Humpty Dumpty: What's All the Hoopla About This Egghead?

What's all the hoopla about this egghead?

Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall,

Humpty Dumpty had a great fall.

All the king's horses, and all the king's men,

couldn't put Humpty together again.

Humpty Dumpty is believed to have come from Colchester England during the Parliamentarian stronghold of Colchester, which at the time was in the control of the Royalist during the English Civil war from 1642 to 1649. The Royalists failed and Colchester fell to the Parliamentarians after the siege that lasted 11 weeks from June 13 1648 to August 27 1648.

Now let's look at what Humpty Dumpty actually means. According to the Oxford English Dictionary, Humpty Dumpty is described as a drink of Brandy boiled with Ale. Humpty Dumpty though was also used as a slang term, which described someone who was fat or obese. Humpty Dumpty also was defined as a short and clumsy person.

Did that clear up the issue of what the words, Humpty Dumpty mean? A short clumsy obese person who likes to drink Brandy boiled with Ale. Well if you put them all together they do make a sentence.

Now lets see if we can figure out who Humpty Dumpty was. There is a story that Cardinal Wolsey's downfall is depicted in the nursery rhyme. He let the village of Calwod in Yorkshire fall into disrepair and was sent away.

Ok, I can see the 'had a great fall' but there is no mention of men or horses or trying to help the Cardinal get back on his throne.

Maybe this is it, a Royalist sniper known as One-Eyed Thompson, also nicknamed Humpty Dumpty, sat in the belfry of the church of St Mary-at- the-walls (Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall) he was most likely given this second nickname because of his corpulence. I would like to interject here for those who do not know what the word corpulence means, ourcivilisation.com has a wonderful definition: A description of the common but fallacious notion that people get overweight because they consume too many calories. Now back to the story. Thompson was shot down (had a great fall) and shortly after, the town was lost to the Parliamentarians (all the king's horses and all the king's men couldn't put Humpty together again)

Okay, I see a clumsy short sniper who supposedly is an excellent shot, with one good eye, and a patch over the other eye, who with his corpulence scampered up to the belfry and without falling managed to hold off the Parliamentarians. I will have to think a bit on this one. And I am still puzzled as to what the horses did to help put anything back together.

From camulos.com the information is that Thompson indeed was a one-eyed gunner and he and his Saker (a small cannon) were placed in the top of the tower on the St Mary's at the walls, and caused considerable damage to Lord Fairfax's attacking forces. In return, Thompson was pounded with an enormous concentration of gunfire and eventually Thompson and his Saker came tumbling down.

I looked up what a Saker was because I had never heard the word. Wikipedia says it is a relatively small ships cannon, usually weighing from 4 to 9 pounds.

Okay, this one is a little more believable, as long as Thompson could aim the cannon in the general area of the enemy, chances are he would have hit something. But there still is no clear point as to how those darn horses tried to put things back together again. Perhaps 'back in the day' horses were more nimble with their hooves.

From Frank Baums, Mother Goose in Prose, the rhyming riddle is devised by the daughter of the king, having witnessed Humpty dead and her father's soldiers efforts to save him.

So Mr. Baums has gotten the idea that Humpty Dumpty was the king and he fell off a wall or just fell from the throne or fell down and was severely injured? I am not at all clear on this one except for the fact that it mentions the daughter making up a riddle about what she had seen.

Other ideas say that name Humpty Dumpty is referring to Charles 1 himself- 'the humpty dumpty of England'. Charles was toppled by the puritan majority in parliament (the great fall) and the king's army could not give him back his power. Another refers to King Richard lll and his defeat at the battle of Bosworth.

Well here we have 2 Kings that may have had a daughter who saw them fall and decided to write a riddle about it.

www.mythsandlegends.com has somewhat of a disclaimer in their information, I thought it was interesting: There is no proof that these events are the origin of the nursery rhyme character as claimed by local folklore.

Now let's move on shall we? We have a few suspects in our heads as to who Humpty Dumpty may actually be. But what if Humpty Dumpty wasn't ever intended to describe a person? What if Humpty Dumpty is actually just an egg? Let's look at a little more information to discern what Humpty Dumpty truly is.

Humpty Dumpty is a character in a Mother Goose rhyme. As the pictures in the books show, it is an egg. But I am wondering about the egg. Why is an egg not mentioned in the rhyme? We now learn that the Humpty Dumpty rhyme was first printed in 1810 and was intended as a riddle.

Ah ha, so the daughter of the king story who made up the riddle may be true. As mentioned before, it is assumed that using the term Humpty Dumpty was meant for a short clumsy person and falling from a wall would break bones that were unrepairable hence the use of an egg.

I would have to agree with this explanation. When an egg drops and breaks there is no putting the gooey back in and no repairing the shell. Perhaps Humpty Dumpty was really just an egg in a nursery rhyme book. After all, straightdope.com says that:

According to Martin Gardner, in the annotated Mother Goose, the Humpty Dumpty rhyme is a riddle. Riddling Rhymes were a popular source of entertainment for many centuries. The answer to the Humpty Dumpty riddle is, of course, an egg.

During my research on Humpty Dumpty I ran across a site that mentioned perhaps Humpty Dumpty might have been an ancient wooden battle tank. I could find no information anywhere of a battle tank named Humpty Dumpty although I find it interesting that the definition of the Saker, mentioned above, was a small ships cannon.

An unknown artist illustrated the egg picture to the rhyme in 1843- this illustrations interpretation of the rhyme represented another historic meaning for Humpty. The character looked human, it had a mug in its hand, and it was drunkenness that made him fall.

Now remember that the Humpty Dumpty rhyme was put to print in 1810 and the first picture to go with the rhyme was not drawn until 1843. The illustrator of the first egg drawing to go with the rhyme is unknown. You can view a time-line of different illustrations of the Humpty Dumpty egg from www.msu.com. The time span covers the years of 1843 to 1920.

Don't get stuck just on the rhyme we are so familiar with today. Actually the first appearance in print in 1810 is slightly different from the version we know today.

Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall,

Humpty Dumpty had a great fall,

Threescore men and threescore more

Cannot place Humpty Dumpty as he was before.

That one leaves the horses out all together.

Another variation that dates back to the early 1800's:

Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall

Humpty Dumpty had a great fall

All the king's horses and all the king's men

Could not set Humpty Dumpty up again.

Notice how this one says they could not set him up again, and not, that they couldn't puthim together again. Although it appeared in print in 1810 the rhyme is certainly older but how much older is a matter of dispute.

I think the entire rhyme is a matter of dispute. Why don't we go right to the source and ask old Humpty Dumpty himself. In Lewis Carroll's Through The Looking Glass, Humpty discusses semantics and pragmatics with Alice. Humpty is quoted as saying" "When I use a word, it means just what I choose it to mean, neither more nor less." Well that really didn't help anything did it. There is actually a term for Humpty's explanation, it is called Humpty Dumptyism. I am not kidding you, look it up. And I am pretty sure that Alice was just as confused as I am.

And last but probably not least, we have this information from an insert taken from the East Anglia Tourist Board in England, Humpty was a cannon mounted on top of the St Mary's at the wall Church in Colchester England. But again, other reports have Humpty as a sniper named One-Eyed Thompson who occupied the same church tower.

So it appears that even the Tourist Board of England is not sure who or what Humpty Dumpty is.

Then I found this: Historical events detailing the siege

June 15 1648- St Mary's church is fortified and a large cannon is placed on the roof, which was fired by one-eyed Jack Thompson.

July 14/July 15 1648- the Royalists fort within the walls at St Mary's church is blown to pieces and their main cannon battery (Humpty Dumpty) is destroyed.

A shot from a Parliamentary cannon succeeded in damaging the wall beneath Humpty Dumpty, which caused the cannon to tumble to the ground. The Royalists (all the kings men) attempted to raise Humpty on to another part of the wall. However it was so heavy that all the king's horses and all the king's men couldn't put it up again.

Now look at the historical detailed dates in these two days. On the 15^th the cannon was put on the roof, but it says that is was blown to pieces on the 14^th or 15^th? Also it states that the cannon was so heavy that they could not reset it to another part of the wall. I am wondering then how they got it up on the roof in the first place. And one other thought, it says it was put on the roof of the Church not a wall. But then states how they tried to get it up to another part of the wall?

So, we solved nothing. I did quite a bit of research on this trying to find the real story behind Humpty Dumpty, but I failed. But can you really fail if there is no answer? I think I will use the advice I got from Humpty Dumpty and also using his Humpty Dumptyisms remembering that words can mean whatever you want them to, here is what really happened.

I pushed him off the wall

It was easy as he isn't very tall

Clumsy, overweight little guy

I remember a small white spot in his eye

All the king's horses and all the king's men

Which together I'm guessing were about ten,

Scrambled around and stirred up quite a mess

And when it was over we had egg benedicts.