Today is Epiphany: The Twelfth Day!

Although many Catholics celebrated the Feast of the Epiphany yesterday at Sunday Mass, today is the twelfth day--the traditional date of the Epiphany of Our Lord. Epiphany means "manifestation" and the day really remembers three great manifestations of Jesus: to the Magi; to John the Baptist in the Jordan; and at the Marriage Feast Cana, where He turned water into wine. A Clerk of Oxford features this fifteenth century English hymn that celebrates the coming of the Magi, narrating the story of their contact with Herod and even his massacre of the Holy Innocents:

Reges de Saba venient,
Aurum, tus myrram offerent.
Alleluia.

1. Now is the Twelfth Day ycome,
The Father and Son together are nome,¹
The Holy Ghost, as they were wone,²
In fere.
God send us a good New Year!

2. I will you sing with all my might,
Of a Child so fair in sight,
A maiden him bore this endernight,
So still;
As it was his will. . . .

A Clerk of Oxford not only explains the carol's origin, but offers an illustrated version of its narration:

This is a lively Epiphany carol, full of drama and dialogue. It comes from a fifteenth-century manuscript of carols, BL Sloane 2593, and I've modernised the spelling from this text; the refrain means "Kings shall come from Sheba, offering gold, frankincense and myrrh" (a quotation from a Christmas hymn). One of my favourite things about it is the moustache-twirling villain Herod in verse 16: "Herod laughed and said, "A-ha!" But really the whole thing is wonderful.

Let's take a lot at the same story as it appears, illustrated in exhaustive detail, in the splendid manuscript BL Yates Thompson 13. This fourteenth-century English Book of Hours has exquisite illustrations on a whole range of subjects but also depicts the entire narrative of the Magi and King Herod, in a series of pictures running across the bottom of ff. 90-95v. So this is the Visit of the Magi: Medieval Graphic Novel Version.

Merry Christmas! Happy Epiphany!

Image Source: wikipedia commons.

King of Angels or King of the English? Adeste Fideles/O Come All Ye Faithful

Because I sent a contribution to the Christian Heritage Centre at Stonyhurst in England, they sent me a Christmas card, signed by Lord and Lady Windsor, Nicholas and Paola. The art for the outside of the Christmas card is one of the manuscript copies of John Francis Wade's "Adeste, Fideles". My husband took the pictures below:

 

The most familiar translation of this hymn, which was written by Wade in 1750, is by Frederick Oakeley, an Oxford Movement follower of Blessed John Henry Newman, who joined the Catholic Church in 1845.

There is a very common theory that this hymn contains a code referring to Bonnie Prince Charlie--Wade was a Jacobite, and an exile in Europe after the '45. The BBC cites this expert, Bennett Zon of Durham University:

He said "clear references" to the prince were in the lyrics, written by John Francis Wade in the 18th Century. The prince was defeated at the Battle of Culloden in 1746 after raising an army to take the British throne.Born shortly before Christmas in December 1720, Bonnie Prince Charlie was the grandson of England's last Catholic monarch, James II. He was born in exile in Italy and became the focus for Catholic Jacobite rebels intent on restoring the House of Stuart to the British throne.

Prof Zon, said there was "far more" to the carol - also known as Adeste Fideles - than was originally thought.

He said: "Fideles is Faithful Catholic Jacobites. Bethlehem is a common Jacobite cipher for England, and Regem Angelorum is a well-known pun on Angelorum, angels and Anglorum, English.

 

"The meaning of the Christmas carol is clear: 'Come and Behold Him, Born the King of Angels' really means, 'Come and Behold Him, Born the King of the English' - Bonnie Prince Charlie." Professor Zon said the Jacobite meaning of the carol gradually faded as the cause lost its grip on popular consciousness.

This interpretation has been around for a long time, however, according to this site. I can accept the possible code in the first verse, but wonder about the rest of the hymn. Did John Francis Wade really intend his fellow Jacobites to think of Bonnie Prince Charlie as "Deum de Deo" (God from God), "Lumen de Lumine" (Light from Light)? I have my doubts about that! Canon Oakeley's translation:

O come, all ye faithful,
Joyful and triumphant,
O come ye, O come ye to Bethlehem;
Come and behold Him
Born the King of angels;
Chorus:O come, let us adore Him,
O come, let us adore Him,
O come, let us adore Him,
Christ the Lord.

God of God,
Light of Light;
Lo, He abhors not the Virgin's womb:
Very God,
Begotten, not created; Chorus.

Sing, choirs of angels;
Sking in exultation,
Sing, all ye citizens of heaven above;
Glory to God
In the highest; Chorus.

Yea, Lord, we greet Thee,
Born this happy morning:
Jesus, to Thee be glory given;
Word of the Father,
Late in flesh appearing; Chorus.

From the Cambridge Lessons and Carols Yesterday

After the Annunciation reading from the Gospel according to St. Luke, the Choir of King's College Cambridge sang this happy hymn:

1. Angelus ad virginem
Subintrans in conclave.
Virginis formidinum
Demulcens inquit "Ave."
Ave regina virginum,
Coeliteraeque dominum
Concipies
Et paries
Intacta,
Salutem hominum.
Tu porta coeli facta
Medella criminum.

2. Quomodo conciperem,
quae virum non cognovi?
Qualiter infringerem,
quae firma mente vovi?
'Spiritus sancti gratia
Perficiet haec omnia;
Ne timaes,
sed gaudeas,
secura,
quod castimonia
Manebit in te pura
Dei potentia.'

3. Ad haec virgo nobilis
Respondens inquit ei;
Ancilla sum humilis
Omnipotentis Dei.
Tibi coelesti nuntio,
Tanta secreti conscio,
Consentiens
Et cupiens
Videre
factum quod audio,
Parata sum parere
Dei consilio.

4. Angelus disparuit
Etstatim puellaris
Uterus intumuit
Vi partus salutaris.
Qui, circumdatus utero
Novem mensium numero,
Hinc Exiit
Et iniit
Conflictum,
Affigens humero
Crucem, qua dedit ictum
Hosti mortifero.

5. Eia Mater Domini,
Quae pacem reddidisti
Angelis et homini,
Cum Christum genuisti;
Tuem exora filium
Ut se nobis propitium
Exhibeat,
Et deleat
Peccata;
Praestans auxilium
Vita frui beta
Post hoc exsilium.

This site gives some background:

The cheerfully sounding song about the Annunciation, Angelus ad Virginem or, in its English form, Gabriel, From Heven King Was To The Maide Sende, was a popular Medieval carol that is still popular today. The text of this song is a poetic version of Hail Mary, full of dramatic tension and theological profundity.

It appeared in an Dublin Troper (c. 1361, a music book for use at Mass) and was found in a Sequentiale (Vellum manuscript, 13th or 14th century), possibly connected with the Church of Addle, Yorks. This lyric also appears in the works of John Audelay, in a group of four Marian poems. Audelay may have been a priest; he spent the last years of his life at Haghmond, an Augustinian abbey, and wrote for the monks there.

It is said to have originally consisted of 27 stanzas, with each following stanza beginning with the consecutive letter of the alphabet.

Chaucer mentions it in his Miller's Tale, where poor scholar Nicholas sang it in Latin to the accompaniment of his psaltery:

And over all there lay a psaltery
Whereon he made an evening's melody,
Playing so sweetly that the chamber rang;
And Angelus ad virginem he sang;
And after that he warbled the King's Note:
Often in good voice was his merry throat.

Both the Oxford Book of Carols and, especially, the New Oxford Book of Carols contain musical settings and additional historical notes.

In addition to the translations provided, there is the translation by John Macleod Campbell Crum, 1932, which is reproduced as #547 in Hymn Ancient & Modern, Revised.

The site also notes:

The carol was probably Franciscan in original and brought to Britain by French friars in the 13th century. There is a 14th Irish source for the latin version and, from the same period, a middle-English version which begins:

Gabriel fram Heven-King / Sent to the Maide sweete,
Broute hir blisful tiding / And fair he gan hir greete:
'Heil be thu, ful of grace aright! / For Godes Son, this Heven Light,
For mannes love / Will man bicome /And take / Fles of thee,
Maide bright, / Manken free for to make / Of sen and devles might.'