, and the symptoms are wrong. There's also strong evidence it started in the US in the mid-18th-century, which even Hollywood can't pretend was particularly plague-ridden.

you guys rule. I knew about 'ring around the rosie' after an extensive year long senior project in highscool on bubonic plague, but not the others. that's one of the most interesting things I've heard in probably a month. I knew someone here would know.

Mg, do you have a link for a site with the info you posted or is it the same as allah's?
thanks again you guys.

There's some stuff (including about Mary) at the Victoria and Albert Museum website. I knew the Jack'n'Jill story from having visited "the official hill", where the village has put up a nice little plaque. Being England, though, nobody's been crass enough to ram a flagpole on top, nor can you purchase souvenir bottles of salad dressing.

"Roses" has more recorded variations than any other nursery rhyme (another pub quiz fact for ya!) including a special one from Louisiana...details on the WP page

As to the Plague (capital P, as in 1665 London) I'm voting with the folks that now believe it wasn't actually the plague (small p) at all - Y.pestis cases don't have the right symptoms for the historical epidemiology, and it was far more likely to be an arenavirus. The Black Death (1340s) was bubonic/pneumonic plague, and interestingly saw the earliest documented case of germ warfare, when the corpses of plague victims were catapulted into a besieged city in the Crimea. The Mongols had been doing it for a while before then, but didn't bother to take notes.

..they clearly didn't know of the Python Defence. Fetchez la vache!

Like Vampy said, most of the fairy tales in original form are pretty vicious and scary.

I know from research that in the original "Pinocchio" story, after Jiminy Cricket speaks to Pinocchio, the wonderful wooden boy stamps on the cricket to death.

I'm also pretty sure that it in the original "Little Red Riding Hood", our lady in red does actually get eaten by the wolf.

It seems that most of these stories, in their original European versions, were like this, but once they became "Americanized", they became more innocent in nature.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Ajax Knucklebones

Like Vampy said, most of the fairy tales in original form are pretty vicious and scary.

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tell me about it. I just bought the complete collection of fairy tales by the brothers grimm and they are really violent.
I heard hans christian andersen's stories were really sad. i'll find out soon, its next on my list.

well, i love the dark side of things as i think we have established and disney made so many of the old vicious stories kid-friendly. i think the mermaid in anderson's story is murdered. i dont remember though. its been a while.

I saw a picture of it in a Ladybird book............it was too nice to be real though

Quote:

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Originally Posted by VoltaireBlue

tell me about it. I just bought the complete collection of fairy tales by the brothers grimm and they are really violent.
I heard hans christian andersen's stories were really sad. i'll find out soon, its next on my list.

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The thing with the eyeballs really freaked me out as a kid "and you can imagine what a terrible sight that was".

This website will tell you all about it, click HERE

The first edition of Grimm's Folk Tales (they didn't use the word "Fairy") was indeed quite dark, but the brother's didn't intend them for children - they collected tales from the oral tradition to stop them from dying out, so thought of themselves as rather obscure historians. As the book gained in popularity they re-issued several versions, gradually cleaning up the adult stuff along the way - it was one of the brothers that took the decision but I can't remember which one. He also had a real hang-up about stepmothers (you can guess why) and so whenever in the historical story there was a wicked character, he changed it into a stepmother. Snow White was originally given the apple by her birth mother.

I particularly like that the original Rapunzel was pulled out the window by the overweight bloke trying to get into her pants, and fell to her death. "No good shall come to a girl who lets her hair down for a boy".

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Mindgames

Snow White was originally given the apple by her birth mother.

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that's the version I have. I have the third edition. I'm going to look for the first. one thing I noticed was that all the stories are so short. most are only two or three pages. I've heard several variations on the ending of snow white. the version I have is the red hot shoes.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by VoltaireBlue

I woke up super early today for some reason or other and was wondering something I've always been curious about. maybe the folks in the uk can help me since I think this childrens rhyme originates in england..... here it is:

mary, mary
quite contrary
how does your garden grow?
with silver bells and cockle shells
and pretty maids all in a row.

so here's my question: what kind of plants or flowers are silver bells, cockle shells, and pretty maids? I'm assuming they are brit country slang for actual plants/flowers. anyone know?

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I can't find the source right now, but I'd long heard that that nursery rhyme was actually a rather sexual one. Also, all are reference to a type of flower. Give me a few days, let me see if I can dig up anything better than vaugery.