The term "mondegreen" was coined by American writer Sylvia Wright in 1954 based on her experience with the lyrics of a song she remembered from childhood. She learned, as an adult, that she had committed to memory words misheard as a child. Wright had heard the Scottish ballad "The Bonnie Earl o' Moray," which contains the line:
"They hae slain the Earl o' Moray, And laid him on the green"
But young Sylvia misheard it as:
"They hae slain the Earl o' Moray, And Lady Mondegreen" |