I'm starting to realize that it's a pretty good rule of thumb not to look too deep into anything from your childhood. Freud be damned. Nothing is sacred, nothing is safe from your youth. Most people know how fucked up Ring Around The Rosie is. We just said shit because children before us said it. We never questioned it, we never broke down verses or sayings. We just ran around screaming shit until you were too tired and fell asleep drinking a Capri Sun. Olley Olley Oxen Free is no different.
Now nobody knows what Olley Olley Oxen Free means, but you know what it means. As in you understand the implication I'm expressing when I say it, but you never realized that those four words in that order make absolutely no fucking sense. The Dictionary of Regional English believe that the phrase is derived from "all ye, all ye, outs in free!". Meaning, the games over and everyone still hiding, come on out. But children, the shitheads that they are, over decades and decades just changed the phrase to sounds that they know and use and that's how we wound up with this nonsense. Makes you wonder with all these mumble rappers if in 100 years will kids be saying "molly molly, pot is free".
But wait there's more! There's a lot of controversy in the Olley Olley Oxen Free World on the origins of the saying. Some scholars (*mumbles Wikipedia*), believe that it may have actually derived from the German phrase 'alle alle auchs sind frie'. Which if you ask me, sounds a hell of a lot like Olley Olley Oxen Free. The meaning of the saying? All, all, all are free. Meaning "Hey everyone come out of your hiding spots! Look everyone else is free!" Now. Can you think of a time in German history when they might be screaming for people to come out of their hiding spots, and promising them their freedom? Yeah, are you thinking what I'm thinking? Say it on the count of three 1...2...3... Tearing down the Berlin Wall!
Somebody think up a new phrase to say when you reach base, I'm done with this bullshit.
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