Cædmon
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Cædmon (; fl. c. 657–684) is the earliest English poet whose name is known. A Northumbrian cowherd who cared for the animals at the double monastery of Streonæshalch (now known as Whitby Abbey) during the abbacy of St. Hilda, he was originally ignorant of "the art of song" but learned to compose one night in the course of a dream, according to the 8th-century Christian historian and saint Bede. He later became a zealous monk and an accomplished and inspirational Christian poet. He is venerated as a saint in the Eastern Orthodox Church, Roman Catholicism and Anglicanism, with a feast day on 11
Person · Open Library
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- Cædmon's Exodus and Daniel
- The later genesis and other old English and old Saxon texts relating to the fall of man; edited by Fr. Klaeber
- The Caedmon poems
- Days after Death
- The fall of man
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Cædmon's Hymn is a short Old English poem originally composed by Cædmon, in honour of God the Creator. It survives in a Latin translation by Bede in his Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum and in vernacular versions written down in several manuscripts of Bede's Historia. Bede wrote about the poet and his work in the fourth book of his Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum. Bede told the story of Cædmon who was an illiterate cow-herd who miraculously was able to recite a Christian song of cre
via Last.fm · Cædmon
Quotes
- “Light was firstThrough the Lord's word Named day:Beauteous, bright creation!”
- “The fiend with all his comradesFell then from heaven above,Through as long as three nights and days,The angels from heaven into hell;And them all the Lord transformed to devils,Because they his deed and wordWould not revere.”
- “I am in charity, my children, with all the servants of God.”
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Key facts
- Saint.honorific_prefix
- Saint
- Saint.name
- Cædmon of Whitby
- Saint.image
- MemorialToCaedmon(RichardThomas)Jul2006.jpg
- Saint.caption
- Memorial to Cædmon, St Mary's Churchyard, Whitby.
- Saint.titles
- Venerable
- Saint.death_date
- c. 684
- Saint.feast_day
- 11 February
- Saint.venerated_in
- Anglican CommunionRoman Catholic ChurchEastern Orthodox Church
- Saint.major_works
- ''Cædmon's Hymn''
via Wikipedia infobox
Wikidata facts
- Image
- MemorialToCaedmon(RichardThomas)Jul2006.jpg
Show 5 more facts
- date of death
- 0680-01-01
- Commons category
- Cædmon
- floruit
- 0700-00-00
- IPA transcription
- ˈkæd.mən
- P12749
- Victor Fleming
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Works in European collections
10 objects attributed to Cædmon, held across European museums, libraries & archives · via Europeana
~25 min read
Article
15 sectionsContents
- Life
- Bede's account
- Dates
- Modern discoveries
- Other medieval sources
- ''Heliand''
- Sources and analogues
- Work
- General corpus
- ''Cædmon's Hymn''
- Manuscript evidence
- Earliest text
- Notes
- References
- External links
Cædmon (; fl. c. 657–684) is the earliest English poet whose name is known. A Northumbrian cowherd who cared for the animals at the double monastery of Streonæshalch (now known as Whitby Abbey) during the abbacy of St. Hilda, he was originally ignorant of "the art of song" but learned to compose one night in the course of a dream, according to the 8th-century Christian historian and saint Bede. He later became a zealous monk and an accomplished and inspirational Christian poet. He is venerated as a saint in the Eastern Orthodox Church, Roman Catholicism and Anglicanism, with a feast day on 11 February.
Cædmon is one of twelve Anglo-Saxon poets identified in medieval sources, and one of three of these for whom both roughly contemporary biographical information and examples of literary output have survived. His story is related in the Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum ("Ecclesiastical History of the English People") by Bede, who wrote, "[t]here was in the Monastery of this Abbess a certain brother particularly remarkable for the Grace of God, who was wont to make religious verses, so that whatever was interpreted to him out of scripture, he soon after put the same into poetical expressions of much sweetness and humility in Old English, which was his native language. By his verse the minds of many were often excited to despise the world, and to aspire to heaven."