CffiLESTIUS
132
CAEN
I left the feast." "Sing to me, however, sing of
Creation." Thereupon Ccedmon began to sing in
praise of God verses which he had never heard
before. Of these verses, called Csedmon's hymn,
Bede gives the Latin equivalent, the AJfredian trans-
lation of Bede gives a West-Saxon poetic version, and
one manuscript of Bede appends a Northumbrian
poetic version, perhaps the very words of Ca;dmon. In
the morning Coedmon recited his story and his verses
to Hilda and the learned men of the monastery, and
all agreed that he had received a Divine gift. Csed-
mon, having further shown his gift by turning into
excellent verse some sacred stories recited to him,
yielded to the exhortation of Hilda that he take the
monastic habit. He was taught the whole series of
sacred history, and then, like a clean animal rumi-
nating, turned it into sweet verse. His poems treated
of Genesis, Exodus, and stories from other books of
the Old Testament, the Incarnation, Passion, Resur-
rection, and Ascension, the Descent of the Holy
Ghost, the teaching of the Apostles, the Last Judg-
ment, Hell and Heaven. Bede ends his narrative
with an account of Caedmon's holy death. Accord-
ing to William of Malmesbury, writing 1125, he was
probably buried at Whitby, and his sanctity was
attested by many miracles. His canonization was
probably popular rather than formal.
esis" and the "Christ and Satan" have the glow of
dramatic life, and the character of Satan is sharply
delineated. The poems, whether we say they are
Csedmon's or of the school of Csedinon, mark a worthy
beginning of the long and noble line of English sacred
poetry.
Brooke, Early English Literature (London, 1S92) ; Morlet, English Writers ( London, 1SSS), I; Ker. Dark Ages (New York, 19041; Hazlitt-W.artON, History of English Poetri/ (London, 1S73); Azarias, Old English Thought (New York, 1879); Li\- GARD, Anglo-Saxon Church (London. 1852); Turner, History of the Anglo-Saxons I London, 1S03); Ten- Brink, English Litera- ture (New "\ ,,rk, lsX2i, I; Idem, Gcschichteder englischen Litter- atur (Str:t~hurc. 1899), 9S and apn.; Routing, Grundriss der Geschii I U ■:, . ■ ichen Litteratur (Munster, 1905) ; Wulcker,
Grundri- : ,r (,'< . e'nrhtr ,lrr inunlsuchs ischin Lilt.; Idem, Ca'd- monu. Milton. Anglia, IV, 40; Moxtu.i mulrt, Monks of the West (Edinburgh, 1S61); ActaSajictorum, 11 Feb.; Sievehs. Der Heliand und die angelsiichsische Gcncs:is (Halle, 1875); Plum- mer, Hist. Eecl. Gentis Anglor. Bcda- (Oxford, 1896); Grein- Wulcker, Bibliolhrk der angi Is'irhsisrhcu I'oesie ( Kassel, 1894); Miller, O. E. Version of Bede, with tr. (London, 1X90!. 95. 96; Thorpe, Cardmnn's Metrical Paraphrase, etc., with Eng. Tr. (London, 1832); Cook and Tinker. Translations from Old English (Boston, 1902); ri'.iilall- ID irrhaologia, XXIV,
341; Cook, Publication) l/. ; .-. /•...... I lton.VI.9;
•Stevens in The Academy, 21 Oct , 1876; G ■ . < irdmon,
Dante, and Milton (New York, 1896 ; X woi mi ister and Braune, Neue Hcirlelberger Jahrbiichcr i 1X94 1, IV. 205; Holt- HAUSEN, Altsachsisches Elemenlarbiich (Heidelherfr, May, 1900).
J. Vincent Crowne. Caelestius. See Pelagius.
Cedmon's Hymn, Eighth-Century MS., University of Cambridge
The Csedmonian poems, found in a unique tenth-
century MS., now in the Bodleian Library, were first
published and ascribed to Caedmon in 1655 by Francis
Junius (du Jon), a friend of Milton, and librarian to
the Earl of Arundel. The MS. consists of poems on
Genesis, Exodus, Daniel, and a group of poems in a
different hand, now called collectively "Christ and
Satan", and containing the Fall of the Angels, the
Descent into Hell, the Resurrection, the Ascension,
the Last Judgment, and the Temptation in the
Wilderness. The tendency among Anglo-Saxon
scholars has been to deny the Csedmonian authorship
of most of these poems, except part of the " Genesis",
called A, and parts of the "Christ and Satan". In
1875 Professor Sievers advanced the theory, on
grounds of metre, language, and st vie, that the part of
the "Genesis" called B, 11. 235-370, and 11. 421-851,
an evident interpolation, was merely a translation
and recension of a lost Old Saxon "Genesis " poem of
the ninth century, whose extant New Testament
part is known as the "Heliand". Old Saxon is the
Old Low German dialect of the continental Saxons,
who were converted in part from England. The
Sievers theory, whose history is one of the brilliant
episodes of modern philology, was established in
is 1 .' I by the discovery of fragments of an Old
Saxon "Genesis". (Parallel passages in Cook and
Tinker.)
Bede tills us that many English writers of sacred verse had imitated Cii'dmon, but that none had equalled him. The literary value of parts of the Csedmonian poems is undoubtedly of a high order. I In Bible stories are not merely paraphrased, but have been brooded upon by the poet until developed into a vivid picture, with touches drawn from the Knglish life and landscape about him. The story of the Sight of Israel resounds with the tread of armies am! the exciti men< of camp and battle. The "Gen-
Caen, University of, founded in 1432 by Henry
VI of England, who was then master of Paris and of
a large part of France. In the beginning it included
only faculties of canon and civil law. To these were
added, in 1437, a faculty of theology and a faculty of
arts, and, in 143S. a faculty of medicine. The Eng-
lish having been repulsed from Paris, the purpose of
these additions and of the many privileges granted by
Henry VI was to give the students the same advantages
they would have found in Paris, and thus prevent
their going to the university of the capital. On the
petition of the Estates of Normandy. Pope Eugenius
IV granted a Bull of erection to the university and
appointed the Bishop of Bayeux as chancellor (30
May, 1437). All those admitted to degrees were re-
quired to take an oath of fidelity to the Roman
pontiff, and to pledge themselves never to attempt
anything against the interests of the Church. The
ceremony of the solemn inauguration took place in
1439, the first rector being an Englishman, Michael
of Tregury, afterwards Archbishop of Dublin. From
the beginning the University of Paris opposed very
strongly the founding of a university at Caen. In
1433 protests were sent to the chancellor of the king-
dom and to the Parlement of Paris. The same year
the delegates of the university to the Council of Basle
were instructed to ask for the suppression of the uni-
versity at Caen. Later a petition was also sent to
Eugenius IV. Notwithstanding this opposition, the
University of Caen developed. In 1445 Henry VI declared it the only university in France enjoying the royal privileges, When Caen was conquered by the French in L450, King Charles allowed the university
to continue as before. It was. however, a mere tolera tion until the king should reach a final decision. This was given on 30 ( (ctober, 1452, when ( 'harles VI 1 created anew the 1'nivcrsity of Caen and gave it a new charter, ignoring altogether its former charter and
