Tell me the origin and meaning of the phrase "eany meany minny mo" and
what typically follows it as in "..catch a _________"

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Request for Question Clarification by pinkfreud-ga on 24 Mar 2005 16:51 PST

Does this article provide a satisfactory answer to your question?

http://tinyurl.com/6jcgz

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Clarification of Question by kedo-ga on 24 Mar 2005 20:10 PST

Use of the rhyme that begins "eany meany minno mo" suggest several
follow on messages to people.  I am interested in where it came from
and what the original meaning was about.

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Request for Question Clarification by pinkfreud-ga on 24 Mar 2005 21:39 PST

Beyond the material provided in the link I posted above, can you tell
us what other information you need? I'm not sure I understand what you
mean by "several follow on messages to people."

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Clarification of Question by kedo-ga on 25 Mar 2005 07:41 PST

Yes, the article gave me just what I need.  Thanks

I'm glad to have been able to find the information you needed. I was
hesitant, at first, to answer this question, since I knew that a good
answer would inevitably involve the use of a racial slur that is often
part of the "eeny meeny" counting rhyme. To avoid using that word on
Google Answers, I have decided to answer by posting links to sites
which disuss the rhyme, its origins, and its variant forms.

The link posted above is an abbreviation of the link which leads to this page:

"Eeny, meeny, miny, moe or eeny, meenie, minie, moe is a children's
counting rhyme, used to select 'it' in games and similar purposes. The
rhyme has been around in various forms since the 1850s or earlier.
Some historians have associated the words 'eenie meeny miny moe' with
Celtic Druid counting words. Since many similar counting rhymes
existed earlier and since that time, it is difficult to ascertain the
exact origin of the modern rhyme."

Absolute Astronomy: Eeny, meeny, miny, moe
http://www.absoluteastronomy.com/encyclopedia/E/Ee/Eeny,_meeny,_miny,_moe.htm

Much more information about the rhyme is available from the site mentioned above.

Here are some additional links to articles about the rhyme that I hope
you'll find interesting:

Nodeworks Encyclopedia: Eeny, meeny, miny, moe
http://pedia.nodeworks.com/E/EE/EEN/Eeny,_meeny,_miny,_moe/

The Phrase Finder: Eeny meeny miny mo
http://www.phrases.org.uk/bulletin_board/18/messages/777.html

Word Origins: Eeny, Meany, Miney, Moe
http://www.wordorigins.org/wordore.htm#Eeny

Google search strategy:

Google Web Search: "miny OR miney mo OR moe" druid OR celtic
://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=%22miny+OR+miney+mo+OR+moe%22+druid+OR+celtic

I hope this is helpful. If anything is unclear or incomplete, please
request clarification; I'll be glad to offer further assistance before
you rate my answer.

Best regards,
pinkfreud

The answer was completely responsive to my questions - well worth the money.

There is a German "Abzählreim" (counting rhyme for the same purpose)
that starts the same:

Ene mene miste,                 nonsense rhyming ?
Es rappelt in der Kiste,        it rattles in the box  (maybe from dice games?)  
Ene mene meck,                   nonsense rhyming ? 
Und du bist weg.                and you are out  (weg rhymes with meck, here)

"ene" and "mene" sound like low German and Dutch:  ene = one, mene = mine   

Although the references cannot report a date earlier than 1855, I have
to doubt that children's rhymes for the same purpose and with this
similarity could have evolved independent from one another, believe
that they must be older and just don't have any earlier source  -who
was recording children's rhymes before then?

Words have meaning, had a meaning once, even when they are lost, and
preserved in a rhyme for that reason.  Let me expand: another counting
situation, sharing a number of sweets, making piles for each person: 
"one = ene/eeny (for you), mine = mene/meeny (or miney, for me) ...

There just have to have been a meaning and an early source for such
similar rhymes for the same purpose, and my German/Dutch connection
would rule out a Celtic one.  Latin seems pretty far fetched. A
children's (or even an adults' game rhyme would be more likely to come
from the vernacular.

"...by the toe"  Chicken, tiger, nigger?  Only the latter "hollers" in
my usage, but to give credence to my above, earlier rhymes must have
then used a different word for what the chicken or tiger did.

Tracing the precise origins of old folk rhymes of this sort is not an
easy matter. I spent several hours on this, and the links posted in my
answer were the best material I could find. Sometimes speculation is
all we have. You may find fault with the lack of factual information,
but please do not blame the messenger.

kedo,

Thank you very much for the five stars and the nice tip!

~pinkfreud

Hi, sorry, Pinkfreud-ga, and Kedo-ga,
I should have started my comment by pointing out that I agree with
your answer, that it is the best one that the web and probably the
literature can supply, but that the existence of the German rhyme
seems to indicate that the rhyme dates from before 1855.  My apologies
for letting you think I was criticizing your answer.
Happy Easter!  Myoarin