"Yankee Doodle" is a traditional song and nursery rhyme, the early versions of which predate the

Seven Years' War The Seven Years' War (1756–1763) was a global conflict that involved most of the European Great Powers, and was fought primarily in Europe, the Americas, and Asia-Pacific. Other concurrent conflicts include the French and Indian War (1754 ...

and

American Revolution The American Revolution was an ideological and political revolution that occurred in British America between 1765 and 1791. The Americans in the Thirteen Colonies formed independent states that defeated the British in the American Revoluti ...

. It is often sung patriotically in the United States today. It is the state anthem of

Connecticut Connecticut () is the southernmost state in the New England region of the Northeastern United States. It is bordered by Rhode Island to the east, Massachusetts to the north, New York (state), New York to the west, and Long Island Sound to the ...

. Its Roud Folk Song Index number is 4501. The melody is thought to be much older than both the lyrics and the subject, going back to folk songs of Medieval Europe.

Origin

The tune of "Yankee Doodle" is thought to be much older than the lyrics, being well known across

western Europe Western Europe is the western region of Europe. The region's countries and territories vary depending on context. The concept of "the West" appeared in Europe in juxtaposition to "the East" and originally applied to the ancient Mediterranean ...

, including

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe ...

France France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of Overseas France, overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic, Pacific Ocean, Pac ...

Netherlands ) , anthem = ( en, "William of Nassau") , image_map = , map_caption = , subdivision_type = Sovereign state , subdivision_name = Kingdom of the Netherlands , established_title = Before independence , established_date = Spanish Netherl ...

Hungary Hungary ( hu, Magyarország ) is a landlocked country in Central Europe. Spanning of the Carpathian Basin, it is bordered by Slovakia to the north, Ukraine to the northeast, Romania to the east and southeast, Serbia to the south, Cr ...

, and

Spain , image_flag = Bandera de España.svg , image_coat = Escudo de España (mazonado).svg , national_motto = '' Plus ultra'' (Latin)(English: "Further Beyond") , national_anthem = (English: "Royal March") , ...

. Johnson, Helen Kendrick The melody of the song may have originated from an Irish tune "All the way to Galway" in which the second strain is identical to Yankee Doodle. The earliest words of "Yankee Doodle" came from a Middle Dutch harvest song which is thought to have followed the same tune, possibly dating back as far as 15th-century Holland. It contained mostly nonsensical words in English and Dutch: "Yanker, didel, doodle down, Diddle, dudel, lanther, Yanke viver, voover vown, ''Botermilk'' und ''tanther''." Farm laborers in Holland were paid "as much

buttermilk Buttermilk is a fermented dairy drink. Traditionally, it was the liquid left behind after churning butter out of cultured cream. As most modern butter in western countries is not made with cultured cream but uncultured sweet cream, most m ...

(''Botermelk'') as they could drink, and a tenth (''tanther'') of the grain". The term ''Doodle'' first appeared in English in the early 17th century and is thought to be derived from the Low German ''dudel,'' meaning "playing music badly", or ''Dödel'', meaning "fool" or "simpleton". The ''

Macaroni Macaroni (, Italian: maccheroni) is dry pasta shaped like narrow tubes.Oxford DictionaryMacaroni/ref> Made with durum wheat, macaroni is commonly cut in short lengths; curved macaroni may be referred to as elbow macaroni. Some home machine ...

'' wig was an extreme fashion in the 1770s and became slang for being a fop. Dandies were men who placed particular importance upon physical appearance, refined language, and leisure hobbies. A self-made dandy was a British middle-class man who impersonated an aristocratic lifestyle. They notably wore silk strip cloth, stuck feathers in their hats, and carried two pocket watches with chains—"one to tell what time it was and the other to tell what time it was not". Philip Dawe, The Macaroni

The macaroni wig was an example of such

Rococo Rococo (, also ), less commonly Roccoco or Late Baroque, is an exceptionally ornamental and theatrical style of architecture, art and decoration which combines asymmetry, scrolling curves, gilding, white and pastel colours, sculpted moulding, ...

dandy fashion, popular in elite circles in Western Europe and much mocked in the London press. The term ''macaroni'' was used to describe a fashionable man who dressed and spoke in an outlandishly affected and effeminate manner. The term pejoratively referred to a man who "exceeded the ordinary bounds of fashion" in terms of clothes, fastidious eating, and gambling. In British conversation, the term "Yankee doodle dandy" implied unsophisticated misappropriation of upper-class fashion, as though simply sticking a feather in one's cap would transform the wearer into a noble. Peter McNeil, a professor of fashion studies, claims that the British were insinuating that the colonists were lower-class men who lacked masculinity, emphasizing that the American men were womanly.

Early versions

The song was a pre- Revolutionary War song originally sung by British military officers to mock the disheveled, disorganized colonial " Yankees" with whom they served in the

French and Indian War The French and Indian War (1754–1763) was a theater of the Seven Years' War, which pitted the North American colonies of the British Empire against those of the French, each side being supported by various Native American tribes. At the st ...

. It was written at Fort Crailo around 1755 by British Army surgeon Richard Shuckburgh while campaigning in Rensselaer, New York. The British troops sang it to make fun of their stereotype of the American soldier as a Yankee simpleton who thought that he was stylish if he simply stuck a feather in his cap. It was also popular among the Americans as a song of defiance, and they added verses to it that mocked the British troops and hailed

George Washington George Washington (February 22, 1732, 1799) was an American military officer, statesman, and Founding Father who served as the first president of the United States from 1789 to 1797. Appointed by the Continental Congress as commander of ...

as the Commander of the Continental army. By 1781, "Yankee Doodle" had turned from being an insult to being a song of national pride. According to one account, Shuckburgh wrote the original lyrics after seeing the appearance of Colonial troops under Colonel Thomas Fitch, the son of Connecticut Governor Thomas Fitch. According to the Online Etymology Dictionary, "the current version seems to have been written in 1776 by Edward Bangs, a Harvard sophomore who also was a Minuteman." He wrote a ballad with 15 verses which circulated in

Boston Boston (), officially the City of Boston, is the state capital and most populous city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, as well as the cultural and financial center of the New England region of the United States. It is the 24th- mo ...

and surrounding towns in 1775 or 1776. A bill was introduced to the House of Representatives on July 25, 1999, recognizing

Billerica, Massachusetts Billerica (, ) is a town in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States. The population was 42,119 according to the 2020 census. It takes its name from the town of Billericay in Essex, England. History In the early 1630s, a Praying Indian ...

, as "America's Yankee Doodle Town". After the Battle of Lexington and Concord, a Boston newspaper reported: The earliest known version of the lyrics comes from 1755 or 1758, as the date of origin is disputed:
The sheet music which accompanies these lyrics reads, "The Words to be Sung through the Nose, & in the West Country drawl & dialect." The tune also appeared in 1762 in one of America's first comic operas '' The Disappointment'', with bawdy lyrics about the search for Blackbeard's buried treasure by a team from Philadelphia. An alternate verse that the British are said to have marched to is attributed to an incident involving Thomas Ditson of

. British soldiers

tarred and feathered Tarring and feathering is a form of public torture and punishment used to enforce unofficial justice or revenge. It was used in feudal Europe and its colonies in the early modern period, as well as the early American frontier, mostly as a ty ...

Ditson because he attempted to buy a musket in Boston in March 1775; he evidently secured one eventually, because he fought at Concord. For this reason, the town of Billerica is called the home of "Yankee Doodle": Another pro-British set of lyrics believed to have used the tune was published in June 1775 following the Battle of Bunker Hill: "Yankee Doodle" was played at the British surrender at Saratoga in 1777. A variant is preserved in the 1810 edition of ''Gammer Gurton's Garland: Or, The Nursery Parnassus'', collected by Francis Douce:

Full version

The full version of the song as it is known today:

Tune

The tune shares with " Jack and Jill" and

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 " Lucy Locket". It also inspires the theme tune for the children's television series, '' Barney & the Backyard Gang'', '' Barney & Friends'', and the 1960s US cartoon series ''

Roger Ramjet ''Roger Ramjet'' is a 1965–1969 American animated television series, starring Roger Ramjet and the American Eagle Squadron. The show was known for its simple animation, frenetic pace, and frequent references to pop culture which appealed to adu ...

''.

Notable renditions

During the aftermath of the

Siege of Yorktown The Siege of Yorktown, also known as the Battle of Yorktown, the surrender at Yorktown, or the German battle (from the presence of Germans in all three armies), beginning on September 28, 1781, and ending on October 19, 1781, at Yorktown, Virg ...

, the surrendering British soldiers looked only at the French soldiers present, refusing to pay the American soldiers any heed. The Marquis de Lafayette was outraged and ordered his band to play "Yankee Doodle" in response to taunt the British. Upon doing so, the British soldiers at last looked upon the Americans.