Eeper Weeper
Nursery rhyme
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"Eeper Weeper" or "Heeper Peeper" is an English nursery rhyme and skipping song that tells the story of a chimney sweep who kills his second wife and hides her body up a chimney. The rhyme has a Roud Folk Song Index number of 13497.[1]
Lyrics
- Eeper Weeper, chimney sweeper,
- Had a wife but couldn't keep her.
- Had another, didn't love her,
- Up the chimney he did shove her.[2]
Origins
Iona and Peter Opie noted that the rhyme had been used in this form from at least the first decade of the 20th century.[clarification needed][2] 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 may be an older version of "Eeper Neeper" and of "Peter Peter Pumpkin Eater".[3]
