Help me a find a public domain version of "Rub a dub dub"
August 15, 2015 11:03 AM   Subscribe

I am guessing there many recorded versions of the traditional nursery rhyme "Rub a dub dub / Three men in a tub" out there in the wild. The question is, are there any older versions that are part of the public domain and could be used in a song without worries of copyright? Even hints about where to start looking would be appreciated!

Just for reference:
Rub-a-dub-dub,
Three men in a tub,
And who do you think they were?
The butcher, the baker,
The candlestick-maker,
They all sailed out to sea,
'Twas enough to make a man stare.
posted by jeremias to Media & Arts (9 answers total)
 
I have a couple of Child Craft books (1949 editions), one has a version of Rub-a-Dub-Dub that goes:
Rub-a-dub-dub,
Three men in a tub;
And who do you think they be?
The butcher, the baker,
The candlestick-maker;
And all of them gone to sea.

The poem is given no attribution and there is no copyright on it, the illustrations were created for the book and are under copyright.
posted by agatha_magatha at 12:40 PM on August 15, 2015


To clarify — you're looking for audio recordings of it? Or you just want to know if there are public domain written versions?
posted by nebulawindphone at 1:10 PM on August 15, 2015


The lyrics themselves are from at least 1798- so definitely public domain
posted by rockindata at 2:04 PM on August 15, 2015


Response by poster: Doh, I should have been more specific, yes I'm looking for audio recordings.
posted by jeremias at 6:23 PM on August 15, 2015


Response by poster: So because my inbox isn't flooding with examples, I'm broadening the scope of my question. At this point I'm looking for *any* nursery rhyme audio recordings that have been digitized and are in the public domain.

This is the sort of thing the Internetz was meant for right? However, examples remain elusive.
posted by jeremias at 5:40 AM on August 16, 2015


Very few sound recordings are in the US public domain -- as in, practically none (see Public Domain Sound Recordings).
posted by slkinsey at 9:47 AM on August 16, 2015


Also, I'm not sure why you would suppose that there are many recorded examples of this nursery rhyme, but I wouldn't think so. What would be the interest? Spoken word must be the least common form of published audio recording.
posted by slkinsey at 9:49 AM on August 16, 2015


Response by poster: Good points all, my assumption was that music/stories for children would have been recorded for commercial purposes to entertain kids, but maybe that's a relatively recent thing.
posted by jeremias at 5:12 PM on August 16, 2015


Any nursery rhyme audio recordings that have been digitized and are in the public domain, you say?

Librivox has you covered:

Our Old Nursery Rhymes
Ring o' Roses: A Nursery Rhyme Picture Book
In the Nursery of my Bookhouse

Wow. That's DOZENS of nursery rhymes and I didn't see a single "Rub-a-Dub Dub". Sorry.

However, if you'd like to contribute to the Librivox project, that's something you could add!
posted by kristi at 10:41 AM on August 18, 2015


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