It's Raining, It's Pouring

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The oldest version of this rhyme reads:

It's raining, it's pouring
The old man is snoring
He went to bed and he bumped his head
And he couldn't get up in the morning

However, in the more common version, the third line is switched around:

It's raining, it's pouring
The old man is snoring
He bumped his head as he went to bed
And couldn't get up in the morning

With the later version, occasional a more sinister sounding fourth line is used:

And didn't get up in the morning or And never got up in the morning

An alternate version reads:

It's raining, it's pouring
The old man is snoring
He went to bed with a cold in his head
And he didn't get up until morning

Yet another alternate version (although the sources for this are very limited and obscure -- and somewhat obtuse as well):

It's raining, it's pouring
The old man is snoring
He bumped his head on a piece of bread
and couldn't get up in the morning

[edit] Parody

For Shakespeare's Macbeth:

It's raining, it's pouring,
The old king's not snoring
He got into bed and was found dead
When they went to him in the morning

[edit] Popular culture

  • A children's book of the same name, written by Kin Eagle and illustrated by Rob Gilbert, expands on this rhyme to show what happens to the old man in all sorts of weather.
  • The PC game Delaware St. John Volume 1: The Curse of Midnight Manor, begins with the ghost of a little girl singing this rhyme in a spooky manner while it's storming outside.