The 15 Most Disturbing Nursery Rhymes You've Never Heard

Nursery rhymes aren’t all pudding and pie. Look closely and you’ll start to notice the starving dogs, nose-severing blackbirds, women held captive in pumpkin shells, and tails lopped off with carving knives. Those horrific images are just the remnants, though. 

Mother Goose rhymes have been fairly sanitized over the years, and earlier versions were chock-full of atrocities. The farther back one looks, the more gruesome the rhymes become. Some even believe that the seemingly harmless “Eeny, meeny, miny, mo” counting rhymes derive from ancient methods of choosing human sacrifices (though the source material is sketchy.)


Domestic violence is one of the more common themes in old nursery rhymes, with wives and daughters bearing the brunt of the abuse, ranging from beating with a stick to flat-out murder. The early Victorians no doubt thought these rhymes were instructive to their daughters, who would learn to be obedient, dutiful wives.

Women weren’t the only ones to suffer in verse. Plenty of men are burnt, hacked or otherwise disposed of, as are children of any gender and a bevy of pets and wildlife.

Nursery rhyme reform was the rallying cause of a few upstanding gentlemen of the 1950s, including Geoffrey Handley-Taylor, who surveyed 200 popular rhymes and listed in detail what sorts of unsavoriness they contained (much as parents groups today decry animated films or video game content).

Handley-Taylor’s list of unsavory elements in the rhymes he read is a whole page long, and includes these bothersome incidents:

• 8 allusions to murder (unclassified)
• 2 cases of choking to death
• 1 case of cutting a person in half
• 1 case of death by devouring
• 15 allusions to maimed human beings or animals
• 23 cases of physical violence (unclassified)

Full list here



Here are 15 examples of nursery rhymes that don’t make the cut in childrens books today. Keep them handy if you have any children you need to keep awake.

There was a Man so Wise,
He jumpt into
A Bramble Bush,
And scratcht out both his Eyes.
And when he saw
His Eyes were out,
And reason to Complain,
He jumpt into a Quickset Hedge,
And scratcht them in again.


Originally from Tommy Thumb’s Pretty Song Book, 1744

Old father Long-Legs
Can’t say his prayers:
Take him by the left leg,
And throw him down the stairs.
And when he’s at the bottom,
Before he long has lain,
Take him by the right leg,
And throw him up again.


Originally from Nancy Cock’s Pretty Song Book for all little Misses and Masters, 1780





There was an old woman,
Her name it was Peg;
Her head was of wood and
She wore a cork leg.
The neighbours all pitch’d
Her into the water,
Her leg was drowned first,
And her head followed after.

From James Halliwell Phillips Nursery Rhymes, 1842 

THERE was a lady all skin and bone;
Sure such a lady was never known :
It happen'd upon a certain day,
This lady went to church to pray.

When she came to the church stile,
There she did rest a little while ;
When she came to the churchyard,
There the bells so loud she heard. 

When she came to the church door,
She stopt to rest a little more ;
When she came the church within,
The parson pray'd 'gainst pride and sin.

On looking up, on looking down,
She saw a dead man on the ground ;
And from his nose unto his chin,
The worms crawl'd out, the worms crawl'd in.

Then she unto the parson said,
Shall I be so when I am dead :
O yes ! O yes, the parson said,
You will be so when you are dead.

Here the lady screams.*


*The person reciting the rhyme is meant to scream bloody murder at the end of the verse.


Originally from Gammer Gurton’s Garland, 1784 (Full text online)


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There was a man, he went mad,
He jumped into a paper bag;

The paper bag was too narrow,
He jumped into a wheelbarrow;

The wheelbarrow took on fire,
He jumped into a cow byre;

The cow byre was too nasty;
He jumped into an apple pasty;

The apple pasty was too sweet,
He jumped into Chester-le-Street;

Chester-le-Street was full of stones,
He fell down and broke his bones.


From an early Mother Goose

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I charge my daughters every one
To keep good house while I am gone,
You and you and especially you,
Or else I'll beat you black and blue.

From an early Mother Goose

----

Here comes a candle to light you to bed,
Here comes a chopper to chop off your head.

From an early Mother Goose

Die, pussy, die,
Shut your little eye:
When you wake,
Find a cake,
Die, pussy, die.


From an early Mother Goose (Actually less threatening than it sounds, this is a rhyme to be recited while stopping a swing.)

---- 

Baby, baby, naughty baby,
Hush, you squalling thing, I say.
Peace this moment, peace, or maybe
Bonaparte will pass this way.


Baby, baby, he's a giant,
Tall and black as Rouen steeple,
And he breakfasts, dines, rely on't,
Every day on naughty people.


Baby, baby, if he hears you
As he gallops past the house,
Limb from limb at once he'll tear you,
Just as pussy tears a mouse.


And he'll beat you, beat you, beat you,
And he'll beat you into pap,
And he'll eat you, eat you, eat you,
Every morsel snap, snap, snap.


From an early Mother Goose lullaby

----


Here come I,
  Little David Doubt;
If you don't give me money,
 I'll sweep you all out.


Money I want,
  And money I crave;
If you don't give me money,
  I'll sweep you all to the grave!


From an early Mother Goose’s Almanack

----

John Ball shot them all;
John Scott made the shot,
But John Ball shot them all.


From James Halliwell Phillips Nursery Rhymes, 1842 (Full text of the poem, which continues on in "The House That Jack Built" style)

----

Little General Monk
Sat upon a trunk
Eating a crust of bread;
There fell a hot coal
And burnt into his clothes a hole,
Now little General Monk is dead.
Keep always from the fire,
If it catch your attire
You too, like General Monk, will be dead.


From Rhymes for the Nursery, 1824

---- 

I married a wife on Sunday,
She began to scold on Monday,
Bad was she on Tuesday,
Middling was she on Wednesday,
Worse she was on Thursday,
Dead was she on Friday,
Glad was I on Saturday night,
To bury my wife on Sunday.


From Tom Tit’s Song Book, 1790

----

 A man of words and not of deeds
Is like a garden full of weeds

And when the weeds begin to grow
It's like a garden full of snow

And when the snow begins to fall
It's like a bird upon the wall

And when the bird away does fly
It's like an eagle in the sky

And when the sky begins to roar
It's like a lion at the door

And when the door begins to crack
It's like a stick across your back

And when your back begins to smart
It's like a penknife in your heart

And when your heart begins to bleed
You're dead, and dead, and dead indeed.


Originally from Gammer Gurton’s Garland, 1784

---

A  long tail’d pig, or a short tail’d  pig,
Or a pig without any tail,
A sow-pig, or a boar-pig,
Or a pig with a curling  tail.

Take hold of his tail,
And eat off his head,
And then you will be sure
The pig-hog is dead.


Originally the street cry of the pig-pie man, reproduced in several early nursery rhyme books.

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What's the grimmest nursery rhyme or story you recall? Give me your creepiest verse in the comments section.