“There Once Was a Girl From Nantucket” (Origin and Meaning)

The specific origin of the limerick is unknown, likely spoken between ancestral friends long before ever being written down. The first publication of limericks began in the 18th century, but didn’t really gain any popularity until the 19th century. Some believe that limericks were originally made to be naughty. Whether this is true or not, they have certainly been vulgarised today.

In this article, we are going to be discussing the limerick ‘there once was a girl from Nantucket’, which has since grown into several versions.

Origin of the phrase

Nantucket is in fact a real place, based in Massachusetts, USA. It is often used for rhyming as the name fits a number of words. This town is one of the settings from the famous book ‘Moby Dick’, and in the 19th century, it was the whaling capital of the world.

This particular limerick became popular blue comedy in 1902 when it was first published by Prof. Dayton Voorhees in ‘Princeton Tiger’. Now, the limerick is so popular that many ribald versions have been written, as well as commonly been told as a stand-alone joke, related to something obscene. Typically, these limericks are hyper-sexualized.

The limericks
Below are 3 of the most well-known versions of the limerick, starting with the original dirty one.

Female version
“There once was a girl from Nantucket,

Who crossed the sea in a bucket.

When she got there,

They asked for a fare,

So she lifted her dress and said ‘f*** it!”.

Male version
“There once was a man from Nantucket,

Who’s d**k was so big he could suck it.

He said with a grin,

As he wiped off his chin,

If my ear were a c**t I would f**k it”.

Clean version
“There once was a man from Nantucket,

Who kept all his cash in a bucket.

But his daughter named Nan,

Ran away with a man,

And as for the bucket, Nantucket”.

Conclusion

‘There once was a girl from Nantucket’ is the first line from a limerick about a girl who couldn’t pay her fare, so she provided a sexual favour instead. Then, it was based upon a well-endowed man. Its clean version is about a man who keeps his change in a bucket.

Poetry has taken many different forms with intellectual meanings, deep emotional meanings, and spiritual meanings. But sometimes, it’s also just sexualized comedy originating from drunken stories.