Why is caedmon hymn important to scholars

Smith, ed. I think it, however, equally probable, that they were the composition of the royal translator. This misreading in fact comes from a sixteenth-century transcript, now BL Additional MS 43, , by Laurence Nowell, who presumably conflated Nu and we in the Cotton text. Abrams et al. New York, , Oxford, , Bede would doubtless be chagrined to learn that modern readers rationalized his miracle as our first literary hoax.

Sometimes at parties in convivio his fellow workers would agree among themselves to liven things up by singing songs in turn. One night, when it is his turn anyway to take care of the cattle, he escapes to the stables, where he falls asleep and is urged by a visitor in a dream to sing about Creation.

Figure 1. The Moore Bede, fol. From The Moore Bede , ed. Reproduced by permission of Rosenkilde and Bagger, Ltd. The Leningrad Bede, fol. From The Leningrad Bede , ed. Arngart, Early English Manuscripts in Facsimile, vol. Reprinted by permission of the publisher. From Seven Old English Poems , ed. John C. Pope, 2d ed. Our green and pleasant land has played host to many notable wordsmiths through the centuries.

Names like Shakespeare, Chaucer, Wordsworth and Keats automatically spring to mind when we talk about English poetry. Perhaps surprisingly, the earliest recorded poem in Old English has very humble origins and is credited to a shy and retiring cowherd named Caedmon. As legend would have it, Caedmon was unable to sing and knew no poetry, quietly departing the mead hall whenever the harp was passed around so that he would not embarrass himself in front of his more literate peers.

Miraculously, Caedmon suddenly began to sing and the memory of the dream stayed with him, allowing him to recall the holy verses for his master, Hilda and members of her inner circle. When Caedmon was able to produce more religious poetry it was decided that the gift was a blessing from God. Caedmon connects the energy of language with the power of divine spirit, and his religious poetry of praise inaugurates a tradition. This way of connecting language to the divine looks backward to Genesis 1 and forward to Thomas Traherne, Henry Vaughan, and Christopher Smart, who sings of the transcendent virtue of praise itself.

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