Cædmon is the earliest English poet whose name is known. An Anglo-Saxon herdsman attached to the double monastery of Streonæshalch (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. He later became a zealous monk and an accomplished and inspirational religious poet. Cædmon is one of twelve Anglo-Saxon poets identified in medieval sources, and one of only three for whom both roughly contemporary biographical information and examples of literary output have survived. His story is told to us in the Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum by St. Bede. Cædmon's only known surviving work is Cædmon's Hymn, the nine-line alliterative vernacular praise poem in honour of God he supposedly learned to sing in his initial dream. The poem is one of the earliest attested examples of Old English and is, with the runic Ruthwell Cross and Franks Casket inscriptions, one of three candidates for the earliest attested example of Old English poetry.
Read the rest of this article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C%C3%A6dmon
_______________________________ Today's selected anniversaries:
1456: Joan of Arc was acquitted of heresy posthumously. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joan_of_Arc)
1846: American forces led by Commodore John D. Sloat occupied Monterey and Yerba Buena, beginning the annexation of California. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_D._Sloat)
1937: The Marco Polo Bridge Incident marked the beginning of the Second Sino-Japanese War. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marco_Polo_Bridge_Incident)
1991: The Slovenian War formally ended with the signing of the Brioni Agreement. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ten-Day_War)
2005: A series of four bomb explosions struck London's public transport system, killing 56. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/7_July_2005_London_bombings)
_____________________ Wikiquote of the day:
"Sin lies only in hurting others unnecessarily. All other 'sins' are invented nonsense." -- Robert A. Heinlein (http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Robert_A._Heinlein)