Twelve Pears Hanging High

DESCRIPTION: Riddle. "Twelve pears hanging high, Twelve (knights/men) came riding by, Each (knight)took a pear, And (yet) left eleven hanging there." Answers vary; the most common may be Just one knight, named Each or Eachknight, took a pear
AUTHOR: unknown
EARLIEST DATE: 1943 (Halliwell, according to Opie/Opie-OxfordDictionaryOfNurseryRhymes)
KEYWORDS: riddle nonballad
FOUND IN: US(SE,So)
REFERENCES (5 citations):
Greenway-FolkloreOfTheGreatWest, p. 63, "(Twelve pears hanging high)" (1 text)
Opie/Opie-OxfordDictionaryOfNurseryRhymes 399, "Twelve pears hanging high" (1 text)
Baring-Gould-AnnotatedMotherGoose #694, p. 273, "(Twelve pears hanging high)"
NorthCarolinaFolkloreJournal, (Peggy Cole and Sally Poole, informants), "Riddles," Vol. 1, No. 1 (Jun 1948), p. 28, "(Twelve Pears Hanging High)" (1 text)
NorthCarolinaFolkloreJournal, Joseph D. Clark, "More North Carolina Riddles," Vol. IX, No. 1 (Jul 1961), p. 14 (#45A, B), "(Twelve men came riding by)," "(Five pears hanging high)" (2 texts)
Roud #20010
File: NCF1028B

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