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| "The Twelve Days of Christmas" | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Song | |
| Published | c. 1780 |
| Genre | Christmas carol |
| Composer(s) | Traditional with additions by Frederic Austin |
"The Twelve Days of Christmas" is an English Christmas carol. A classic example of a cumulative song, the lyrics detail a series of increasingly numerous gifts given to the speaker by their "true love" on each of the twelve days of Christmas (the twelve days that make up the Christmas season, starting with Christmas Day).[1][2] The carol, whose words were first published in England in the late eighteenth century, has a Roud Folk Song Index number of 68. A large number of different melodies have been associated with the song, of which the best known is derived from a 1909 arrangement of a traditional folk melody by English composer Frederic Austin.
Lyrics
"The Twelve Days of Christmas" is a cumulative song, meaning that each verse is built on top of the previous verses. There are twelve verses, each describing a gift given by "my true love" on one of the twelve days of Christmas. There are many variations in the lyrics. The lyrics given here are from Frederic Austin's 1909 publication that established the current form of the carol.[3] The first three verses run, in full, as follows:
On the first day of Christmas my true love sent to me
A partridge in a pear tree
On the second day of Christmas my true love sent to me
Two turtle doves,
And a partridge in a pear tree.
On the third day of Christmas my true love sent to me
Three French hens,
Two turtle doves,
And a partridge in a pear tree.
Subsequent verses follow the same pattern. Each verse deals with the next day of Christmastide, adding one new gift and then repeating all the earlier gifts, so that each verse is one line longer than its predecessor.
- four calling birds
- five gold rings
- six geese a-laying
- seven swans a-swimming
- eight maids a-milking
- nine ladies dancing
- ten lords a-leaping
- eleven pipers piping
- twelve drummers drumming
Variations of the lyrics
The earliest known publications of the words to "The Twelve Days of Christmas" were an illustrated children's book, Mirth Without Mischief, published in London in 1780, and a broadsheet by Angus, of Newcastle, dated to the late eighteenth or early nineteenth centuries.[4][5]
While the words as published in Mirth Without Mischief and the Angus broadsheet were almost identical, subsequent versions (beginning with James Orchard Halliwell's Nursery Rhymes of England of 1842) have displayed considerable variation:[6]
- In the earliest versions, the word on is not present at the beginning of each verse—for example, the first verse begins simply "The first day of Christmas". On was added in Austin's 1909 version, and became very popular thereafter.
- In the early versions "my true love sent to me" the gifts. However, a 20th-century variant has "my true love gave to me"; this wording has become particularly common in North America.[7]
- In one 19th-century variant, the gifts come from "my mother" rather than "my true love".
- Some variants have "juniper tree" or "June apple tree" rather than "pear tree", presumably a mishearing of "partridge in a pear tree".
- The 1780 version has "four colly birds"—colly being a regional English expression for "coal-black" (the name of the collie dog breed may come from this word).[8][9] This wording must have been opaque to many even in the 19th century: "canary birds", "colour'd birds", "curley birds", and "corley birds" are found in its place. Austin's 1909 version, which introduced the now-standard melody, also altered the fourth day's gift to four "calling" birds, and this variant has become the most popular, although "colly" is still found.[original research?]
- "Five gold rings" has often become "five golden rings", especially in North America since the 1961 recording by Mitch Miller and The Gang.[7] In the standard melody, this change enables singers to fit one syllable per musical note.[10]
- The gifts associated with the final four days are often reordered. For example, the pipers may be on the ninth day rather than the eleventh.[9]
For ease of comparison with Austin's 1909 version given above:
(a) differences in wording, ignoring capitalisation and punctuation, are indicated in italics (including permutations, where for example the 10th day of Austin's version becomes the 9th day here); (b) items that do not appear at all in Austin's version are indicated in bold italics.
| Source | Giver | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Mirth Without Mischief, 1780[4] |
My true love sent to me | Partridge in a pear-tree | Turtle doves | French hens | Colly birds | Gold rings | Geese a laying | Swans a swimming | Maids a milking | Drummers drumming | Pipers piping | Ladies dancing | Lords a leaping |
| Angus, 1774–1825[5] | My true love sent to me | Partridge in a pear tree | Turtle doves | French hens | Colly birds | Gold rings | Geese a laying | Swans a swimming | Maids a milking | Drummers drumming | Pipers piping | Ladies dancing | Lords a leaping |
| Baring-Gould, c. 1840 (1974)[11] | My true love sent to me | Part of a juniper tree | Turtle doves | French hens | Colley birds | A golden ring | Geese a laying | Swans a swimming | Hares a running | Ladies dancing | Lords a playing | Bears a baiting | Bulls a roaring |
| Halliwell, 1842[6] | My mother sent to me | Partridge in a pear-tree | Turtle doves | French hens | Canary birds | Gold rings | Geese a laying | Swans a swimming | Ladies dancing | Lords a leaping | Ships a sailing | Ladies spinning | Bells ringing |
| Rimbault, 1846[12] | My mother sent to me | Parteridge in a pear tree | Turtle doves | French hens | Canary birds | Gold rings | Geese a laying | Swans a swimming | Ladies dancing | Lords a leaping | Ships a sailing | Ladies spinning | Bells ringing |
| Halliwell, 1853[13] | My true love sent to me | Partridge in a pear tree | Turtle doves | French hens | Colly birds | Gold rings | Geese a laying | Swans a swimming | Maids a milking | Drummers drumming | Pipers piping | Ladies dancing | Lords a leaping |
| Salmon, 1855[14] | My true love sent to me | Partridge upon a pear-tree | Turtle-doves | French hens | Collie birds | Gold rings | Geese a-laying | Swans a-swimming | Maids a-milking | Drummers drumming | Pipers piping | Ladies dancing | Lords a-leaping |
| Caledonian, 1858[15] | My true love sent to me | Partridge upon a pear-tree | Turtle-doves | French hens | Collie birds | Gold rings | Geese a-laying | Swans a-swimming | Maids a-milking | Drummers drumming | Fifers fifing | Ladies dancing | Lords a-leaping |
| Husk, 1864[16] | My true love sent to me | Partridge in a pear-tree | Turtle doves | French hens | Colley birds | Gold rings | Geese a-laying | Swans a-swimming | Maids a-milking | Drummers drumming | Pipers piping | Ladies dancing | Lords a-leaping |
| Hughes, 1864[17] | My true love sent to me | Partridge and a pear tree | Turtle-doves | Fat hens | Ducks quacking | Hares running | "and so on" | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| Cliftonian, 1867[18] | My true-love sent to me | Partridge in a pear-tree | Turtle-doves | French hens | Colley birds | Gold rings | Ducks a-laying | Swans swimming | Hares a-running | Ladies dancing | Lords a-leaping | Badgers baiting | Bells a-ringing |
| Clark, 1875[19] | My true love sent to me | Partridge in a pear tree | Turtle doves | French hens | Colour'd birds | Gold rings | Geese laying | Swans swimming | Maids milking | Drummers drumming | Pipers piping | Ladies dancing | Lords leaping |
| Kittredge, 1877 (1917)[20] | My true love sent to me | Some part of a juniper tree/And some part of a juniper tree | French hens | Turtle doves | Colly birds | Gold rings | Geese a-laying | Swans a-swimming | Lambs a-bleating | Ladies dancing | Lords a-leading | Bells a-ringing | |
| Henderson, 1879[21] | My true love sent to me | Partridge upon a pear tree | Turtle doves | French hens | Curley birds | Gold rings | Geese laying | Swans swimming | Maids milking | Drummers drumming | Pipers piping | — | — |
| Barnes, 1882[22] | My true love sent to me | The sprig of a juniper tree | Turtle doves | French hens | Zdroj:https://en.wikipedia.org?pojem=The_Twelve_Days_of_Christmas_(song)