Cædmon's Hymn

Cædmon's Hymn  (7th century)  by Cædmon

related portals: English literature, Christian poetry, Medieval poetry. sister projects: Wikipedia article. The only known survivor from Cædmon's oeuvre is his Hymn. The poem is known from 21 manuscript copies, making it the best-attested Old English poem after Bede's "Death Song" (35 witnesses) and the best attested in the poetic corpus in manuscripts copied or owned in the British Isles during the Anglo-Saxon period. The Hymn also has by far the most complicated known textual history of any surviving Anglo-Saxon poem.— Excerpted from Cædmon#Cædmon's Hymn on Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

(a) Northumbrian ‘Moore’ Version, Cambridge University Library MS. Kk 5.16 ["Moore"], fol. 128v; ca. AD 737.

Nū scylun hergan hefaenrīces Uard,

Metudæs maecti end his mōdgidanc,

uerc Uuldurfadur, suē hē uundra gihuaes,

ēci dryctin, ōr āstelidæ.

Hē āērist scōp aelda barnum

heben til hrōfe, hāleg Scepen.

Thā middungeard moncynnæs Uard,

ēci Dryctin, æfter tīadæ

firum foldu, Frēa allmectig.

primo cantauit Cædmon istud carmen.

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(b) Northumbrian ‘Leningrad’ Version, Saltykov-Schedrin Public Library MS. Q.v.I.18, fol. 107, from Elliott Van Kirk Dobbie, The Manuscripts of Cædmon's Hymn and Bede's Death Song (New York: Columbia University Press, 1937): 13, 17. PR 1613 D6 Robarts Library. Cf. "Northumbrian Fragments," edited by Henry Sweet, A Second Anglo-Saxon Reader: Archaic and Dialectal, 2nd edn., revised by T. F. Hoad (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1978): 106. AD 746.

Nū scilun herga hefenrīcæs Uard,

Metudæs mehti end his mōdgithanc,

uerc Uuldurfadur, suē hē uundra gihuæs,

ēci Dryctin, ōr āstelidæ.

Hē ǣrist scōp aeldu barnum

heben tō hrōfæ, hālig Sceppend.

Thā middingard moncynnæs Uard,

ēci dryctin, æfter tīadæ

firum foldu, Frēa allmehtig.

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(c) West Saxon Version, Bodleian Library,Tanner MS 10, 10th century.

Nū sculon herigean heofonrīces Weard,

Meotedes meahte ond his mōdgeþanc,

weorc Wuldorfæder, swā he wundra gihwæs,

ēce Drihten, ōr onstealde.

Hē ǣrest sceōp eorðan bearnum

heofon tō hrōfe, hālig Scyppend.

Þā middangeard moncynnes Weard,

ēce Drihten, æfter tēode

firum foldan, Frēa ælmihtig.