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In the HoME, Christopher Tolkien tells a bit of the background of this poem. It was originally published in 1923, and the undertitle is "A Nursery Rhyme Undone and its Scandalous Secret Unlocked". Apparently JRRT felt that such a strange nursery rhyme needed a background explanation and came up with the poem which expands on it. Later he changed it somewhat and put it in the LotR as Frodo's song in the 'Prancing Pony'.
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'Mercy!' cried Gandalf. 'If the giving of information is to be the cure of your inquisitiveness, I shall spend all the rest of my days in answering you. What more do you want to know?' 'The whole history of Middle-earth.. .'
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