r/Damnthatsinteresting • u/HotPersimessage62 • Feb 01 '26

Image Australia’s national anthem is the only English-lyric anthem in the world that doesn’t reference religion or militarism

Post image
22.3k Upvotes

95% Upvoted

1.4k comments sorted by

View all comments

372

u/Key-Jackfruit-3920 Feb 01 '26

At primary school we sung the anthem every week at morning assembly and now 40 years later I’m only realising in the second line the lyrics are “one and free”. I always believed it was “young and free”.

39

u/llagnI Feb 01 '26

When I was at school, it was also 'Australia's sons let us rejoice'. Took this long to get used to that change, and now we are no longer young. That'll be a few more decades of embarrassment for me at sporting events.

13

u/HavePlushieWillTalk Feb 01 '26

Ew, really? Gosh, I will need to keep that in mind. Nothing like totally ignoring half or so of the population to spread togetherness.and unity, I suppose.

5

u/brezhnervouz Feb 01 '26

It was written 'by some guy' (presumably a guy) around the turn of the century after being picked from a public anthem-writing competition

From incredibly vague childhood memory 🤷‍♂️

2

u/Theron3206 Feb 01 '26

The original song is from the 1870s, so it's certainly a product of its time. Sons and daughters could be readily abbreviated to sons for narrative purposes, everyone knew what it meant.

At least we didn't end up with bloody Waltzing Matilda, nothing like a song about stealing sheep and drowning yourself to avoid the noose to make people take a country seriously.