The words to the song appeared in Baring-Gould and Sharp's "English Folk-Songs for Schools" (London: Curwen, n.d. [1906]):


This old man, he played one,
   He played nick-nack on my drum;
Nick-nack paddy-whack, give a dog a bone,
   This old man came rolling home.

...two...shoe...

...three...tree...

...four...door

...five...hive...

...six...sticks...

...seven...Devon...

...eight...gate...

..nine...line...

..ten...hen...

A "Devon" is a breed of cattle. B-G & S give no tune.

The English Dialect Dictionary defines "play nick-nack" as a North Country expression meaning "'To make a sound as with castanets or 'bones.'" The earliest example is from a text of "The Keach i' the Creel" printed in 1846.


The song, accompanied by the familiar tune, was printed in Lorraine d'Oremieulx Warner's "Kindergarten Book of Folk Songs" (N.Y.: G. Schirmer, 1923). The lyrics are the same, except for "three-knee," "eight-pate," and "nine-spine."


My grandmother, born in NYC in the 1880s, often used the word "paddywhack" somewhat humorously to mean a slap delivered to a child's bottom.

She didn't sing the song, however.