Hymns for sext and none of Paschaltide
  • DCM
    Posts: 70
    Today I was studying the hymns for the little hours of Paschaltide. The hymns for terce, sext and none are abbreviations of longer texts. Does anyone know anything about the hymns for sext and none—Venite, servi supplices and Haec hora, quae resplenduit? They appear to come from the Frankish Hymnal and the 6th century Benedictine office, and are excerpts of, respectively, Iam sexta sensim and Ter hora trina.

    I can't find a complete translation of these two longer hymns, either verse or literal. Could anyone point me to one?
  • DCM
    Posts: 70
    To be clear, I have translations of the shorter versions in the LH: the Ryde Abbey and ICEL versions. I'm looking for extant translations of the longer versions I linked to.
  • Chris Garton-Zavesky
    Posts: 6,902
    DCM,

    Help me out, here. I know there are new hymns at Lauds and Vespers, but my Breviary doesn't have special hymns for Paschaltide for the Little Hours.
  • FKulash
    Posts: 82
    Hi, Chris,

    The short hymns that DCM mentioned are on page 450, volume 2 of Liturgia Horarum (2000).
    Thanked by 1Chris Garton-Zavesky
  • monasteryliturgistmonasteryliturgist
    Posts: 310
    They are also in the Liber Hymnarius. I have a note which says Haec Hora comes from St. Peter Damian and Iam Surgit from St. Ambrose but both have question marks next to them... so questionable I guess.
  • FKulash
    Posts: 82
    The 2019 edition of Liber Hymnarius says "saec. V-VI" for both of those hymns.
  • DCM
    Posts: 70
    FKulash: the '83 LH says the same thing too. No notes on authorship though.

    monasteryliturgist: Haec hora definitely can't be by Peter Damian, since it's attested as early as the 6th century.

    Chris: Here they are. They're also used for sext and none on Pentecost (with different melodies). There's a note in the LH saying that in paschaltide they can also be sung to the melody of Aurora lucis.

    The Universalis app (which gives literal translations of all the hymns) says they're from "the Rule of St Caesarius of Arles and the Rule of St Aurelianus" two 6th century bishops and monastic reformers.

    As for the terce hymn, Iam surgit, it's one of only four hymns of indisputably Ambrosian authorship. The Tridentine office only has one, and the LotH restored the other three, though Iam surgit has been abbreviated (not unreasonably; it would be atypical to have a 9-strophe hymn at a little hour). Here's a translation of the full hymn, on page 9 of this book .

    What I'm trying to find, without any luck so far, is if anyone has ever done a translation of the longer versions of the two hymns I'm talking about. Neale didn't, Newman didn't, Caswall didn't, Connelly didn't, the Ryde Abbey sisters (bless them, what would I do without their translations) didn't, ICEL didn't, and neither has any academic text that I can access. It seems that if a hymn wasn't in one the various uses in England on the eve of the Reformation, none of the Oxford boys were interested in it. And if it isn't in an official version of the Roman office, whether 1570 or 1970, no one else was interested either.
    Thanked by 2tomjaw igneus
  • tomjaw
    Posts: 2,782
    @DCM
    Others to try Bagshawe OR
    Mant, Richard, 1776-1848 OR Donahoe, Daniel Joseph, OR Copeland, William John, 1804-1885, and Julian
    The problem is that we have very few translations of the non-Roman Hymns, The Paris breviary and the Dominican Hymns have been translated.
    Thanked by 1DCM
  • DCM
    Posts: 70
    @tomjaw
    Thank you for the breadcrumbs! Sadly no luck with Bagshawe, Mant, Donahoe (2vol, in neither one), Copeland or Julian. Julian's dictionary is a beast of a book and I'm going to have a lot of fun reading it. It doesn't have specific entries for either hymn, sadly. It does list Iam sexta sensim in an entry on translations. And there's a reference to a translation, in Elizabeth Charles' Voice of the Christian Life in Song. which I'll be trying to track down. Thank you!

    Copeland's book has a very funny preface for his Anglican brethren, in which he basically says "cmon, guys, just because these hymns come from the Catholics doesn't mean they're bad.":

    There are matters of faith and worship and practice in which want of sympathy with the great body of Western Christendom is simply suicidal to ourselves. ... When Nathaniel's strong prejudice made him say, "Can any good thing come out of Nazareth?", his honest and good heart led him to "come and see."
    Thanked by 2tomjaw Anna_Bendiksen
  • tomjaw
    Posts: 2,782
    @DCM
    I had a quick look myself, I have a long list of such books stored on my computer. I hoped that there may be some reference buried. Not all of these books are properly indexed, and sometimes you will find verses in different orders, or with minor changes.

    From your above post I found this in less than a minute,
    https://archive.org/details/voicechristianl03chargoog/page/n106/mode/2up?q=jam
    Thanked by 1DCM
  • DCM
    Posts: 70
    Yep, I had already found it thanks to the note in Julian. Slightly different edition I found on google. Page 113-4 in this one. Appears to be a translation of strophes 1-4, 9 & 10, paraphrasing the bits in the middle into one strophe. That works! I can use this now.

    Thank you very much for helping me find it!
    Thanked by 1tomjaw
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