This is some interesting and also a strange news that is read in a book by me about the famous rhyme that is sung by children so innocently all these years without knowing the story behind it. It’s all about the rhyme…..
Ring a ring o’ roses,
A pocket full of posies,
Atishoo ! Atishoo !
We all fell down.
The song arose in the London streets in 1665 during an epidemic of plague.
Ring o’ Roses refers to small, red rash-like areas on people infected with plague, or the Black death.
Pocket full of poises was a reference to the fact from ancient times people believed that evil smells were the poisonous breath of demons who afflicted them with disease. Sweet-smelling herbs and flowers were thought to ward them off.
To this day, judges in England carry nosegays on many ceremonial occasions – a memory of the distant days when their predecessors carried flowers as a protection against gaol fever (typhus).
Atishoo ! Atishoo ! During the plague, sneezing was a symptom of plague victims.
We all fall down. As, indeed, thousands of people did – dead.
As estimated 25 million people died during the infamous epidemic of the Black Death, which swept into and across Europe from distant Asia in the middle of 14th century.
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