Bye, baby Bunting

"Bye, baby Bunting" (Roud 11018) is an English-language nursery rhyme and lullaby.^{[citation needed]}

For the Australian children's stores, see Baby Bunting (store).

"Bye, baby Bunting"
Sheet music
Nursery rhyme
Published	1784
Songwriter(s)	Traditional

Lyrics and melody

The most common modern version is:

Bye, baby Bunting,
Daddy's gone a-hunting,
Gone to get a rabbit skin [To get a little rabbit's skin^[1]]
To wrap the baby Bunting in.^[2][3]

From 1784:^[4]

Origins

The expression bunting is a term of endearment that may also imply 'plump'.^[2] A version of the rhyme was published in 1731 in England.^[5] A version in Songs for the Nursery 1805 had the longer lyrics:^{[citation needed]}

Bye, baby Bunting,
Father's gone a-hunting,
Mother's gone a-milking,
Sister's gone a-silking,
Brother's gone to buy a skin
To wrap the baby Bunting in.^[2][6][7]

There have been many interpretations^[which?] of the meaning behind this nursery rhyme, with some claiming^[who?] that the skin is akin to a winding sheet.^{[citation needed]} But it contains many similar elements to other lullabies from the British Isles, including absence of the parents, and gifts for the baby upon their promised return.

See also

• Little Baby Buntin', a 1987 album

Notes

1. Rackham, Arthur (1913). Mother Goose: The Old Nursery Rhymes, p.4. Century Company.
2. I. Opie and P. Opie, The Oxford Dictionary of Nursery Rhymes (Oxford University Press, 1951, 2nd edn., 1997), p. 63.
3. Kaye Bennett Dotson (2020). The Value of Games, p.66. Rowman & Littlefield Publishers. ISBN 9781475846416.
4. Pamela Conn Beall, Susan Hagen Nipp (2002). Wee Sing Nursery Rhymes and Lullabies, p.50. Penguin Publishing Group. ISBN 9780843177664.
5. "Weekly Essays". The Gentleman's Magazine. No. IV. London, England. April 1731. p. 150.
6. Eulalie Osgood Grover, ed. (1915). Mother Goose. P.F. Volland. [ISBN unspecified].
7. (1899). The Child Life Quarterly Volumes 1-2, p.94. C.F. Hodgson & Son

External links

• Media related to Bye, baby Bunting at Wikimedia Commons