Baa Baa Black Sheep is a nursery rhyme, now sung to a variant of the 1761 French melody Ah! vous dirai-je, Maman. The original form of the tune is used for Twinkle Twinkle Little Star and the Alphabet song.
Contents |
Standard version
- Baa, baa, black sheep,
- Have you any wool?
- Yes sir, yes sir,
- Three bags full.
- One for the master,
- One for the dame,
- And one for the little boy
- Who lives down the lane.
Variants
In Mother Goose's Melody (circa 1765) the last lines run:
- But none for the little boy
- Who cries in the lane.[1]
An old variant of the ending runs:
- Two for the master,
- one for the dame,
- but none for the little boy
- who lives down the lane.
or similar.[2] This referred to social inequalities that were common in the English countryside. The equalized version is more recent.
Modern Alterations
In recent years, several kindergartens and nurseries have been teaching children different versions of the rhyme, for example replacing "black sheep" with "rainbow sheep."[3] Previous attempts to alter the lyrics of the rhyme have substituted "black" with either "green", "happy." or "fluffy" [1] [4] These changes have been met with considerable criticism, many citing it as "political correctness gone mad', because of the presumption that the rhyme was changed for racial reasons, despite the claim of one of the bodies involved that the changes were educationally motivated.
Reference in linguistics
The term 'Baa Baa Black Sheep dialect' has also been used informally in linguistics to describe varieties of English (such as British English) that allow the syntax "Have you any wool?" compared to others (such as American English) that prefer "Do you have any wool?" with the auxiliary verb 'do'.[5] In the question 'Have you any wool?' the verb 'have' appears as a transitive verb with the sense of possession, but it also appears to behave like an auxiliary in the sense that it undergoes syntactic inversion.[6]
In other languages
Swedish version
The nursery rhyme is very common in Sweden.
- Bää bää, vita lamm
- Har du någon ull?
- Ja, ja kära barn, jag har säcken full
- Heldagsrock åt far, och söndagskjol åt mor
- Och två par strumpor åt lille, lillebror
Originally, translated from English by August Strindberg, this rhyme started with 'Bää bää, Svarta får' ('black sheep'), but Alice Tegnér changed it to 'vita lamm' ('white lamb'). Translated into English the Swedish rhyme reads:
- Baa, baa white lamb
- Have you any wool?
- Yes, yes, dear child, the whole bag full
- A holiday-robe for father, and a Sunday-skirt for mother
- And a pair of socks for the little, little brother.
Dutch version
The dutch version of this common nursery rime goes:
- Schaapje, schaapje, heb je witte wol?
- Ja baas, ja baas, drie zakken vol.
- Eén voor de meester en één voor zijn vrouw.
- Eén voor het kindje, dat bibbert van de kou.
The English translation would be:
- Little sheep, little sheep, do you have white wool?
- Yes boss, Yes boss, thee bags full.
- One for the master, one for his wife.
- One for the little child, that shivers from the cold.
References
- Opie, Iona and Peter, The Oxford Dictionary of Nursery Rhymes, Oxford University Press, 1951.
Footnotes
- ^ Oxford Dictionary of Nursery Rhymes
- ^ See entry at OldPoetry.com
- ^ 'Nursery Opts For "Rainbow" Sheep' BBC News, Tuesday 7 March 2006 accessed 7 November 2006
- ^ 'Baa Baa Rainbow Sheep' Daily Mail, Wednesday 8 March 2006 accessed 7 November 2006
- ^ For example, Radford, Andrew, Syntactic Theory and the Structure of English: A Minimalist Approach pages 235 – 259 talks of 'Baa Baa Black Sheep varieties of English' Cambridge University Press, 1997. ISBN 0521477077.
- ^ Radford, op. cit. page 235
