Halloween

 ⁨@PeacocksTaleMusic⁩  

 This track stumbles terrified through the cellars and attics of England's haunted house. These famous nursery rhymes are said to record the gothic cruelties of opposing religious regimes during the Reformation.

The old man who wouldn't say his prayers was the Catholic or priest who wouldn't conform to the new State religion under Edward VI and (after Mary) Elizabeth. My lady's chamber could be a forbidden chapel dedicated to Mary in a house or a suggestion that the priest was having improper relations with the Catholic lady of the house. The left leg meant a Catholic out of step with the rest. Some readers also see Protestant taunts of Catholic Mary Tudor (and Catholic Mary Queen of Scots') childlessness.

The cockle shells were instruments of torture used by the Catholic regime against Protestants under Bloody Mary (quite contrary) the pretty maids all in a row the graves of Protestant martyrs who had suffered such genital torture. The silver bells were thumbscrews. The garden was a graveyard: England under Mary.

It's all anti-Mary in the sense that it is about as far away from the Christian love and forgiveness the Virgin Mother is supposed to personify as possible, on both sides.

A more innocent reading of the Mary rhyme is that the maids in a row are nuns praying, the silver bells are the bells of Catholic cathedrals (forbidden since Elizabeth) and the cockle shells are pilgrim badges (also forbidden.)

These rhymes come out of a divided country. The animus felt against Catholicism by Puritans fearing that Charles I was trying to reintroduce 'Bloody Mary's' faith (and Spanish and French power) into Protestant England by the back door has roots in these kind of experiences; and vice versa. 

Mary Mary quite contrary

How does your garden grow?

With silver bells and cockle shells

And pretty maids all in a row.

Goose-a, goose-a, gander

Where shall I wander?

Up stairs, down stairs

In my lady’s chamber.

There you'll find an old man

Who wouldn't say his prayers.

I took him by the left leg

And threw him down the stairs.

Mary, Mary...

Goosey goose gander

Whither shall I wander?

Upstairs and downstairs

And in my lady's chamber.

A priesthole for the old Guy

Who crossed the new State God,

The left-footed southpaw

Gutted for His Love.

Mary, Mary...

Mary Tudor, Bishop Gardner

Killing and Torturing Prots,

Silver thumbscrews, Manhood carvers,

Maidening their anti-Mary plots.

Anti-Mary maidening their plots.

The Queen of Heaven's makeless idol

Of childless Mary Tudor and of Scots,

Maids in waiting, headless-churchbells,

Pilgrim badges, nuns and empty cots.

Goosey goose gander

Whither shall I wander?

Upstairs and downstairs

And in my lady's chamber.

There I met an old man

Who would not say his prayers.

I took him by the left leg

And threw him down the stairs.

Goosey goose gander

Eyeing up the totty

Necklines and waistlines

Fronty and botty.

Mary Mary quite contrary

How does your garden grow?

With silver bells and cockle shells

And pretty maids all in a row.

from https://peacocks-tale.bandcamp.com/album/the-english-civil-wars-and-other-nursery-crimes, released August 22, 2021 

Pic by Bhas Allan.

Alternative music video - youtu.be/TDCbetcIG2I