Baa, Baa, Black Sheep

For other uses, see Baa, Baa, Black Sheep (disambiguation).

"Baa, Baa, Black Sheep" Roud #18267
Written by	Traditional
Published	c. 1744
Written	England
Language	English
Form	Nursery rhyme

Baa, Baa, Black Sheep is an English nursery rhyme, sung to a variant of the 1761 French melody Ah! Vous dirai-je, Maman. The original form of the tune is used for Twinkle Twinkle Little Star and the Alphabet song. The words have changed little in two and a half centuries. It has a Roud Folk Song Index number of 18267.

Modern version

The black sheep, according to Denslow

More recent versions tend to take the following form:

Baa, baa, black sheep,

Have you any wool?

Yes sir, yes sir,

Three bags full.

One for the master,

One for the dame,

And one for the little boy

Who lives down the lane. (or Who cries down the lane.)

Original version

William Wallace Denslow's illustrations for Baa, Baa, Black Sheep, from a 1901 edition of Mother Goose

This rhyme was first printed in Tommy Thumb's Pretty Song Book, published in 1744 with the following lyrics:

Bah, Bah a black Sheep,

Have you any Wool?

Yes merry have I,

Three Bags full,

One for my master,

One for my Dame,

One for the little Boy

That lives down the lane.

Origins and meaning

As with many nursery rhymes, attempts have been made to find origins and meanings for the rhyme. These include:

• A description of the medieval 'Great' or 'Old Custom' wool tax of 1275, which survived until the fifteenth century. Contrary to some commentaries, this tax did not involve the collection of one-third to the king, and one-third to the church, but a less punitive sum of 6s 8d to the Crown per sack, about 5 per cent of the value. This theory also depends on the rhyme surviving unrecorded and even unmentioned in extant texts for hundreds of years.
• A connection to the slave trade. This explanation was advanced during debates over political correctness and the use and reform of nursery rhymes in the 1980s, but scholars agree that it has no basis in fact.

Modern controversies

Further information: Loony Left

A controversy emerged over changing the language of 'Baa Baa Black Sheep' in Britain from 1986, because, it was alleged in the popular press, it was seen as racially dubious. This was based only on a rewriting of the rhyme in one private nursery as an exercise for the children there and not on any local government policy. A similar controversy emerged in 1999 when reservations about the rhyme were submitted to Birmingham City Council by a working group on racism in children's resources, which were never approved or implemented. Two private nurseries in Oxfordshire in 2006 altered the song to "Baa Baa Rainbow Sheep", with black being replaced with a variety of other adjectives, like "happy, sad, hopping" and "pink". Commentators have asserted that these controversies have been exaggerated or distorted by some elements of the press as part of a more general campaign against political correctness.

Allusions

The phrase "yes sir, yes sir, three bags full sir" has been used to describe any obsequious or craven subordinate. It is attested from 1910, and originally was common in the British Royal Navy.

Linguistics

The term 'Baa Baa Black Sheep dialect' has also been used informally in linguistics to describe varieties of English that allow the syntax "Have you any wool?" compared to the alternative "Do you have any wool?" with the auxiliary verb 'do'. In the question 'Have you any wool?' the verb 'have' appears as a transitive verb with the sense of possession, however it also appears to behave like an auxiliary in the sense that it undergoes syntactic inversion.

Popular culture

• Together with "In the Mood", "Baa Baa Black Sheep" was, in 1951, the first song ever to be digitally saved and played on a computer.

• The name Black Sheep Squadron was used for the Marine Attack Squadron 214 of the United States Marine Corps from 1942 and the title Baa Baa Black Sheep was used for a book by its leader Colonel Gregory "Pappy" Boyington and was used for a TV series (later syndicated as Black Sheep Squadron that aired on NBC from 1976 until 1978.

• A popular rap group from 1991 was named Black Sheep had a song "Baa Baa Black Sheep (Have U.N.E. Pull?)"

• There is a recording, made by Clarence Nash and called 'Donald's Singing Lesson', in which Donald Duck wants to try as a singer, but with no success. His test is based just on 'Baa baa, black sheep'.^{[citation needed]}

• In the Bee Gees song "Odessa" from the Album with the same name, There's a reference to "Baa Baa Black Sheep".

• The song Somebody That I Used To Know by Australian musician Gotye, which was number 1 in the Triple J Hottest 100, 2011 employs the same rhythm and melody as baa baa black sheep for the xylophone part.

See also

• Nursery rhymes

References

• Opie, Iona and Peter, The Oxford Dictionary of Nursery Rhymes, Oxford University Press, 1951.

External links

• Rhyme and music
• Have You Any? Song Lyrics & Words
• Nursery Rhyme Videos including Baa Baa Black Sheep