Mabh Savage
Words and the world passing by; how it sings to me; how I clamour back.
Magpies
Photo by me, Magpie through a rainy window, copyright 2017.
One for Sorrow
Two for Joy
Three for a Girl
Four for a Boy
Five for Silver
Six for Gold
Seven for a Secret
Ne’er to be told.
Ok, most of us will know some version of that rhyme, a strange form of avian divination that relies upon there never being eight magpies or more. But have you also heard:
Once a Wish
Twice a Kiss
Thrice a Letter
Four, something better…
I was taught this as a little girl, but this was also interchangeable as a sneezing rhyme.
One website, nurseryrhymes.org, gives us a further verse to the original rhyme:
Eight for a Wish
Nine for a Kiss
Ten for a Bird
You must not miss.
But this seems to me to simply be a rough amalgamation of the two rhymes, with a filler line thrown in at the end to round it off neatly.
Terry Pratchett also gave this alternative version, in Carpe Jugulum:
One for Sorrow
Two for Mirth
Three for a Funeral
Four for a Birth
Five for Heaven
Six for Hell
Seven’s the De’il
His ane Sel.
Another well known magpie superstition is to salute the birds if you should happen to see them. Or to say ‘Hello’ and touch your forelock.
All these superstitions (except the sneeze rhyme) revolve around the idea that to see a lone magpie is bad luck, and by acknowledging the bird you are breaking the curse; dispelling the bad vibes, so to speak.
Countrylife.co.uk tells us that to see a crow immediately after a magpie cancels any bad luck, which just shows how much we revere corvids in the British Isles, and how much power we associate with them.
Pica pica lonesome is a portent of doom, but a group of magpies is a mischief. What magpie superstitions do you know, and what’s local to your area?
Mabh Savage 