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As the clock strikes midnight and the world ushers in 2026partygoers around the world will sing “Auld Lang Syne,” a song about “an old acquaintance be forgotten” and, well, other lyrics that people might not remember from the New Year’s song.
The song’s origins date back to an 18th-century Scottish ballad, with “Auld Lang Syne” eventually becoming a staple of New Year’s celebrations. Experts have explained the lyrics, origin and enduring nature of the song.
What does “auld lang syne” mean?
Roughly translated, the phrase means “long old” or “for old times’ sake.” The title of the song is actually in Scottish languagewhich is similar to English, according to the Scottish National Tourist Board.
“‘Auld Lang Syne’ can be translated literally as ‘Old Long Since,’ but literal English does not convey a sense of what that means to a user of Scots, where it refers to a shared past that underpins the current relationships of a family, community or professional/social association,” Professor Murray Pittock, a literary historian at the Robert Burns Study Center at the University of Glasgow, told CBS News in 2023. “As such it is more evocative and nostalgic and communally unifying than any simple English equivalent.
What are the origins of the song?
Today’s song is taken from a publication by Scottish poet Robert Burns. The poet was trying to preserve Scottish language and culture after the formation of the United Kingdom by Scotland and England, according to the Scottish National Tourist Board. So he traveled the country and collected old Scottish poetry and songs, notably “Auld Lang Syne”.
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“Burns said in one of the letters on display that he had listened to an old man singing the song and that it had never been printed or handwritten until he wrote it down from this old man singing,” said Christine Nelson, who once organized a song exhibition at the Morgan Library in Manhattan, told CBS News in 2012.
The song Burns wrote dates back to “Auld Kyndness Forgot,” which was preserved in a 1568 manuscript, Pittock said.
Historians believe that Burns significantly rewrote the words.
“He made no secret of the fact that he was doing what he called ‘fixing’ these old songs,” Nelson said in his 2012 interview. “So that they could be, you know, given to the public for posterity.”
His words were first published in 1796, according to the Library of Congress. Burns also sent a slightly revised version to a publisher in 1793, but this version was not published until 1799, three years after Burns’ death. The best-known set of words for “Auld Lang Syne” is that published in 1799.
Why do we sing this song every New Year’s Eve?
Although the song has Scottish roots, its popularity in the United States is due to a Canadian.
Bandleader Guy Lombardo popularized it after he and his Royal Canadian Big Band played it on a New Year’s Eve broadcast in 1929. In 1965, Lombardo said LIFE magazine that he came from a part of western Ontario with a large Scottish population. In this region, it was tradition for groups to end each dance with “Auld Lang Syne.”
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“The main reason Lombardo has been identified as the ghost of New Year Past, New Year Present and New Year Yet to Come,” he says, “is because Auld Lang Syne is our theme song – and that was way before anyone heard us on the radio.” LIFE reported.
After Lombardo’s show in 1929, “Auld Lang Syne” became part of popular culture, playing in “Forrest Gump,” “Sex and the City” and “When Harry Met Sally.”
Harry and Sally even have a conversation about the song, trying to understand its meaning.
“I don’t know for the life of me what that song means,” says Harry, played by actor and comedian Billy Crystal, in the 1989 film. “I mean, ‘should you forget an old acquaintance?’ Does this mean that we have to forget old knowledge or does it mean that if we forget it, we have to remember it, which is not possible because we have already forgotten it?
“Well, maybe that just means we should remember that we forgot about them or something,” Meg Ryan’s character Sally responds. “Anyway, they’re old friends.”
THE U.S. Embassy in Italy perhaps explained it best in a blog post: “The lyrics of ‘Auld Lang Syne’ ask the question: How can we better remember memories, friends, and experiences from previous years?” The answer, Burns tells us, is to “share one more cup of kindness” as we enter the new year.
