Hymn in honour of *Cosmas and Damianus (brothers, physician martyrs of Syria, S00385) composed in Latin in Spain, possibly in the 7th c.
Evidence ID
E04937
Type of Evidence
Liturgical texts - Hymns
Literary - Poems
Hymnodia Hispanica, Hymn 104
Summary:
At the beginning the people of God are encouraged to hear the story of the miraculous power of Saints Cosmas and Damianus (strophes 1–2). Then the hymn praises their outstanding capability to heal all ailments 'with word and touch' (strophes 3–4). Their power is so strong that it heals not only the part of the body indicated by a sick person looking for their help, but restores the whole body (strophes 5–6). Diseases disappear because the saints conquer demons causing them (strophe 7). Strophe 8 is a doxology (the praise of God in the Trinity).
Text: Castro Sánchez 2010, 385-386.
Summary: M. Szada.
Liturgical ActivitiesService for the saint
FestivalsPrayer/supplication/invocation
MiraclesEcclesiastics – unspecified
Service for the saint
Chant and religious singing
FestivalsSaint’s feast
Non Liturgical ActivityPrayer/supplication/invocation
Composing and translating saint-related texts
MiraclesHealing diseases and disabilities
Protagonists in Cult and NarrativesEcclesiastics – unspecified
Other lay individuals/ people
Source
This hymn in honour of Cosmas and Damianus is written in quantitative trochaic septenarii of good quality, which led Pérez de Urbel (1926, 231) to argue for an early date of composition. He also tentatively proposed Ildefonsus of Toledo as its author, because we know from the Life of Ildefonsus, penned in the 8th century by Cixila, that Ildefonsus was an abba in the church of saints Cosmas and Damian in Agali in the vicinity of Toledo (Patrologia Latina 96, 43). Szövérffy (1971, 36) also dated the hymn to the 7th century, while Diaz (1958: 428) thought that it is from 8th century.The hymn is preserved in three manuscripts: Psalmi Cantica et Hymni, Madrid, Biblioteca Nacional, ms. 10001 (9th/11th c.); Alia Officia Toletana, London, British Library, Add. 30845 (10th/11th c.); and Psalmi, Cantica et Hymni, London, British Library, 30851 (11th c.).
Josef Pérez de Urbell’s method of dating hymns:
The method is based on two preliminary assumptions:
a) that the bulk of the Hispanic liturgy was composed in the seventh century, the ‘golden age’ of the Hispanic church, and that important intellectual figures of this period (Braulio of Zaragoza, Isidore of Seville, Eugenius of Toledo, and others) participated in its creation;
b) that the liturgy was, nevertheless, still developing and changing in the period after the Arab invasion, and therefore, many texts which we find in the ninth, tenth, and eleventh centuries liturgical manuscripts might be of more recent date. Some hymns can be dated with some confidence to the period after 711, for instance if they mention ‘hagaric oppression’ or if they are in honour of saints whose cult appears to have been imported into Hispania after the seventh century (since they do not feature in earlier literary and epigraphic evidence, nor are attested in the oldest liturgical book from Hispania, the Orationale Visigothicum).
It is more difficult to identify the hymns which are certainly from before 711. Pérez de Urbell, firstly and reasonably, attributed to this group hymns with what appear to be reliable attributions to authors from the seventh century (like Braulio of Zaragoza or Quiricius of Barcelona), and those which are stylistically close to the poetry of Eugenius of Toledo from the seventh century.
Pérez de Urbell then compared the two groups of hymns – those probably earlier than 711, and those probably later – and noticed the following:
a) late hymns contain barbarisms and solecisms, while early ones are written in correct Latin;
b) late hymns are composed in rhythmic metres, while early ones are in correct classical quantitative metres; authors of the eighth and ninth century who attempted to write in quantitative metres always made mistakes; also from the eighth century onwards we have no more poetic inscriptions in quantitative metres;
c) some rhythmical poetry could nevertheless be early;
d) although both early and late hymns sometimes have rhymes, perfect rhymes occur only in late hymns.
In the absence of any certain indications for dating, Pérez de Urbell assumed that a hymn is early if at least two requirements were met: the Latin is ‘correct’ and there are no perfect rhymes. He also considered early every hymn composed in a quantitative metre.
Discussion
The feast of Cosmas and Damianus was celebrated in the Spanish Church in the 7th century on 22 October: see the prayers in the Orationale Visigothicum (E05652). The Liber Ordinum, the liturgical book of rites performed by a priest (either a bishop or a presbyter) of the Old Hispanic Rite, which may reflect usage already established in the 7th century, preserves an interesting ritual of confecting oil to be used to anoint the sick on the feast, see $E###.Bibliography
Edition:Castro Sánchez, J., Hymnodia hispanica (Corpus Christianorum Series Latina 167; Turnhout: Brepols, 2010).
Castro Sánchez, J., Hymnodia hispánica (Corpus Christianorum in Translation 19; Turnhout: Brepols, 2014). Spanish translation.
Further reading:
Diaz y Diaz, M.C., "El latin medieval español," in: Actas del Primer Congreso Español де Estudios Clásicos (Madrid: Congreso Español de Estudios Clásicos, 1958), 559-579.
Pérez de Urbel, J., "Origen de los himnos mozárabes," Bulletin Hispanique 28 (1926), 5-21, 113-139, 209-245, 305-320.
Szövérffy, J., Iberian Latin Hymnody: Survey and Problems (Turnhout: Brepols, 1998).
Record Created By
Marta Szada
Date of Entry
| ID | Name | Name in Source | Identity | S00385 | Kosmas and Damianos, brothers, physician martyrs of Syria | Cosmas et Damianus | Certain |
|---|
Please quote this record referring to its author, database name, number, and, if possible, stable URL:
Marta Szada, Cult of Saints, E04937 - http://csla.history.ox.ac.uk/record.php?recid=E04937