Monday's Child

Traditional song or poem

"Monday's Child Poem"
As published in St. Nicholas Magazine, 1873
Nursery rhyme
Published	1838 (first printed source)
Songwriter(s)	unknown

"Monday's Child" is one of many fortune-telling songs, popular as nursery rhymes for children. It is supposed to tell a child's character or future from their day of birth and to help young children remember the seven days of the week. As with many nursery rhymes, there are many versions. It has a Roud Folk Song Index number of 19526.

Lyrics

The following is a common modern version:

Monday's child is fair of face,
Tuesday's child is full of grace.
Wednesday's child is full of woe,
Thursday's child has far to go.
Friday's child is loving and giving,
Saturday's child works hard for a living.
But the child that is born on Sabbath day,
Is bonny and blithe, good and gay.^[1]

Origins

This rhyme was first recorded in A. E. Bray's Traditions of Devonshire (Volume II, pp. 287–288)^[2] in 1838 and was collected by James Orchard Halliwell in the mid-19th century.^[3] The tradition of fortune telling by days of birth is much older. Thomas Nashe recalled stories told to children in Suffolk in the 1570s which included "what luck eurie [every] one should have by the day of the weeke he was borne on".^[4]

There was considerable variation and debate about the exact attributes of each day and even over the days. Halliwell had 'Christmas Day' instead of the Sabbath. Unlike modern versions in which "Wednesday's child is full of woe", an earlier incarnation of this rhyme appeared in a multi-part fictional story in a chapter appearing in Harper's Weekly on September 17, 1887, in which "Friday's child is full of woe", perhaps reflecting traditional superstitions associated with bad luck on Friday – as many Christians associated Friday with the Crucifixion. The fates of Thursday's and Saturday's children were also exchanged and Sunday's child is "happy and wise" instead of "blithe and good".^[5]

Legacy

In James Joyce's novel Ulysses, brothel worker Zoe Higgins quotes the line about Thursday's child to Stephen Dedalus upon learning he was born on a Thursday, the same weekday on which the novel is set.^[6]

The whole rhyme was later included by John Rutter for a cappella choir in the collection Five Childhood Lyrics, first published in 1974.^[7]^[8]

References

^ Iona Opie and Peter Opie, The Oxford Dictionary of Nursery Rhymes (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1951, 2nd ed., 1997), pp. 364–5.
^ Traditions, Legends, Superstitions, and Sketches of Devonshire: On the Borders of the Tamar and the Tavy, Illustrative of Its Manners, Customs, History, Antiquities, Scenery, and Natural History, in a Series of Letters to Robert Southey, Esq. Vol. 2. J. Murray. 1838. Retrieved 23 June 2015.
^ Popular Rhymes and Nursery Tales, London 1849, "Days of Birth", p.228
^ A. Fox, Oral and Literate Culture in England, 1500–1700 (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2000), p. 182.
^ 'Children's charms and Oracles' New York Folklore Quarterly (1952), p. 46.
^ Joyce, James (2022). The Cambridge Centenary Ulysses: The 1922 Text with Essays and Notes. Cambridge University Press. p. 698.
^ Oxford University Press
^ A performance on YouTube