There Was An Old Woman Tossed Up In A Basket
1981 
Ireland Lyrics
Seventeen times as high as the moon,
Where she was going, I could not but ask it,
For in her hands she carried a broom.
'Old woman, old woman, old woman' quath I,
O wither, O wither, O wither so high?
To sweep the cobwebs from the sky,
But I’ll be with thee by-and-by.
There was an old woman tossed up in a basket,
Seventeen times as high as the moon,
Where she was going, I just had to ask it,
For in her hands she carried a broom.
'Old woman, old woman, old woman' said I,
Please tell me, please tell me why you’re up so high?
To sweep the cobwebs down from the sky,
And I’ll be with thee by-and-by.
History and Meaning
"There Was an Old Woman Tossed Up in a Basket" is an 18th-century English nursery rhyme with English words dating back to 1765 and music believed to be Irish from the 1600s. It first appeared in "Mother Goose's Melody; or Sonnets for the Cradle," compiled around 1765 and published in 1780, and was frequently sung to the tune of "Lilliburlero." The central mission of the old woman in the rhyme is "to sweep the cobwebs from the sky," often interpreted as depicting a "good witch" who cleans the sky to ensure clear views of the moon and stars. Various versions exist, with the old woman sometimes being tossed in a blanket rather than a basket, and the height she reaches varying from seventeen to ninety-nine times as high as the moon. Early editions included mock scholarly interpretations, with one attempting to connect it to Henry V's French campaigns.