A-tishoo

The nursery rhyme, Ring-a-ring o’roses, is thought to have developed as a sort of folk memory of The Black Death, the bubonic plague that first ravaged England in 1348.

Approximately one eighth of the English population perished as a result of the epidemic, the symptoms of which were skin discolouration, coughing and sneezing.

The famous line, ‘A-tishoo! A-tishoo! We all fall down’ is suspected to be a reference to the imminence of death once a person had developed these much-feared symptoms.

The word a-tishoo, at one time instilled fear and widespread panic amid the masses. Thankfully the implications of the word are far less dire now, but it’s still just as common these days as it was several hundred years ago.

Outbreaks of bubonic plague continued through the ages until The Great Plague of 1665 when nearly a quarter of the population of London perished.