Ri-ra-slip

Ri-ra-rutsch is a widespread nursery rhyme that has been passed down since the 19th century.

The verse "Ri ra slip, we drive in the carriage" has been documented in printed form since 1831 at the latest. The quote appeared at the time without any further context, its origin was given as Berlin .

The verse can be found in various nursery rhymes with different contexts since the first half of the 19th century. In children's rounds or moving singing games , the children stand in pairs next to each other, cross hands and walk in circles with one another. The verse "Ri ra slide, we are driving in the carriage" marks the spot, and they turn around in the last verse. In other Singspiel variants, the word "Kutsch" changes direction, and "Rutsch" turns again.

Text variants

Come on, let's wander,
from one city to another,
ri, ra, slip!
we ride in the coach.
               (Berlin?, 1848)

We want to wander,
From one city to another;
If a cruiser is on the table
, pay it who owes it.
Ri, ra, slip,
we ride in the carriage .
               (from Swabia, 1851)

We want to go for a walk,
we want to see the king.
Ri ra slip!
The king rides in the carriage.

Ri, ra, rutschika,
we're moving to America,
Ri, ra, rutschika,
we're driving in the carriage !
               (Reichenbach, 1867)

Ri, ra, slip,
the girls dance Schuttsch, the
boys dance waltzes,
these are the best dancers.
               (Chemnitz, before 1877)
Ri, ra, slip,
we ride in the coach ,
up to the green edge,
there is a musician.
               (Stollberg, before 1877)

In 1897 the rhyme was first printed as a nursery rhyme in the work Deutsches Kinderlied und Kinderspiel by Franz Magnus Böhme .

Ri ra slip,
we're going by carriage .
We take the train, there are
lots of girls hanging on it.
Ri ra slip,
we're going by carriage .
            (From the Rhine)

Böhme published this text as part of a group of verses, one of which is underlaid with a melody in 2/4 time text:

Come on, let's wander from one city to another,
ri-ra-slip, we ride in the carriage.

Come on, let's wander from one city to another,
ri-ra-slip, we ride in the golden carriage. We ride in the golden carriage, we ride

on a donkey,
ri-ra-rutsch, we ride in the golden carriage.

Over the years there have been several other - sometimes joking - modifications of the nursery rhyme. On the one hand, one speaks of a penny, in other examples one speaks of a Heller. The nursery rhyme used today:

Ri-ra-rutsch
We go with the carriage We go with the
snail mail
where it doesn't cost a penny.
Ri-ra-rutsch
We go with the carriage

This text version takes up parts of another song about the snail mail occurring in the text , which was recorded in 1871 under the title I drive with the post in the Hungarian Ödenburg . The origin of the text was described as popular, the Austrian post horn signal served as the melody .

I drive, i drive, i drive to the post office!
Ride on the snail
mail that Kreutzer eats for me.
I drive, i drive, i drive to the post office.

Later the song was translated into High German with Ich fahr mit der Schneckenpost or Ich fahr, ich fahr (Schneckenpost) .

Ri-ra-slip!
We drive in the coach,
We drive over hill and dale,
The white horse breaks a leg.
Ri-ra-slip!
We ride in the carriage!

Ri-ra-rides!
We're going with the sledge,
we're going across the deep lake, then
the sledge breaks in, oh dear!
Ri-ra-rides!
There is the sledge in the lake!

Ri-ra-romnibus!
We take the omnibus;
The coachman sleeps, then it goes: bum!
The old box falls over.
Ri-ra-romnibus!
There is the omnibus!

Ri-ra-soot!
Now let's go on foot!
We won't break a mold
leg either, or a sledge will break in!
Ri-ra-soot!
Doesn't fall for an omnibus!

Rirarutsch,
we ride in the coach, we
shoot with cannons,
peas, lentils, beans.
Rirarutsch,
we're going in the carriage .

Melodies

Editing and reception

In her Theresienstadt nursery rhyme , which was written between 1942 and 1944 in the Theresienstadt ghetto , the writer Ilse Weber (1903–1944) used the nursery rhyme model to put the hopelessness of the situation in the ghetto into words.

Theresienstadt nursery rhyme

Rira, rirarutsch,
we ride in the corpse
carriage, rira, rirarutsch,
we ride in the carriage.
We stand here and stand there
and swiftly move the corpses away,
rirarutsch,
we drive in the carriage.

Rira, rirarutsch,
what we once had is now gone,
rira, rirarutsch,
everything has long been gone.
The joy is gone,
the home is gone, the last suitcase is moving ,
oh fright, rirarutsch,
now the corpse carriage away.

Rira, rirarutsch,
we are harnessed to the corpse carriage.
Rira, rirarutsch,
we are harnessed to the carriage.
If she had loaded our sorrow,
we wouldn't come three paces,
rirarutsch, the coach
would then be too heavy.

Footnotes

1. ^ Wilhelm Wackernagel : About conjugation and word formation through ablaut in German, Greek and Latin. In: Archives for Philology and Education. 1, 1831, pp. 17–50, here p. 25 ( digitized in the Google book search).
2. ↑ Hermann Dunger : Children's songs and children's games from the Vogtlande with an introductory lecture on the nature of popular children's songs. 2nd Edition. Neupert, Plauen 1894, p. 164 ( digitized in the Google book search)
3. ^ ^{A b} Karl Wehrhan : Frankfurt Children's Life in Customs and Customs, Children's Song and Children's Play. Staadt, Wiesbaden 1929, p. 227 f. ( Digitized version ).
4. ↑ ^{a b} Friedrich Zimmer : Popular game songs and song games for school and nursery. Vieweg, Quedlinburg 1879, pp. 44 f., 58; Digitized .
5. ↑ Ri-ra-rutsch on labbe.de.
6. ^ A. Kuhn : Children's songs. Mostly collected and communicated in Berlin. In: New yearbook of the Berlin Society for German Language and Antiquity . 8, 1848, pp. 227–238, here p. 231 ( digitized in the Google book search).
7. ^ Ernst Heinrich Meier : German children's rhymes and children's games from Swabia. Ludw. Friedr. Fues, Tübingen 1851, p. 98 ( digitized in the Google book search).
8. ↑ Edmund Kretschmer (arr.): Orpheus in the nursery. 50 joke and occasional songs with piano accompaniment, etc. Bock, Dresden oJ [1865], p. 13 ( digitized in the Google book search).
9. ↑ Johann August Ernst Köhler : Popular custom, superstition, sagas and other old traditions in Voigtlande, with consideration of the Orlagau and the Pleissnerland. F. Fleischer, Leipzig 1867, p. 198 ( digitized in the Google book search)
10. ↑ Th. Yellow: Children's songs and rhymes. In: Germania. Quarterly publication for German antiquity. 29 (= Neue Reihe 10), 1877, pp. 293-315, here p. 307 ( digitized version in the Google book search).
11. ^ Franz Magnus Böhme: German children's song and children's game. Breitkopf and Härtel, Leipzig 1897, p. 594 f. ( Textarchiv - Internet Archive ).
12. ↑ Ri-ra-slip. In: lieder-archiv.de. Retrieved on August 5, 2021 (German). 
13. ↑ Ludwig Erk , Franz Magnus Böhme (ed.): Deutscher Liederhort . Volume 3. Breitkopf and Härtel, Leipzig 1894, p. 597 ( digitized version ).
14. ↑ Ingeborg Weber-Kellermann : The book of children's songs. Schott, Mainz 1997, ISBN 978-3-254-08370-8 , pp. 79/80.
15. ↑ I'm going with the snail mail labbe.de
16. ↑ Maria Kühn: Open the gate! Old German children's songs, rhymes, jokes and singing games, some with melodies. 126-131. Thousand. Karl Robert Langewiesche Verlag, 1937 (1905); P. 74 ( digitized version ).
17. ↑ Monika Koster, Ernst Klusen (Ed.), Mouche Vormstein (Ill.): The most beautiful children's songs and nursery rhymes. Naumann & Göbel, Cologne undated [1987], ISBN 3-625-10721-X , p. 74.
18. ↑ Raphaela Tkotzyk: KZ-Lyrik: On the problem of the linguistic representability of the Holocaust using the example of the poem "Theresienstädter Kinderreim" by Ilse Weber. Lecture, 2016 ( academia.edu ; PDF), accessed on August 31, 2021.
19. ↑ Ilse Weber: Suffering lives within your walls - poems from the Theresienstadt concentration camp. Bleicher, Gerlingen 1991, ISBN 3-88350-718-0 , p. 89 ( online ). Also in: Ilse Weber: When will the suffering come to an end. Letters and poems from Theresienstadt. Hanser, Munich 2008, ISBN 978-3-446-23050-7 , p. 230.