Yan Tan Tethera - Trivia

Trivia

The English composer Harrison Birtwistle (b. 1934) composed a chamber opera entitled Yan Tan Tethera (subtitled "a mechanical pastoral") in 1984 with a libretto by the poet Tony Harrison. It is based on a folk tale about two shepherds, and includes sheep being counted using 'Yan Tan Tethera' and the rival 'One Two Three' system.

Yan Tan Tethera is the name of a book by David Herter related to his first novel, Ceres Storm.

In the Broadway musical The Music Man, Eulalie Mackechnie Shinn, the mayor's wife, uses a different version of the Yan Tan Tethera ("Een Teen Tuther Feather Pip!") in the "Indian Tongue" of her "spectacle" with the schoolchildren.

English chansonnier Jake Thackray wrote, performed and recorded a song about a shepherdess, entitled Old Molly Metcalfe, with the refrain Yan Tean Tether Mether Pip she counted. In the introduction to the song he describes how Swaledale sheep farmers "count their sheep in a curious fashion," and gives the entire sequence from 1 to 20.

In Finnegans Wake, James Joyce quotes the counting rhyme onus, yan, tyan, tethera, methera, pimp.

In The Mating of Lydia, by Mrs Humphrey Ward, the following counting rhyme is quoted as being from the northern dales: "Yan—tyan—tethera—methera—pimp—sethera—lethera—hovera—dovera—dick—Yan-a-dick—tyan-a-dick—tethera-a-dick—methera-a-dick—bumfit—Yan-a-bumfit—tyan-a-bumfit—tethera-a-bumfit—methera-a-bumfit—giggot"

In Terry Pratchett's novel The Wee Free Men the heroine, Tiffany Aching, is called "little jiggit" by her Grandmother, a female shepherd, as Tiffany was her twentieth grandchild; also, the titular race of sheep-stealing pictsies, use the "yan-tan-teth'ra" sequence for counting off. The "yan tan teth'ra" system of counting is said to be used for "important things," such as sheep and grandchildren. (They also use it for groups counting in unison before lifting heavy objects, but usually those are sheep or kine they're stealing.)

In a novel by Bernard Cornwell, Azincourt, the central character is an English archer, preparing for battle in 1415. He "turned to count his men. He did it in the old way of the country, like a shepherd counting his flock, just as his father had taught him. Yain, tain, eddero, he counted and got to bumfit, which was fifteen, and looked for the extra man and saw two. Tain-o-bumfit?"

In Garth Nix novel Grim Tuesday, Grim Tuesday splits his Dawn, Noon, and Dusk servants into seven parts named Yan, Tan, Tethera, Methera, Pits, Sethera and Azer.

Joan Aiken's children's book The Cuckoo Tree features ten "Gentlemen" named Yan, Tan, Tethera, Methera, Pip, Sethera, Wineberry, Wagtail, Tarrydiddle and Den.

The children's album Fiddle Up a Tune by Eric Nagler features a song "Yan Tan Tethera," whose eponymous phrase begins an incantation used to calm leprechauns: "Yan tan tethera, one two three: All you little ones, let us be. Hevapin sethera, four five six: Lay down your magic fiddlesticks."

The Bad Shepherds, a band featuring TV comedian Adrian Edmondson, released an album entitled Yan, Tyan, Tethera, Methera in April 2009. It consists mostly of punk songs performed in the folk style.

In the second series of Catweazle, the eponymous character counts using a form of Yan Tan; this is part of the writer Carpenter's detailed research into historical accuracy for his 1066 wizard character.