Happy first day of Christmas!
"A partridge in a pear tree" is the gift of the day (as the old song goes), but I have to admit, I don't actually know what a partridge is! Some kind of bird I think!
I know--let's check the handy resource known as Wikipedia.
From the Partridge page:
These are medium-sized birds, intermediate between the larger pheasants and the smaller quail. Partridges are native to the grassy steppes of Europe, Asia, Africa and the Middle East. Nowadays they are often found nesting on agricultural land. They nest on the ground and have a diet consisting of seeds, grapes and insects. Species such as the grey partridge and the red-legged partridge are popular as game birds, and are often reared in captivity and released for the purpose of hunting. For the same reason, they have been introduced into large areas of North America.
Learn something new every day. Wait a second... "A partridge in a pear tree"..."They nest on the ground".... Most curious indeed.
It's a bit of a conundrum. A paradox. Why has the singer's true love placed a partridge in a pear tree? For how else did the partridge come to be in the tree...?
What is the meaning of this?
I've gone down the rabbit hole now. It seems that the song has evolved over time like a giant game of telephone! The lyrics have many alternative versions... almost too many to count, but our friends at Wikipedia have produced this handy resource: The Twelve Days of Christmas (song).
I call your attention to 2 (two) major points: (1) The incredible chart highlighting differences in the lyrics and their order in various printed versions of the song and (2) As made note of by Cecil Sharp: in French, the word perdrix (partridge) sounds an awful lot like pear-tree. An intentional bit of word play? Or an accidental addition... A mistake of the ear... A misunderstanding.
At this point the world will likely never know the truth. Alas, it will remain one of the few great unsolved mysteries of our time.
-Frank
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