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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 23 August 2011
Judged by its survival in manuscripts, the most popular Latin hymn in Middle English translations was “Criste qui lux es et dies.” Challenged only by “Ave Maris stella” in six versions, and trailed by three hymns extant in three MSS. each (“Alma redemptoris mater,” “Hostis Herodes impie,” and “Vexilla regis prodeunt”), this piece is found in eight different versions, all except one of the fifteenth century:
1 Brown, Carleton and Robbins, Rossell Hope, The Index of Middle English Verse (New York, 1943)Google Scholar, Nos. 454, 1054, 1079, 1081, 1082, 3887 (new first line: “Ayl be þowster of se”).
2 Ibid., p. 762, under “Latin hymns.”
3 Stevenson, J., The Latin Hymns of the Anglo-Saxon Church, Surtees Society, XXIII (Durham, 1851), pp. 12–13Google Scholar. The MS. is “a little later than the Norman Conquest” (p. viii) and contains “the bulk of the hymns used in the Anglican Church” before the Conquest (p. x).
4 Clay, William Keatinge, Private Prayers of the Reign of Queen Elizabeth, Parker Society (Cambridge, 1851), p. 269Google Scholar, used at Vespers. In the Orarium of 1560, a hymn imitated from Te lucis ante terminum is used for Compline (ibid., p. 156), and this is translated in the 1559 Primer (ibid., p. 44). Most of the customary hymns were taken over directly into the Primer.
5 Hymns Ancient and Modern (Historical Edition), (London, 1909), p. 146Google Scholar, refers to a Tudor four-part composition in B.M. Addit. MSS. 18936–9.
6 Ellis, Ruth Messenger, The Medieval Latin Hymn (Washington, 1953), p. 17Google Scholar; three such texts are printed by Drèves, Guido [et alii], Analecta Hymnica Medii Aevi, XXVII (Leipzig, 1897), pp. IIIGoogle Scholar.
7 Drèves, ibid., LI (Leipzig, 1908), p. 23 — Caesarius of Aries in 542.
8 Ibid.
9 Migne, Patrologica Latina, XVII. 1176 (attributed to St. Ambrose); Daniel, Adalbert, Thesaurus Hymnologicus (Halis, 1841)Google Scholar, I. 33, IV. 54; Chevalier, Guy Ulysse, Repertorium Hymnologicum (Louvain, 1892), I. 173Google Scholar, No. 2934.
10 A Catalogue of the Harleian Manuscripts (London, 1808), I. 637–638Google Scholar.
11 The Latin appears on f. 196v and the English follows on f. 197v. This text is not listed in the Index.
Lorde of us thou haue menynge
her in this heuy dwellynge
thow that of oure sawles ert defendower
be neght tille us in euerilk stowre
Lorde ne forget thow noght
the prayeris of pouer men that thow wroght
of mek menne the prayeris thow here
in this werlde of angres sere
To cry to the lorde es oure thoght
forsake us lorde ne well thou noght
haste the sone and dwell noght lange
and saue us wreches fra bitter bande
Thow god cryst oure saueowre
and oure endeles defendowre
we wyet lorde in to thi hande
oure sawles when we sal heryen wende amen
12 A Catalogue of the Harleian Manuscripts, I. 400–401.
13 Index, No. 1207; printed in my Secular Lyrics of the XIVth and XVth Centuries (Oxford, 1952), p. 118.
14 There are several misreadings in the Latin headings, which are corrected in the English stanzas, e.g., st. 3 Ne grauis compuis irruat; st. 4 Oculi sompnum capiantis. The Bannatyne MS reads st. 2 as noctem quietem tribue.
15 Zupitza, Archiv, LXXXIX (1892), 326–327Google Scholar.
16 Twenty-two rhyme-royal translations (containing the only known ME versions of the Office hymns of the Psalter) in B.M. MS. Addit. 34193, printed by Patterson, Frank A., Medieval Studies in Memory of Gertrude Schoepperle Loomis (Paris, 1927), pp. 443Google Scholar.
17 Greene, Richard Leighton, The Early English Carols (Oxford, 1935), p. 393Google Scholar.