Oh to be as mad as a March hare

 “Thanne þey begyn to swere and to stare, And be as braynles as a Marshe hare”

(Then they begin to swerve and to stare, And be as brainless as a March hare)

These words appear in a fifteenth century poem called Blowbol’s Test. The origin of the phrase “as brainless as a March hare” came about because people saw hares boxing with other hares, jumping vertically and generally displaying abnormal behavior during the month of March, seemingly for no reason. Since they could not explain the behavior, the observers decided that the animals must be temporarily mad.

  The actual phrase “mad as a March hare” appears in a book written by John Heywood, the playwright. In addition to his plays, now mostly forgotten, he collected and published several comprehensive sets of proverbs and epigrams that were in use in Tudor England. In 1546 he published the largest and best-known of these: A Dialogue conteinyng the nomber in effect of all the Prouerbes in the Englishe tongue. The proverbs scattered throughout the rambling text appear in the form of rhyming couplets. One of these reads: 

“Contrary to reason ye stampe and ye stare.

Ye frete and ye fume, as mad as a marche hare.”

The phrase “Mad as a March hare” was still in use in the time of Lewis Carroll when he was writing hisbook Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. In the book, published in 1865, Carroll truly popularized (and thereby immortalized) the saying. For the book he created a character called the March Hare, whom most will recognize as the friend and tea party host of the Mad Hatter. In the story Alice reaches the March Hare's house in time for an outdoor tea-party. In attendance are Alice, the March Hare, the Mad Hatter, and a Dormouse. A very peculiar conversation ensues and here is a piece of it:

'Have some wine,' the March Hare said in an encouraging tone. 

Alice looked around the table, but there was nothing on it but tea. 'I don't see any wine,' she remarked. 

'There isn't any,' said the March Hare.

So there you have it, the March Hare is definitely a few sandwiches short of a picnic. In the early illustrations of Carroll’s book the March Hare is shown wearing straw around his head, which was a common way to depict madness in Victorian times.

   Eventually, once they were able to get past the idea that hares lost their marbles in March, naturalists came to the conclusion that what they were seeing was male hares fighting for breeding supremacy. This was a perfectly reasonable conclusion to make as many male animals fight, display, sing, and otherwise show off during the breeding season. However, more recently, zoologists proved that the behavior actually involves females fighting off the advances of overzealous frisky suitors. I should note here that jackrabbits, which we have here in the U.S., display similar behavior. The name Jackrabbit is a misnomer, these animals are hares, not rabbits. They were named for their long donkey-like ears. Jacks are male donkeys, hence the name “Jackrabbit.” Sometimes the common names of animals make no sense at all. 

Painting of the boxing hares by Bridget Syms

Illustration of the March Hare by Sir John Tenniel