"See Saw Margery Daw" is an

English language English is a West Germanic language of the Indo-European language family, with its earliest forms spoken by the inhabitants of early medieval England. It is named after the Angles, one of the ancient Germanic peoples that migrated to the ...

nursery rhyme, folk song and playground

singing game A singing game is an activity based on a particular verse or rhyme, usually associated with a set of actions and movements. As a collection, they have been studied by folklorists, ethnologists, and psychologists and are seen as important part of ...

. The rhyme first appeared in its modern form in ''Mother Goose's Melody'', published in London in around 1765. It has a Roud Folk Song Index number of 13028.

Lyrics and melody

A common modern version is: :See Saw Margery Daw, :Jacky shall have a new master; :Jacky shall earn but a penny a day, :Because he can't work any faster.I. Opie and P. Opie, ''The Oxford Dictionary of Nursery Rhymes'' (Oxford University Press, 1951, 2nd edn., 1997), pp. 297-8. The name Jacky is often replaced with Johnny or Jack. The melody commonly associated with the rhyme was first recorded by the composer and nursery rhyme collector

James William Elliott James William Elliott (J.W. Elliott) (1833 – 1915) was an English collector of nursery rhymes. Together with George Dalziel and Edward Dalziel The Brothers Dalziel (pronounced ) was a prolific wood-engraving business in Victorian London, found ...

in his ''National Nursery Rhymes and Nursery Songs'' (1870).J. J. Fuld, ''The Book of World-Famous Music: Classical, Popular, and Folk'' (Courier Dover Publications, 5th edn., 2000), , p. 502.

Meaning and origin

The

seesaw A seesaw (also known as a teeter-totter or teeterboard) is a long, narrow board supported by a single pivot point, most commonly located at the midpoint between both ends; as one end goes up, the other goes down. These are most commonly found a ...

is one of the oldest 'rides' for children, easily constructed from logs of different sizes. The words of "See Saw Margery Daw" reflect children playing on a see-saw and singing this rhyme to accompany their game. No person has been identified by the name ''Margery Daw'' and so it is assumed that this was purely used to rhyme with the words 'seesaw'. The rhyme may have its origins as a

work song A work song is a piece of music closely connected to a form of work, either sung while conducting a task (usually to coordinate timing) or a song linked to a task which might be a connected narrative, description, or protest song. Definitions and ...

for

saw A saw is a tool consisting of a tough blade, wire, or chain with a hard toothed edge. It is used to cut through material, very often wood, though sometimes metal or stone. The cut is made by placing the toothed edge against the material and mov ...

yers, helping to keep rhythm when using a two-person saw. In his 1640 play '' The Antipodes'',

Richard Brome Richard Brome ; (c. 1590? – 24 September 1652) was an English dramatist of the Caroline era. Life Virtually nothing is known about Brome's private life. Repeated allusions in contemporary works, like Ben Jonson's '' Bartholomew Fair'', in ...

indicated the connection between sawyers and the phrase "see saw sacke a downe". The game of see-saw in which two children classically sit opposite each other holding hands and moving backwards and forwards first appears in print from about 1700. The Opies note that "daw" means "a lazy person", but in Scots it is "an untidy woman, a slut, a slattern" and give this variant of "Margery Daw": :See-saw, Margery Daw, :Sold her bed and lay on the straw; :Sold her bed and lay upon hay :And pisky came and carried her away.

References

External links

See Saw Margery Daw
essay by George Orwell, including Margery Daw {{Authority control Singing games English children's songs English folk songs Traditional children's songs English nursery rhymes