There’s no place like home

The proverbial saying ‘There’s no place like home’ is usually, but incorrectly, said to be from the 1823 song Home, Sweet Home, words by John Payne and music by Sir Henry Bishop. The song includes these lines:

‘Mid pleasures and palaces
Though we may roam,
Be it ever so humble,
There’s no place like home.
A charm from the skies
Seems to hallow us there,
Which seek thro’ the world,
Is ne’er met with elsewhere.
Home, home, sweet sweet home,
There’s no place like home,
There’s no place like home.

There is some doubt as to who wrote the lyrics of this song. In his later life Bishop claimed he did.

What isn’t in doubt is that neither Bishop nor Payne coined the phrase ‘there’s no place like home’.

The proverb had been widely used in England for many years before it appeared in the song. Here’s an example of its use, from the The English newspaper The Bath Chronicle, September 1781:

But this maxim mind –
No place like Home
For safety will you find

See also: the List of Proverbs.