Posts Tagged ‘Three Blind Mice’
“There’s an old saying about those who forget history. I don’t remember it, but it’s good.”*…
Matan Stauber‘s “Histography” is, if not the most complete timeline ever, certainly close…
“Histography” is interactive timeline that spans across 14 billion years of history, from the Big Bang to 2015.
The site draws historical events from Wikipedia and self-updates daily with new recorded events.
The interface allows for users to view between decades to millions of years.
The viewer can choose to watch a variety of events which have happened in a particular period or to target a specific event in time. For example you can look at the past century within the categories of war and inventions.
* Stephen Colbert
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As we remember, with Churchill that, “The farther backward [we] can look, the farther forward [we] are likely to see,” we might recall that it was on this date in 1609 that “Three Blind Mice” was first published. Appearing in Deuteromelia or The Seconde part of Musicks melodie, a book edited by Thomas Ravenscroft (who may also have authored the rhyme, though there’a case to be made that it dates back to the days of Queen Mary, and refers to her punishment of “The Oxford Martyrs“).
The original lyrics were:
Three Blinde Mice,
Three Blinde Mice,
Dame Iulian,
Dame Iulian,
the Miller and his merry olde Wife,
she scrapte her tripe licke thou the knife.
The lyrics as we’ve come to know them appeared in the mid-19th century in a children’s anthology collected by James Orchard Halliwell.
Columbus sailed the prairie green…
Today is Columbus Day in the United States, the day that we celebrate Columbus, Indiana.*
Among its many other virtues, Columbus– a town of just under 40,000– ranks 6th in the nation for architectural innovation and design (as assessed by the American Institute of Architects) on a list that includes the likes of Chicago, New York, Boston, San Francisco, and Washington, D.C.
Smithsonian Magazine has called Columbus a “veritable museum of modern architecture.” Visitors to Columbus can see more than 70 buildings and pieces of public art by internationally noted architects and artists, including I.M. Pei, Eliel Saarinen, Eero Saarinen, Richard Meier, Harry Weese, Dale Chihuly and Henry Moore. For example,
* The day once commemorated a Renaissance representative of Spain, who mistook the Caribbean Islands for the South China Sea (to wit, the name “West Indies”); on consideration of his crimes and misdemeanors (see almanac entry here), it was decided to shift the celebratory focus to the rather-less-mitigatedly delightful gem of Indiana.
As we book our visits, we might recall that, on this date in 1609, Thomas Ravenscroft, still a teenager at the time, published Deuteromelia or The Seconde part of Musicks melodie — which included the words to “Three Blind Mice” (to be set to a traditional tune), probably the first song lyrics to be published in English. Ravenscroft was the editor of the book, and the likely author of the rhyme.
Three Blinde Mice,
Three Blinde Mice,
Dame Iulian,
Dame Iulian,
the Miller and his merry olde Wife,
shee scrapte her tripe licke thou the knife
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