Sing a Song of Sixpence

First recorded: 1744

Origin: England

Lyrics

Sing a song of sixpence,A pocket full of rye.Four and twenty blackbirdsBaked in a pie.

When the pie was opened,The birds began to sing;Wasn't that a dainty dishTo set before the king?

The king was in his counting house,Counting out his money;The queen was in the parlour,Eating bread and honey.

The maid was in the garden,Hanging out the clothes,When down came a blackbirdAnd pecked off her nose!

And shortly after that,there came a little wren,As she sat upon a chair,and put it on again.

Two dozen blackbirds burst out of a pie when it is cut, the rhyme's strangest image, and it was once a real banquet trick: a 1549 cookbook gives a recipe for baking a crust "so that birds may be alive in them and fly out." "Sing a Song of Sixpence" reached print in 1744.

What is the origin and history of Sing a Song of Sixpence?

The earliest known printed version appeared around 1744 in Tommy Thumb's Pretty Song Book in London. This initial version differed slightly from the modern one, featuring "Four and twenty Naughty Boys, Baked in a Pye" instead of blackbirds. By approximately 1780, the naughty boys had been replaced by birds, and a version with four verses similar to the modern one was published in 1784. References in Shakespeare's play Twelfth Night (c. 1602) suggest the opening phrase circulated orally long before.

Did people really bake live birds in pies?

Yes, the lyrics likely refer to an actual Tudor culinary practice from the sixteenth century. Live birds were sometimes placed in empty baked pie crusts as a form of elaborate entertainment for banquets. When the pie was cut, the birds would fly out, causing surprise and amusement for the guests. An Italian cookbook from 1549, translated into English in 1598, even contained a recipe for "pies so that birds may be alive in them and fly out when it is cut up," which was a "dainty dish" for royalty like King Henry VIII.

What does the blackbird pecking off the maid's nose represent?

One prominent theory suggests the rhyme is a political allegory related to King Henry VIII's reign and the Dissolution of the Monasteries in the 1530s:

The King represents Henry VIII.
The Queen represents Catherine of Aragon.
The Maid represents Anne Boleyn.
The Blackbird pecking off the maid's nose symbolizes Anne's execution by beheading.
The Blackbirds in the Pie may represent Catholic monks or deeds to monastic estates seized during the Reformation.