It is so easy to love the nursery rhyme about Jack and Jill as we think of them going up the hill to fetch a pail of water! But it is even more fun to trace the history and origin of this rhyme. There are many stories about Jack and Jill – the scariest one is about who they really were!

One theory says that the rhyme has come to us from France and the terrible tragedy of the Reign of Terror in France in 1793. Jack is supposed to be King Louis XVI who was beheaded and lost his crown! Jill, sadly, was Queen Marie Antoinette who came tumbling after him! But the nursery rhyme was made simple and happy, so children would not be frightened. Historians believe this is true because the Jack and Jill rhyme was published in 1795, which connects with the history and horrible happenings of the Reign of Terror.

But then, there is another tale, a happier and kinder one which says that in Iceland’s history, Jack and Jill were two kids who had been kidnapped by the moon and taken up to heaven! They had been filling up a bucket with water carried with a pole clutched across their shoulders. Icelanders believe that they are still standing over the moon, with their water bucket! When you see spots on the moon, they could be Jack and Jill safely behind its golden skin!

If you dig deeper into the history of nursery rhymes you will be surprised to find the oddest stories related to them. There is yet another story about Jack and his friend Jill. In an early woodcut illustration, Jack and Gill (it was an older way of writing Jill) were both boys! They were supposed to be two priests from history. One was Cardinal Wolsey and the other was Bishop Tarbes!

The rhyme is supposed to be about their visit to France to arrange the marriage of Mary Tudor to the French monarch.

Some experts even feel that the rhyme is  very ancient and has religious connections. There may be some mystic holy ceremony hidden in its words about climbing up the hill to fetch water. The water may be having some special meaning, they feel.

The editors of The Oxford Dictionary of Nursery Rhymes write that the rhyme of ‘after’ with Water maypoint out to the fact that this rhyme originated in the first half of the seventeenth century.

You can even find this rhyme in Shakespeare’s plays: Midsummer Night’s Dream and Love’s Labours Lost.  But Jack and Jill in these poems does not refer to the poem. Jack just meant a boy, and Jill meant a girl from the fifteenth century onwards!

The original, older version of this fairy tale has eight more lines to it: they are:
Up Jack got, and home did trot,
As fast as he could caper,
To old Dame Dob, who patched his nob,
With vinegar and brown paper.
When Jill came in, how she did grin,
To see Jack’s paper plaster;
Dame Dob, vexed, did whip her next
For causing Jack’s disaster

Open Sesame will introduce you to one of your favourite rhymes every week, with a
little bit about its history, origin and meaning. Look out for it, and for different versions of it that may surprise you.

If you find old Mother Goose books you may also meet one of the most famous artists of the world, known as Arthur Rackham whose black and white illustration runs around this page. He has illustrated almost all the nursery rhymes ever written.

Ancient rhymes, jokes and stories have been collected under the wing of Mother Goose for hundreds of years. Meet Mother Goose’s pals here and solve the mysteries surrounding them.