RADIO CAEDMON

On the 30th of May, BBC Radio 4's Poetry Please featured Liverpool poet Roger McGough investigating the wealth of poetry manuscripts held by Cambridge University Library.

Among these was the Moore Bede, an early manuscript of The Venerable Bede's Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum ( Ecclesiastical History of the English People). It was donated to the library by George I who purchased it from Bishop John Moore (1646-1714).

Caedmon's Hymn as it appears in the Moore Bede

Dated to the eighth century, it cosists of 128 pages. The final page contains a version known as the Northumbrian aelda recension of Caedmon's Hymn, thought to be the earliest occurrence of the poem.

Here is a short clip of the programme in which, after a brief introduction, the poem is firstly read in Anglo Saxon with its rich rhythms and characteristic consonants, and then offered in a modern translation read by the actress Juliet Stevenson