An egg-shaped figure falls off a wall and proves beyond mending, however many horses and men turn up to try. The rhyme never actually says Humpty is an egg, which is part of its long-running charm and a nice thing to let a child work out for themselves. Four lines are enough to teach the shape of a story: a fall, a failed rescue, an ending.
Sung to its own short tune, or chanted; big pause before the fall.
From Mother Goose / Nursery Rhymes (traditional). See the whole collection.
Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall,
Humpty Dumpty had a great fall;
All the King's horses, and all the King's men
Cannot put Humpty Dumpty together again.
About this poem
Roud Folk Song Index 13026
Humpty Dumpty started life as a riddle, and the answer is an egg. Once you know that, the rest makes sense: a broken egg is the one thing all the king's horses and men truly cannot mend. It was printed as a riddle in the late 1700s, with the egg kept back as the solution to guess. The well-known tale that Humpty was a cannon in the English Civil War came much later and has no evidence behind it.
Play the riddle straight. Before you reach the end, ask your child what Humpty really is, and see if they land on the egg. Rest a hand on the arm of a chair for the wall, then let it topple. It suits any moment a small one needs a laugh.
Public domain. Text from The Real Mother Goose (Blanche Fisher Wright, 1916), via Project Gutenberg. View the source edition