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"As I was going to St Ives" is a traditional nursery rhyme. The earliest known published version of it dates to around 1730. The words are, in one version, as follows:
- As I was going to St Ives
- I met a man with seven wives
- And every wife had seven sacks
- And every sack had seven cats
- And every cat had seven kits
- Kits, cats, sacks, wives
- How many were going to St Ives?
The nursery rhyme is generally thought to be a riddle to which the answer is one. The explanation is that the person reciting the rhyme was going to St Ives, and everyone else was going the opposite way.
Going away from St Ives were: one (1) man, seven (7) wives, seven times seven (49) sacks, seven times seven times seven (343) cats, and seven times seven times seven times seven (2,401) kits, making a total of 8 humans, 49 sacks, and a slightly implausible 2,744 felines; a grand total of 2,800 kits, cats, sacks, and wives (or 2,801 if you include the man).
There are a number of places called St Ives in England and elsewhere.
Rhind Papyrus
A similar problem is found in the Rhind Papyrus (Problem 79), dated to around 1650 BC.
The papyrus is transliterated as follows [1] (http://pup.princeton.edu/books/maor/sidebar_a.pdf):
A house inventory:
| | | houses | 7 |
| 1 | 2,801 | | cats | 49 |
| 2 | 5,602 | | mice | 343 |
| 4 | 11,204 | | spelt | 2,301 |
| | | hekat | 16,807 |
| Total | 19,607 | | Total | 19,607 |
The problem appears to be an illustration of an algorithm for multiplying numbers.
The sequence 7, 7 × 7, 7 × 7 × 7, ..., appears in the right-hand column,
and the terms 2801, 2 × 2801, 4 × 2801 appear in the left;
the sum on the left is 7 × 2801 = 19,607,
the same as the sum of the terms on the right.
Note that the author of the papyrus miscalculated the fourth power of 7;
it should be 2401, not 2301.
However, the sum of the powers (19,607) is correct.
The problem has been paraphrased by modern commentators as a story problem involving houses, cats, mice, and grain,
although in the Rhind Papyrus there is no discussion beyond the bare outline stated above.
It may be noted that the hekat was 1/30 of a cubic cubit,
which makes it about 4.8 liters.
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