Peter Peter Pumpkin Eater

Lyrics

Common modern versions include:

Peter, Peter pumpkin eater, Had a wife but couldn't keep her; He put her in a pumpkin shell And there he kept her very well. Peter, Peter pumpkin eater, Had another and didn't love her; Peter learned to read and spell, And then he loved her very well.

Origins

The first surviving version of the rhyme was published in Infant Institutes, part the first: or a Nurserical Essay on the Poetry, Lyric and Allegorical, of the Earliest Ages, &c., in London around 1797. It also appears in Mother Goose's Quarto: or Melodies Complete, printed in Boston, Massachusetts around 1825. A verse collected from Aberdeen, Scotland and published in 1868 had the words:

Peter, my neeper, Had a wife, And he couidna' keep her, He pat her i' the wa', And lat a' the mice eat her.

This verse is also considered to be an older version of the rhyme Eeper Weeper.