Who really killed Cock Robin?: Nursery rhymes and carols restored to their original meanings

by Norman Iles

Book by Iles, Norman

Genres: Nonfiction

256 pages, Hardcover

Published January 1, 1986

Reviews

[Rob Lee]

Norman, we get it. They're about sex.

[Jim]

In The Restoration of Cock Robin, Norman Iles restores more than sixty traditional English nursery rhymes and carols to their original meanings. In pre-Christian times, these rhymes and songs were composed, recited, sung and danced to by rural folk in celebration of Spring, courtship, mating, sex, marriage, procreation and, by extension, fertility of crops and livestock. They were part of a communal oral tradition that was passed down from generation to generation. With the coming of Christianity to Britain, over time many rhymes and carols were censored and modified by prudish monks into Christian carols and later by Victorians into nonsense rhymes for children.

Although I enjoyed reading this book, the author needed to add annotations. Four stars for subject matter and content, two stars for lack of annotations.