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Oldest Poem in English Discovered!

 
 
jespah
 
Reply Sun 17 May, 2026 11:52 am
Recently, researchers were stunned at discovering that, in Rome, there just so happened to be a book which contained the oldest (known!) English language poem. It's called Caedmon's Hymn and it's a nine-line religious text, apparently meant to be sung. See: https://www.wcvb.com/article/rome-medieval-book-oldest-english-poem/71327524

But what if…

What if there was an older poem? Caedmon's Hymn is from the 7th century (that would be 600 - 699 CE* also known as AD), but you can go back to about 450 AD/CE and still have English. See: https://www.oed.com/discover/early-modern-english-an-overview/

Picture, if you will. Siena or what becomes London or wherever you like, 475 CE. Life is short, brutal, and nasty, to quote Thomas Hobbes. The muse of the time decides she's tired of all the ick and time travels to our era.

She picks you to write what will become the oldest English-language poem ever when she travels back to 475 and sticks it in some random illuminated manuscript that will be discovered three months from whichever day you're reading this topic.

So, it's time to write it!

Here's a possible poem ~

There once was a lady with sass
with Dark Ages-style class.
She said to a miller
whose flour was mostly filler,
"I'll get medieval on your ass!"


Note: CE means Common Era and can be used essentially interchangeably with AD (anno domini).
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