"Eggs and Marrowbone" (Laws Q2, Roud 183), also known as "There Was An Old Woman", is a traditional folk song of a wife's attempted murder of her husband. Of unknown origins, there are multiple variations. The most well known variations are "The Old Woman From Boston" and "The Rich Old Lady". Other versions include "The Aul' Man and the Churnstaff", and "Woman from Yorkshire." In Scotland it is known as "The Wily Auld Carle" or "The Wife of Kelso." In Ireland there are variations called "The Old Woman of Wexford" and "Tigaree Torum Orum." In England the song is widely known as "Marrowbones". "A similar song, "Johnny Sands" (Roud 184), was written by John Sinclair about 1840 and also became popular with local singers." In this version the husband pretends to be tired of life, and asks his wife to tie his hands behind his back. Herbert Hughes writes that the song is English in origin.

Synopsis

The song concerns an old woman who, in one popular version, loves "her husband dearly, but another man twice as well." She decides to kill him, and is advised by a local doctor that feeding him eggs and marrowbone will make him blind. Thus She fed him eggs and marrowbone And made him sup them all And it wasn't too long before He couldn't see her at all She then arranges to push him into the river. He steps aside and she falls in. Subsequently, She cried for help, she screamed for help And loudly she did bawl The old man said "I'm so blind I can't see you at all!" Despite his blindness, the old man manages to keep her from climbing out of the river by pushing her back in with a pole. She swam around and swam around Until she came to the brim The old man got the linen prop And pushed her further in. (A linen prop is a pole used to prevent washing on a line from blowing about too much). The moral of the song is: Now the old woman is dead and gone And the Devil's got her soul Wasn't she a gosh-darn fool That she didn't grab that pole? Eating eggs and marrowbone Won't make your old man blind So if you want to do him in You must sneak up from behind

Notable versions

Field Recordings

Many of these are available to listen online.