116. The strife is o’er, the battle done
Latin
Tr. Francis Pott, 1832-1909
Alleluia, Alleluia, Alleluia.
Finita iam sunt praelia,
Est parta iam victoria;
Gaudeamus et canamus:
Alleluia!
Post fata mortis barbara
Devicit Iesus tartara;
Applaudamus et psallamus:
Alleluia!
Surrexit die tertia
Caelesti clarus gratia
Insonemus et cantemus:
Alleluia!
Sunt clausa stygis ostia.
Et caeli patent atria;
Gaudeamus et canamus:
Alleluia!
Per tua, Iesu, vulnera
Nos mala morte libera,
Ut vivamus et canamus:
Alleluia! Amen.
One of the most celebrated of Easter hymns. It comes from an anonymous medieval Latin poem which appeared in the Jesuit Symphonia Sirenum, Cologne, 1695.
The translation is by Francis Pott, an Englishman. He was educated at Oxford University and after serving a long number of years as curate and rector in various churches, he retired on account of increasing deafness. Pott published several volumes of hymns and wrote a book on the “Te Deum.” He was a member of the original committee which produced Hymns Ancient and Modern.
MUSIC. VICTORY, also called “Palestrina,” is an adaptation from the “Gloria Patri” of a work called, Magnificat Tertii Toni, 1591, by the eminent Italian composer, Giovanni Pierluigi Sante Da Palestrina, 1525-94.
The present arrangement was made by Wm. H. Monk for this hymn.
Palestrina, foremost composer of the Roman Catholic Church and supreme master of polyphonic music, was born at Palestrina, Italy, the son of a wealthy peasant, Pierluigi Sante. He was named “Da Palestrina” after his birthplace, a common custom in his time. He received his musical training at Rome where he came under the powerful influence of Orlando di Lasso, the great master from the Netherlands. Palestrina served as chapelmaster in his home town, master of the boys in the Julian Chapel in Rome, and in 1555 was appointed one of the pontifical singers in the Sistine Chapel but was dismissed a few months later when he became guilty of the “crime” of matrimony. He then became chapelmaster at St. John Lateran and later of the Liberian Chapel of Santa Maria Maggiore, during which time he became known as “the saviour of church music.” Many abuses had crept into the music of the church, particularly in the use of secular airs grafted on stately church themes, and improvizations by the singers who sometimes departed from the solemn words of the service and substituted profane and lewd words in Italian and French. To correct this scandal, the Ecumenical Council of Trent, in 1552, asked Palestrina to prepare a mass free from the admixture of alien words and secular melodies, and suitable for church use. The result was the composition of three 6-part services, one of which, Missa Papae Marcelli, has been regarded as one of the most sublime creations of all music and the model of what church music should be. As a reward for this service, Palestrina was granted a stipend by papal decree which was not large but gave him a sufficient income. In 1571 he was re-elected to his old post as Chapelmaster of St. Peter’s, where he remained for life. His fame as teacher and composer extended throughout Europe, but his happiness was clouded by the loss of two sons and the death of his wife in 1580, while the remaining son, Igino, became a source of grief to him. Palestrina’s compositions were many and of great variety, including 93 masses, 179 motets, hymns, prayers, responses, madrigals, etc.
For comments on Monk see [Hymn 40].