"Molly Malone" (A Song)

As Benjamin Keatinge highlights, “Molly Malone” (also known as “Cockles and Mussels”) is one of the most well-known street ballads in Ireland and is the unofficial anthem for the Leinster and Irish rugby teams.[1] The song, which recounts the tale of a beautiful fishmonger who dies of fever in the seventeenth century and returns to haunt the streets and peddle her wares, originated in the late-nineteenth century and has varied little since its beginnings.[2] In his examination of diseases throughout history, Dr. R.S. Bray concludes that Molly – be her factual or fictional – was most likely a victim of the Typhus epidemic which swept throughout Europe during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.[3]

In Dublin's fair city, where the girls are so pretty,
I first set my eyes on sweet Molly Malone,
As she wheeled her wheelbarrow thro’ streets broad and narrow
Cryin’ ‘Cockles and mussels! Alive, alive, O!’ 
     Alive, alive, O! Alive, alive, O! 
     Cryin’ ‘Cockles and mussels! Alive, alive, O!’

She was a fishmonger, but sure ‘twas no wonder,
For so were her father and mother before,
And they each wheeled their barrows thro’ streets broad and narrow
Cryin’ ‘Cockles and mussels! Alive, alive, O!’
     Alive, alive, O! Alive, alive, O!
     Cryin’ ‘Cockles and mussels! Alive, alive, O!

She died of a fever, and no one could save her,
And that was the end of sweet Molly Malone.
Now her ghost wheels her barrow thro’ streets broad and narrow
Cryin’ ‘Cockles and mussels! Alive, alive, O!’
     Alive, alive, O! Alive, alive, O!
     Cryin’ ‘Cockles and mussels! Alive, alive, O![4]

Works Referenced

Aldrich, Mark. A Catalog of Folk Song Settings for Wind Band. Galesville, MD: Meredith Music Publications, 2004.

Bray, R.S. Armies of Pestilence: The Impact of Disease on History. New York: James Clark and Company, 1996.

Keatinge, Benjamin. “‘In Dublin’s Fair City’: Joyce, Bloomsday, Dubliners and the Invention of Tradition.” The Beauty of Convention: Essays in Literature and Culture. Ed. Marija Krivokapić-Knežević and Aleksandra Nikčević-Batrićević. Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2014. 51-64.

“Molly Malone.” 500 Best-Loved Sing Lyrics. Ed. Ronald Herder. Mineola, NY: Dover Publications, Inc., 1998. 226.
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[1] Keatinge, 51.
[2] Aldrich, 168.
[3] Bray, 144. 
[4] "Molly Malone," 226.