# Man \*on\* the Moon to mean the mythical character? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [August 15, 2014, 4:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/man-on-the-moon-to-mean-the-mythical-character/695583 "2014-08-15T04:40:28Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 14\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spectre_of_pithecanthropus/32/12343_2.png) [@Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spectre_of_Pithecanthropus)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2014, 4:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/man-on-the-moon-to-mean-the-mythical-character/695583/1 "2014-08-15T04:40:28Z")
Today as we were driving somewhere the song “Cat’s In The Cradle” came on the radio. Now, I already got my fill of early 1970s folk music quite some time back, namely in the early 1970s. But the first two lines of this song’s chorus have always rubbed me the wrong way for an additional reason: > [@Harry Chapin](#): > > ``` > Cat's in the cradle and the silver spoon > Little Boy Blue and the Man *On* The Moon > > ``` (Italics mine.) To me this passage has always suggested that as early 1974, popular culture was already conflating the recent historical events concerning men _on_ the moon with the old myths of a man _in_ the moon. I’m not saying Chapin didn’t know the difference, but it appears that he couldn’t be bothered to write it down that way. At times, in retrospect, this lyric even seemed to be an early hint of the meh future of space exploration which we now know to have come true. There would be no more of these soul-stirring crewed expeditions to other worlds. This time today, however, I thought of another possibility: perhaps some English speakers, whether idiosyncratically by themselves or as as part of dialect populations, have always said “man on the moon” to mean the old fable. Are there any populations that do this? I’ve never heard it myself, though. What say ye? ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2014, 6:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/man-on-the-moon-to-mean-the-mythical-character/695583/2 "2014-08-15T06:50:36Z")
Some traditions have a man actually _on_ the moon, not just a face. Maybe from that? ---
**Author:** ![aldiboronti](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9fc348/32.png) [@aldiboronti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aldiboronti)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2014, 6:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/man-on-the-moon-to-mean-the-mythical-character/695583/3 "2014-08-15T06:57:42Z")
The OED in a long list of cites from 1325 onwards has not a single instance of the variant _the man on the moon_. I’d say this is simply a case of ignorance at work. ---
**Author:** ![Inna\_Minnit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/5f8ce5/32.png) [@Inna\_Minnit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inna_Minnit)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2014, 7:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/man-on-the-moon-to-mean-the-mythical-character/695583/4 "2014-08-15T07:11:50Z")
Ask Lady Mondegreen. ---
**Author:** ![Lord\_Mondegreen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/91b2a8/32.png) [@Lord\_Mondegreen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lord_Mondegreen)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2014, 7:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/man-on-the-moon-to-mean-the-mythical-character/695583/5 "2014-08-15T07:57:22Z")
She’s not home at the moment, and somehow I don’t think she’ll have much to contribute on the topic. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Isilder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/cc9497/32.png) [@Isilder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Isilder)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2014, 8:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/man-on-the-moon-to-mean-the-mythical-character/695583/6 "2014-08-15T08:45:30Z")
There is a nursery rhyme about “The Man ON the Moon”. See [http://books.google.com.au/books?id=w5z60cOaOBoC&pg=PA84&lpg=PA84&dq="man+on+the+moon"+traditional+rhyme&source=bl&ots=XCp8XWfima&sig=yyqJXlqONtcJLqdTLZ3xzryGQFM&hl=en&sa=X&ei=ScftU\_bTItH2oATm-ILoBg&ved=0CDAQ6AEwAw#v=onepage&q="man%20on%20the%20moon"%20traditional%20rhyme&f=false](http://books.google.com.au/books?id=w5z60cOaOBoC&pg=PA84&lpg=PA84&dq=%22man+on+the+moon%22+traditional+rhyme&source=bl&ots=XCp8XWfima&sig=yyqJXlqONtcJLqdTLZ3xzryGQFM&hl=en&sa=X&ei=ScftU_bTItH2oATm-ILoBg&ved=0CDAQ6AEwAw#v=onepage&q=%22man%20on%20the%20moon%22%20traditional%20rhyme&f=false) Big Book of Seasons, Holidays, and Weather: Rhymes, Fingerplays, and Songs … By Elizabeth Cothen Low , P84 However, this does not actually show that Harry Chaplin on purpose put On rather than In. ---
**Author:** ![Isilder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/cc9497/32.png) [@Isilder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Isilder)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2014, 8:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/man-on-the-moon-to-mean-the-mythical-character/695583/7 "2014-08-15T08:55:00Z")
OF course Elizabeth may be making or repeating a mistake her way, its more plausible that a man IN the moon controls the moon… to personify the moon and make the moon a steerable thing… a man merely ON the moon is more of a passenger on the rock that goes around in a boring orbit. ---
**Author:** ![bob\_2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bob_2/32/3341_2.png) [@bob\_2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bob_2)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2014, 10:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/man-on-the-moon-to-mean-the-mythical-character/695583/8 "2014-08-15T10:57:33Z")
There is a pub near me called “The Man On The Moon”. Many people substitute ‘in’ for ‘on’ thinking of the nursery rhyme, but in fact the pub was named in 1969 to celebrate Armstrong, Collins and Aldrin’s achievement. ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2014, 2:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/man-on-the-moon-to-mean-the-mythical-character/695583/9 "2014-08-15T14:29:14Z")
[This site](http://www.metrolyrics.com/cats-in-the-cradle-lyrics-harry-chapin.html) says “man \*\*\*in \*\*\*the moon.” So does [this site](http://www.sing365.com/music/lyric.nsf/Cat%27s-in-the-Cradle-lyrics-Harry-Chapin/BA220879AAA70B8A48256CAA002DFE9B). This [songbook](http://books.google.com/books?id=Xfv3dlIKX64C&pg=PA28&dq=harry+chapin+cat%27s+in+the+cradle&hl=en&sa=X&ei=shjuU_ykM4qVyASv1YCIAg&ved=0CB4Q6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=harry%20chapin%20cat%27s%20in%20the%20cradle&f=false) also uses “in”. I listened to the song on YouTube and that syllable could have gone either way. You would hear “on” if you wanted to, but “in” if that’s what you were expecting. Just as a side note: the poem was written by Harry’s wife Sandy, and he put it to music. Maybe we should ask her what she meant. ---
**Author:** ![cochrane](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cochrane/32/10441_2.png) [@cochrane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cochrane)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2014, 5:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/man-on-the-moon-to-mean-the-mythical-character/695583/10 "2014-08-15T17:45:55Z")
Google Moon has an image of [a man on the moon](http://pix11.com/2014/08/14/nasa-offers-explanation-for-photo-of-man-on-the-moon/). ---
**Author:** ![Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spectre_of_pithecanthropus/32/12343_2.png) [@Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spectre_of_Pithecanthropus)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2014, 9:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/man-on-the-moon-to-mean-the-mythical-character/695583/11 "2014-08-15T21:00:56Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > Some traditions have a man actually _on_ the moon, not just a face. Maybe from that? A German version of the tale has it that the man was banished to the Moon for gathering firewood, i.e. working, on the Sabbath. On the way home, with his bundle of wood slung diagonally across his back, he meets a stranger “in a Sunday suit” to whom he mocks the Sabbath. The stranger seems to have some power to mete out divine retributions, so he responds by saying “now all your days shall be Mo(o)nday”, and condemns the man to reside in the Moon forever, as a warning to all Sabbath breakers. The _Monday_/_Moonday_ pun works in most Romance and Germanic languages reasonably well, given that the word for Monday is usually based on some variant of “Luna” or “Moon”. Accordingly, in the tradition based on this story, some people prefer to imagine the full figure of the man standing, with his wood still bundled behind his back, as shown [here](http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Curious_Myths_of_the_Middle_Ages/The_Man_in_the_Moon). But even given this version of the story, it doesn’t seem like the man could be _on_ the moon, given that the moon usually seems to be a mere flat disk pasted to the sky’ and it’s hard to see how uneducated peasants would conceive of it as a place _on_ which you can stand and walk around. Speaking for myself, the “face” has always been obvious as far back as I can remember, and seems perfectly calculated to convey the idea of slack-jawed ignorance and credulity. ---
**Author:** ![pulykamell](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pulykamell/32/3166_2.png) [@pulykamell](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pulykamell)\ **Post date:** [August 16, 2014, 12:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/man-on-the-moon-to-mean-the-mythical-character/695583/12 "2014-08-16T00:25:39Z")
> [@Exapno\_Mapcase](#): > > [This site](http://www.metrolyrics.com/cats-in-the-cradle-lyrics-harry-chapin.html) says “man \*\*\*in \*\*\*the moon.” So does [this site](http://www.sing365.com/music/lyric.nsf/Cat%27s-in-the-Cradle-lyrics-Harry-Chapin/BA220879AAA70B8A48256CAA002DFE9B). This [songbook](http://books.google.com/books?id=Xfv3dlIKX64C&pg=PA28&dq=harry+chapin+cat%27s+in+the+cradle&hl=en&sa=X&ei=shjuU_ykM4qVyASv1YCIAg&ved=0CB4Q6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=harry%20chapin%20cat%27s%20in%20the%20cradle&f=false) also uses “in”. > > I listened to the song on YouTube and that syllable could have gone either way. You would hear “on” if you wanted to, but “in” if that’s what you were expecting. Yeah, I’ve always heard it and sang it as “man in the moon,” myself. Listening to it again, I guess I could see how you can hear it as “man on the moon,” but I hear it as “man in the moon.” ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_L.A](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnny_l.a/32/1084_2.png) [@Johnny\_L.A](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_L.A)\ **Post date:** [August 16, 2014, 12:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/man-on-the-moon-to-mean-the-mythical-character/695583/13 "2014-08-16T00:27:57Z")
> [@pulykamell](#): > > Yeah, I’ve always heard it and sang it as “man in the moon,” myself. Listening to it again, I guess I could see how you can hear it as “man on the moon,” but I hear it as “man in the moon.” I’ve always heard ‘in’. ---
**Author:** ![Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spectre_of_pithecanthropus/32/12343_2.png) [@Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spectre_of_Pithecanthropus)\ **Post date:** [August 16, 2014, 2:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/man-on-the-moon-to-mean-the-mythical-character/695583/14 "2014-08-16T02:11:39Z")
Interesting. I’ve always heard it as “on”, without question, and **Johnny** grew up in Southern California same as I did. It could be that the singer’s pronunciation differs slightly in the successive chorus repeats, and each of us has unintentionally focused on a particular repeat as Chapin’s definitive pronunciation.