Claim:   Urban Myths board game falls for a joke about Blackbeard's using a nursery rhyme to recruit fellow pirates.

Status:   True.

Origins:   When we published our "Pocket Full of Wry" page several years ago — a ridiculous little piece of fiction about buccaneers' belting out the nursery rhyme "Sing a Song of Sixpence" in taverns as a covert method of recruiting fellow pirates — we never imagined it would grow such a pair of legs.

The piece was created (with some help from our message board denizens) as a spoof of the fervently believed notion that many nursery rhymes (such as "Ring Around the Rosie") encode hidden messages and as an object lesson in the pitfalls of false authority syndrome — not to mention as a handy little device for catching those who "borrow" material without due diligence. In the last five years, our humorous article has made quite a name for itself: it's been cited in a number of news articles, published on a variety of web sites as the authoritative explanation on the origins of "Sing a Song of Sixpence," and even reported as true by a television program dedicated to "debunking" urban legends.

We thought this one had run its course, so imagine our surprise when a friend recently presented us with a gift of the Urban Myth board game, which challenges players to identify whether the common beliefs stated on game cards are true or false, and we found a familiar story again reported as true:


We noted with sardonic amusement the card that immediately followed this one in the deck:


Last updated:   29 June 2007

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