The lyric “I gave my love a cherry that had no stone” begins the first riddle in “The Riddle Song.”
The song is also known as “I Gave My Love a Cherry.” It is a traditional English-language folk song built from impossible or paradoxical images, including a cherry without a stone and a baby without crying.
The final verse provides answers to the riddles, explaining that the images refer to natural or biblical ideas. Like many folk songs, it exists in multiple versions with changes in wording and order.
The song became widely known through folk revival performers, but its underlying riddle tradition is older than most modern recordings.