“Rock-a-bye Baby (also known as Hush a Bye Baby) is an 18th century English nursery rhyme and lullaby.
This very popular rhyme probably originates from the days when women working in the hop fields, would tie their babies cradles to the branches of trees to allow the wind to rock them to sleep.
Another possibility is that a Pilgrim youth, a passenger on the Mayflower, wrote the rhyme after seeing the way Native American women rocked their babies in birchbark cradles. Although this supposition makes sense, there is absolutely no written reference to support it.
It was first mentioned in written form in 1765 in Mother Goose’s Melody. Shortly after, in 1785, it was published on American soil as well.
“Rock-a-bye Baby” Lyrics
Rock-a-bye baby, on the treetops,
When the wind blows, the cradle will rock,
When the bough breaks, the cradle will fall,
And down will come baby, cradle and all.