Researchers stunned by a forgotten medieval book in Rome hiding the oldest English poem

[ancianita]

2. What's important is the date of the manuscript, since I read that poem back in 1970 as an English major at FSU.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cædmon%27s_Hymn

The following Old English text is a normalized reading of the oldest or second-oldest manuscript of the poem, the mid-eighth-century Northumbrian Moore Bede (Cambridge, University Library, MS Kk. 5. 16). The translation notes key points of debate as to meaning, and variation in other manuscripts.

Nū scylun hergan hefaenrīcaes Uard,
metudæs maecti end his mōdgidanc,
uerc Uuldurfadur, suē hē uundra gihuaes,
ēci dryctin ōr āstelidæ
hē ǣrist scōp aelda barnum
heben til hrōfe, hāleg scepen.
Thā middungeard moncynnæs Uard,
eci Dryctin, æfter tīadæ
fīrum foldu, Frēa allmectig.[7]

Translation:
Now [we] shall honour / heaven-kingdom's guardian,
the measurer's might / and his mind's plan,
the work of the father of glory[a] / as he of each wonder,
eternal lord, / the origin established;
he first created[c] / for the children of men[d]
heaven for a roof, / holy creator.
Then Middle-earth / mankind's guardian,
eternal Lord, / after bestowed
the lands to men,[e] / Lord almighty.

Although the different Old English versions do not diverge from one another enormously, they vary enough that researchers have been able to reconstruct five substantively different variants of the poem, witnessed by different groups of the twenty-three manuscripts.[8]: §5.1 


Guardian of heaven whom we come to praise
who mapped creation in His thought's sinews
Glory-Father who worked out each wonder
began with broad earth a gift for His children
first roofed it with heaven the Holy Shaper
established it forever as in the beginning
called it middle kingdom fenced it with angels
created a habitation for man to praise His splendor

Bede's story
Cædmon's Hymn survives only in manuscripts of Bede's Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum, which recounts the poem as part of an elaborate miracle-story. Bede's chronology suggests that these events took place under the abbacy of Hilda of Whitby (658–80),[8]: §1  or in the decade after her death.[11] Whether Bede had this story directly from oral sources or whether he had access to a written account is a matter of debate,[12] but although world literature attests to many stories of poetic inspiration that recall Bede's, none is similar enough to be a likely source.[8]: §2 [13][14]

That the same copy is found in Rome’s National Central Library look at a manuscript containing a rare, long-lost copy of Caedmon’s Hymn, just doesn't seem like such a big deal, but the distribution of the Venerable Bede's writing definitely is.