A RELIC OF CHRISTIAN POETRY

Caedmon’s Hymn is the oldest poem to be recorded
in Old English, the language of the Anglo-Saxon
settlers of Great Britain. Its author, Caedmon, was
supposedly an illiterate cow-herder who nonetheless could
compose lyrics in praise of God. The Hymn is his only known
work, surviving to this day and age mainly through the Venerable
Bede’s ex libris, the Ecclesiastical History of the English
People, first written in 731 AD.

 

Caedmon’s Hymn

“Now we must honor the Guardian
of Heaven,
The might of the Architect, and His
purpose,
The work of the Father of glory
As he, the eternal Lord, established
the beginning of wonders;
He first created for the children of
men
Heaven as a roof, the holy creator
Then the guardian of mankind,
The eternal lord, afterwards
appointed the middle earth,
The lands for men, the Lord Almighty.”