"Two Little Dickie Birds" or "Two Little Black Birds" 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 is ...

nursery rhyme A nursery rhyme is a traditional poem or song for children in Britain and many other countries, but usage of the term dates only from the late 18th/early 19th century. The term Mother Goose rhymes is interchangeable with nursery rhymes. From t ...

and fingerplay. It has a

Roud Folk Song Index The Roud Folk Song Index is a database of around 250,000 references to nearly 25,000 songs collected from oral tradition in the English language from all over the world. It is compiled by Steve Roud (born 1949), a former librarian in the London ...

number of 16401.

Lyrics

Modern versions of the rhyme include: :Two little dickie birds sitting on a wall. :One named Peter, one named Paul. :Fly away, Peter! Fly away, Paul! :Come back, Peter! Come back, Paul!I. Opie and P. Opie, ''The Oxford Dictionary of Nursery Rhymes'' (Oxford University Press, 1951, 2nd edn., 1997), p. 147.

Origins

The rhyme was first recorded when published in ''Mother Goose's Melody'' in London around 1765. In this version the names of the birds were Jack and Gill: :There were two blackbirds ::Sat upon a hill, :The one was nam'd Jack, ::The other nam'd Gill; :Fly away Jack, ::Fly away Gill, :Come again Jack, ::Come again Gill. These names seem to have been replaced with the

apostles An apostle (), in its literal sense, is an emissary, from Ancient Greek ἀπόστολος (''apóstolos''), literally "one who is sent off", from the verb ἀποστέλλειν (''apostéllein''), "to send off". The purpose of such sending ...

Peter and Paul in the 19th century.

Variants

In American English, the variant "Two Little Blackbirds" is more common. Two little blackbirds sitting on a hill. One named Jack and one named Jill. Fly away Jack, fly away Jill. Come back Jack, come back Jill. Two little blackbirds flying in the sky. One named Low and one named High. Fly away Low, fly away High. Come back Low, come back High. Two little blackbirds sitting on a pole. One named Fast and one named Slow. Fly away Fast, fly away Slow. Come back Fast, come back Slow. Two little blackbirds sitting on a gate. One named Early and one named Late. Fly away Early, fly away Late. Come back Early, come back Late.

Hand actions

The adult, out of sight of the child, will mark in some conspicuous way the nail of the index finger of one hand and the nail of the second finger of the other hand. Both hands are then shown to the child as fists (folded fingers downwards) with the two fingers with marked nails pointing forward – these represent Peter and Paul. As the rhyme is recited, the hand actions are:

References

{{Authority control Finger plays English nursery rhymes English folk songs English children's songs Traditional children's songs Fictional birds Fictional duos Songs about birds