Hot Cross Buns

DESCRIPTION: "Hot cross buns! Hot cross buns! One a penny, two a penny, Hot cross buns! If your daughters do not like them, give them to your sons...." Else, "eat them yourselves"
AUTHOR: unknown
EARLIEST DATE: 1797 (_Christmas Box_, according to Opie/Opie-OxfordDictionaryOfNurseryRhymes)
KEYWORDS: food commerce nonballad
FOUND IN: Britain(England,Scotland(Aber)) Ireland
REFERENCES (9 citations):
Greig/Duncan8 1686, "Hot Cross Buns" (1 text, 1 tune)
Opie/Opie-OxfordDictionaryOfNurseryRhymes 84, "Hot Cross Buns!" (2 texts)
Jack-PopGoesTheWeasel, p. 75, "Hot Cross Buns" (1 text)
Dolby-OrangesAndLemons, p. 159, "Hot Cross Buns" (1 text)
Delamar-ChildrensCountingOutRhymes, p. 119, "Hot-cross buns, hot-cross buns" (1 text)
Brady-AllInAllIn, p. 97, "(Hot Cross Buns)" (1 text)
Peirce-KeepTheKettleBoiling, p. 48, "(Hot cross buns)" (1 text)
ADDITIONAL: Enid Porter, _The Folklore of East Anglia_, Batsford, 1974, p. 59, "(no title)" (1 text)
Marjorie Rowling, _The Folklore of the Lake District_, Rowman and Littlefield, 1976, p. 112, "(Hot Cross Buns, Hot Cross Buns) (1 short text)
Roud #13029
NOTES [116 words]: Opie/Opie-OxfordDictionaryOfNurseryRhymes: "This was formerly a street cry, as mentioned, for instance, in Poor Robin's Almanack for 1733." - BS
As the Opies note, this began life as a street cry. But the tradition of hot cross buns at Eastertide has become so strong that it appears the piece has gone into tradition.
There is a pretty good chance the buyers' daughters (as the song says) would not like them -- because (in Sussex at least) the buns were often kept for the entire year, as a good luck charm, and were said to never grow moldy. Which was probably true, because they were baked very dry and hard; see Jacqueline Simpson, The Folklore of Sussex, B. T. Batsford, 1973, p. 112. - RBW
Last updated in version 6.6
File: OpOx084

Go to the Ballad Search form
Go to the Ballad Index Song List

Go to the Ballad Index Instructions
Go to the Ballad Index Bibliography or Discography