Book: Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 4, Part 4

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Tacitus, _Histories_, i. 53, 61, 67-70, ii. 20-25, 41-44, iii. 13; Dio
Cassius lxv. 10-14, lxvi. 16; Plutarch, _Otho_, 7; Suetonius, _Titus_, 6;
Zonaras xi. 17.

CAEDMON, the earliest English Christian poet. His story, and even his very
name, are known to us only from Baeda (_Hist. Eccl._ iv. 24). He was,
according to Baeda (see BEDE), a herdsman, who received a divine call to
poetry by means of a dream. One night, having quitted a festive company
because, from want of skill, he could not comply with the demand made of
each guest in turn to sing to the harp, he sought his bed and fell asleep.
He dreamed that there appeared to him a stranger, who addressed him by his
name, and commanded him to sing of "the beginning of created things." He
pleaded inability, but the stranger insisted, and he was compelled to obey.
He found himself uttering "verses which he had never heard." Of Caedmon's
song Baeda gives a prose paraphrase, which may be literally rendered as
follows:--"Now must we praise the author of the heavenly kingdom, the
Creator's power and counsel, the deeds of the Father of glory: how He, the
eternal God, was the author of all marvels--He, who first gave to the sons
of men the heaven for a roof, and then, Almighty Guardian of mankind,
created the earth." Baeda explains that his version represents the sense
only, not the arrangement of the words, because no poetry, however
excellent, can be rendered into another language, without the loss of its
beauty of expression. When Caedmon awoke he remembered the verses that he
had sung and added to them others. He related his dream to the farm bailiff
under whom he worked, and was conducted by him to the neighbouring
monastery at Streanaeshalch (now called Whitby). The abbess Hild and her
monks recognized that the illiterate herdsman had received a gift from
heaven, and, in order to test his powers, proposed to him that he should
try to render into verse a portion of sacred history which they explained
to him. On the following morning he returned having fulfilled his task. At
the request of the abbess he became an inmate of the monastery. Throughout
the remainder of his life his more learned brethren from time to time
expounded to him the events of Scripture history and the doctrines of the
faith, and all that he heard from them he reproduced in beautiful poetry.
"He sang of the creation of the world, of the origin of mankind and of all
the history of Genesis, of the exodus of Israel from Egypt and their
entrance into the Promised Land, of many other incidents of Scripture
history, of the Lord's incarnation, passion, resurrection and ascension, of
the coming of the Holy Ghost and the teaching of the apostles. He also made
many songs of the terrors of the coming judgment, of the horrors of hell
and the sweetness of heaven; and of the mercies and the judgments of God."
All his poetry was on sacred themes, and its unvarying aim was to turn men
from sin to righteousness and the love of God. Although many amongst the
Angles had, following his example, essayed to compose religious poetry,
none of them, in Baeda's opinion, had approached the excellence of Caedmon's
songs.

Baeda's account of Caedmon's deathbed has often been quoted, and is of
singular beauty. It is commonly stated that he died in 680, in the same
year as the abbess Hild, but for this there is no authority. All that we
know of his date is that his dream took place during the period (658-680)
in which Hild was abbess of Streanaeshalch, and that he must have died some
considerable time before Baeda finished his history in 731.

The hymn said to have been composed by Caedmon in his dream is extant in its
original language. A copy of it, in the poet's own Northumbrian dialect,
and in a handwriting of the 8th century, appears on a blank page of the
Moore MS. of Baeda's History; and five other Latin MSS. of Baeda have the
poem (but transliterated into a more southern dialect) as a marginal note.
In the old English version of Baeda, ascribed to King Alfred, and certainly
made by his command if not by himself, it is given in the text. Probably
the Latin MS. used by the translator was one that contained this addition.
It was formerly maintained by some scholars that the extant Old English
verses are not Baeda's original, but a mere retranslation from his Latin
prose version. The argument was that they correspond too closely with the
Latin; Baeda's words, "hic est sensus, non autem ordo ipse verborum," being
taken to mean that he had given, not a literal translation, but only a free
paraphrase. But the form of the sentences in Baeda's prose shows a close
adherence to the parallelistic structure of Old English verse, and the
alliterating words in the poem are in nearly every case the most obvious
and almost the inevitable equivalents of those used by Baeda. The sentence
quoted above[1] can therefore have been meant only as an apology for the
absence of those poetic graces that necessarily disappear in translations
into another tongue. Even on the assumption that the existing verses are a
retranslation, it would still be certain that they differ very slightly
from what the original must have been. It is of course possible to hold
that the story of the dream is pure fiction, and that the lines which Baeda
translated were not Caedmon's at all. But there is really nothing to justify
this extreme of scepticism. As the hymn is said to have been Caedmon's first
essay in verse, its lack of poetic merit is rather an argument for its
genuineness than against it. Whether Baeda's narrative be historical or
not--and it involves nothing either miraculous or essentially
improbable--there is no reason to doubt that the nine lines of the Moore
MS. are Caedmon's composition.

This poor fragment is all that can with confidence be affirmed to remain of
the voluminous works of the man whom Baeda regarded as the greatest of
vernacular religious poets. It is true that for two centuries and a half a
considerable body of verse has been currently known by his name; but among
modern scholars the use of the customary designation is merely a matter of
convenience, and does not imply any belief in the correctness of the
attribution. The so-called Caedmon poems are contained [v.04 p.0935] in a
MS. written about A.D. 1000, which was given in 1651 by Archbishop Ussher
to the famous scholar Francis Junius, and is now in the Bodleian library.
They consist of paraphrases of parts of Genesis, Exodus and Daniel, and
three separate poems the first on the lamentations of the fallen angels,
the second on the "Harrowing of Hell," the resurrection, ascension and
second coming of Christ, and the third (a mere fragment) on the temptation.
The subjects correspond so well with those of Caedmon's poetry as described
by Baeda that it is not surprising that Junius, in his edition, published in
1655, unhesitatingly attributed the poems to him. The ascription was
rejected in 1684 by G. Hickes, whose chief argument, based on the character
of the language, is now known to be fallacious, as most of the poetry that
has come down to us in the West Saxon dialect is certainly of Northumbrian
origin. Since, however, we learn from Baeda that already in his time Caedmon
had had many imitators, the abstract probability is rather unfavourable
than otherwise to the assumption that a collection of poems contained in a
late 10th century MS. contains any of his work. Modern criticism has shown
conclusively that the poetry of the "Caedmon MS." cannot be all by one
author. Some portions of it are plainly the work of a scholar who wrote
with his Latin Bible before him. It is possible that some of the rest may
be the composition of the Northumbrian herdsman; but in the absence of any
authenticated example of the poet's work to serve as a basis of comparison,
the internal evidence can afford no ground for an affirmative conclusion.
On the other hand, the mere unlikeness of any particular passage to the
nine lines of the _Hymn_ is obviously no reason for denying that it may
have been by the same author.

The _Genesis_ contains a long passage (ii. 235-851) on the fall of the
angels and the temptation of our first parents, which differs markedly in
style and metre from the rest. This passage, which begins in the middle of
a sentence (two leaves of the MS. having been lost) is one of the finest in
all Old English poetry. In 1877 Professor E. Sievers argued, on linguistic
grounds, that it was a translation, with some original insertions, from a
lost poem in Old Saxon, probably by the author of the _Heliand_. Sievers's
conclusions were brilliantly confirmed in 1894 by the discovery in the
Vatican library of a MS. containing 62 lines of the _Heliand_ and three
fragments of an old Saxon poem on the story of Genesis. The first of these
fragments includes the original of 28 lines of the interpolated passage of
the Old English _Genesis_. The Old Saxon Biblical poetry belongs to the
middle of the 9th century; the Old English translation of a portion of it
is consequently later than this.

As the _Genesis_ begins with a line identical in meaning, though not in
wording, with the opening of Caedmon's _Hymn_, we may perhaps infer that the
writer knew and used Caedmon's genuine poems. Some of the more poetical
passages may possibly echo Caedmon's expressions; but when, after treating
of the creation of the angels and the revolt of Lucifer, the paraphrast
comes to the Biblical part of the story, he follows the sacred text with
servile fidelity, omitting no detail, however prosaic. The ages of the
antediluvian patriarchs, for instance, are accurately rendered into verse.
In all probability the _Genesis_ is of Northumbrian origin. The names
assigned to the wives of Noah and his three sons (Phercoba, Olla, Olliua,
Olliuani[2]) have been traced to an Irish source, and this fact seems to
point to the influence of the Irish missionaries in Northumbria.

The _Exodus_ is a fine poem, strangely unlike anything else in Old English
literature. It is full of martial spirit, yet makes no use of the phrases
of the heathen epic, which Cynewulf and other Christian poets were
accustomed to borrow freely, often with little appropriateness. The
condensation of the style and the peculiar vocabulary make the _Exodus_
somewhat obscure in many places. It is probably of southern origin, and can
hardly be supposed to be even an imitation of Caedmon.

The _Daniel_ is often unjustly depreciated. It is not a great poem but the
narration is lucid and interesting. The author has borrowed some 70 lines
from the beginning of a poetical rendering of the Prayer of Azarias and the
Song of the Three Children, of which there is a copy in the Exeter Book.
The borrowed portion ends with verse 3 of the canticle, the remainder of
which follows in a version for the most part independent, though containing
here and there a line from _Azarias_. Except in inserting the prayer and
the _Benedicite_, the paraphrast draws only from the canonical part of the
book of Daniel. The poem is obviously the work of a scholar, though the
Bible is the only source used.

The three other poems, designated as "Book II" in the Junius MS., are
characterized by considerable imaginative power and vigour of expression,
but they show an absence of literary culture and are somewhat rambling,
full of repetitions and generally lacking in finish. They abound in
passages of fervid religious exhortation. On the whole, both their merits
and their defects are such as we should expect to find in the work of the
poet celebrated by Baeda, and it seems possible, though hardly more than
possible, that we have in these pieces a comparatively little altered
specimen of Caedmon's compositions.

Of poems not included in the Junius MS., the _Dream of the Rood_ (see
CYNEWULF) is the only one that has with any plausibility been ascribed to
Caedmon. It was affirmed by Professor G. Stephens that the Ruthwell Cross,
on which a portion of the poem is inscribed in runes, bore on its top-stone
the name "Cadmon";[3] but, according to Professor W. Vietor, the traces of
runes that are still visible exclude all possibility of this reading. The
poem is certainly Northumbrian and earlier than the date of Cynewulf. It
would be impossible to prove that Caedmon was not the author, though the
production of such a work by the herdsman of Streanaeshalch would certainly
deserve to rank among the miracles of genius.

Certain similarities between passages in _Paradise Lost_ and parts of the
translation from Old Saxon interpolated in the Old English _Genesis_ have
given occasion to the suggestion that some scholar may have talked to
Milton about the poetry published by Junius in 1655, and that the poet may
thus have gained some hints which he used in his great work. The parallels,
however, though very interesting, are only such as might be expected to
occur between two poets of kindred genius working on what was essentially
the same body of traditional material.

The name Caedmon (in the MSS. of the Old English version of Baeda written
_Cedmon, Ceadmann_) is not explicable by means of Old English; the
statement that it means "boatman" is founded on the corrupt gloss
_liburnam, ced_, where _ced_ is an editorial misreading for _ceol_. It is
most probably the British _Cadman_, intermediate between the Old Celtic
_Catumanus_ and the modern Welsh _Cadfan_. Possibly the poet may have been
of British descent, though the inference is not certain, as British names
may sometimes have been given to English children. The name Caedwalla or
Ceadwalla was borne by a British king mentioned by Baeda and by a king of
the West Saxons. The initial element _Caed_--or _Cead_ (probably adopted
from British names in which it represents _catu_, war) appears combined
with an Old English terminal element in the name _Caedbaed_ (cp., however,
the Irish name Cathbad), and hypocoristic forms of names containing it were
borne by the English saints Ceadda (commonly known as St Chad) and his
brother Cedd, called Ceadwealla in one MS. of the _Old English
Martyrology_. A Cadmon witnesses a Buckinghamshire charter of about A.D.
948.

The older editions of the so-called "Caedmon's Paraphrase" by F. Junius
(1655); B. Thorpe (1832), with an English translation; K.W. Bouterwek
(1851-1854); C.W.M. Grein in his _Bibliothek der angelsaechsischen Poesie_
(1857) are superseded, so far as the text is concerned, by R. Wuelker's
re-edition of Grein's _Bibliothek_, Bd. ii. (1895). This work contains also
the texts of the _Hymn_ and the _Dream of the Rood_. The pictorial
illustrations of the Junius MS. were published in 1833 by Sir H. Ellis.

(H. BR.)

[1] It is a significant fact that the Alfredian version, instead of
translating this sentence, introduces the verses with the words, "This is
the order of the words."

[2] The invention of these names was perhaps suggested by _Pericope Oollae
et Oolibae_, which may have been a current title for the 23rd chapter of
Ezekiel.

[3] Stephens read the inscription on the top-stone as _Cadmon mae fauaepo_,
which he rendered "Cadmon made me." But these words are mere jargon, not
belonging to any known or possible Old English dialect.

[v.04 p.0936] CAELIA, the name of two ancient cities in Italy, (1) In
Apulia (mod. _Ceglie di Bari_) on the Via Traiana, 5 m. S. of Barium. Coins
found here bearing the inscription [Greek: Kailinon] prove that it was once
an independent town. Discoveries of ruins and tombs have also been made.
(2) In Calabria (mod. _Ceglie Messapica_) 25 m. W. of Brundusium, and 991
ft. above sea-level. It was in early times a place of some importance, as
is indicated by the remains of a prehistoric _enceinte_ and by the
discovery of several Messapian inscriptions.

See Ch. Huelsen in Pauly-Wissowa, _Realencyclopadie_, iii. 1252.

CAEN, a city of north-western France, capital of the department of
Calvados, 71/2 m. from the English Channel and 149 m. W.N.W. of Paris on the
Western railway to Cherbourg. Pop. (1906) 36,247. It is situated in the
valley and on the left bank of the Orne, the right bank of which is
occupied by the suburb of Vaucelles with the station of the Western
railway. To the south-west of Caen, the Orne is joined by the Odon, arms of
which water the "Prairie," a fine plain on which a well-known race-course
is laid out. Its wide streets, of which the most important is the rue St
Jean, shady boulevards, and public gardens enhance the attraction which the
town derives from an abundance of fine churches and old houses. Hardly any
remains of its once extensive ramparts and towers are now to be seen; but
the castle, founded by William the Conqueror and completed by Henry I., is
still employed as barracks, though in a greatly altered condition. St
Pierre, the most beautiful church in Caen, stands at the northern extremity
of the rue St Jean, in the centre of the town. In the main, its
architecture is Gothic, but the choir and the apsidal chapels, with their
elaborate interior and exterior decoration, are of Renaissance workmanship.
The graceful tower, which rises beside the southern portal to a height of
255 ft., belongs to the early 14th century. The church of St Etienne, or
l'Abbaye-aux-Hommes, in the west of the town, is an important specimen of
Romanesque architecture, dating from about 1070, when it was founded by
William the Conqueror. It is unfortunately hemmed in by other buildings, so
that a comprehensive view of it is not to be obtained. The whole building,
and especially the west facade, which is flanked by two towers with lofty
spires, is characterized by its simplicity. The choir, which is one of the
earliest examples of the Norman Gothic style, dates from the early 13th
century. In 1562 the Protestants did great damage to the building, which
was skilfully restored in the early 17th century. A marble slab marks the
former resting-place of William the Conqueror. The abbey-buildings were
rebuilt in the 17th and 18th centuries, and now shelter the lycee. Matilda,
wife of the Conqueror, was the foundress of the church of La Trinite or
l'Abbaye-aux-Dames, which is of the same date as St Etienne. Two square
unfinished towers flank the western entrance, and another rises above the
transept. Queen Matilda is interred in the choir, and a fine crypt beneath
it contains the remains of former abbesses. The buildings of the nunnery,
reconstructed in the early 18th century, now serve as a hospital. Other
interesting old churches are those of St Sauveur, St Michel de Vaucelles,
St Jean, St Gilles, Notre-Dame de la Gloriette, St Etienne le Vieux and St
Nicolas, the last two now secularized. Caen possesses many old timber
houses and stone mansions, in one of which, the hotel d'Ecoville (c. 1530),
the exchange and the tribunal of commerce are established. The hotel de
Than, also of the 16th century, is remarkable for its graceful
dormer-windows. The Maison des Gens d'Armes (15th century), in the eastern
outskirts of the town, has a massive tower adorned with medallions and
surmounted by two figures of armed men. The monuments at Caen include one
to the natives of Calvados killed in 1870 and 1871 and one to the lawyer
J.C.F. Demolombe, together with statues of Louis XIV, Elie de Beaumont,
Pierre Simon, marquis de Laplace, D.F.E. Auber and Francois de Malherbe,
the two last natives of the town. Caen is the seat of a court of appeal, of
a court of assizes and of a prefect. It is the centre of an academy and has
a university with faculties of law, science and letters and a preparatory
school of medicine and pharmacy; there are also a lycee, training colleges,
schools of art and music, and two large hospitals. The other chief public
institutions are tribunals of first instance and commerce, an exchange, a
chamber of commerce and a branch of the Bank of France. The hotel-de-ville
contains the library, with more than 100,000 volumes and the art museum
with a fine collection of paintings. The town is the seat of several
learned societies including the Societe des Antiquaires, which has a rich
museum of antiquities. Caen, despite a diversity of manufactures, is
commercial rather than industrial. Its trade is due to its position in the
agricultural and horse-breeding district known as the "Campagne de Caen"
and to its proximity to the iron mines of the Orne valley, and to
manufacturing towns such as Falaise, Le Mans, &c. In the south-east of the
town there is a floating basin lined with quays and connected with the Orne
and with the canal which debouches into the sea at Ouistreham 9 m. to the
N.N.E. The port, which also includes a portion of the river-bed,
communicates with Havre and Newhaven by a regular line of steamers; it has
a considerable fishing population. In 1905 the number of vessels entered
was 563 with a tonnage of 190,190. English coal is foremost among the
imports, which also include timber and grain, while iron ore, Caen
stone[1], butter and eggs and fruit are among the exports. Important horse
and cattle fairs are held in the town. The industries of Caen include
timber-sawing, metal-founding and machine-construction, cloth-weaving,
lace-making, the manufacture of leather and gloves, and of oil from the
colza grown in the district, furniture and other wooden goods and chemical
products.

Though Caen is not a town of great antiquity, the date of its foundation is
unknown. It existed as early as the 9th century, and when, in 912, Neustria
was ceded to the Normans by Charles the Simple, it was a large and
important place. Under the dukes of Normandy, and particularly under
William the Conqueror, it rapidly increased. It became the capital of lower
Normandy, and in 1346 was besieged and taken by Edward III. of England. It
was again taken by the English in 1417, and was retained by them till 1450,
when it capitulated to the French. The university was founded in 1436 by
Henry VI. of England. During the Wars of Religion, Caen embraced the
reform; in the succeeding century its prosperity was shattered by the
revocation of the edict of Nantes (1685). In 1793 the city was the focus of
the Girondist movement against the Convention.

See G. Mancel et C. Woinez, _Hist. de la ville de Caen et de ses progres_
(Caen, 1836); B. Pent, _Hist. de la ville de Caen, ses origines_ (Caen,
1866); E. de R. de Beaurepaire, _Caen illustre: son histoire, ses
monuments_ (Caen, 1896).

[1] A limestone well adapted for building. It was well known in the 15th
and 16th centuries, at which period many English churches were built of it.

CAEPIO, QUINTUS SERVILIUS, Roman general, consul 106 B.C. During his year
of office, he brought forward a law by which the jurymen were again to be
chosen from the senators instead of the equites (Tacitus, _Ann._ xii. 60).
As governor of Gallia Narbonensis, he plundered the temple of the Celtic
Apollo at Tolosa (Toulouse), which had joined the Cimbri. In 105, Caepio
suffered a crushing defeat from the Cimbri at Arausio (Orange) on the
Rhone, which was looked upon as a punishment for his sacrilege; hence the
proverb _Aurum Tolosanum habet_, of an act involving disastrous
consequences. In the same year he was deprived of his proconsulship and his
property confiscated; subsequently (the chronology is obscure, see Mommsen,
_History of Rome_, bk. iv. ch. 5) he was expelled from the senate, accused
by the tribune Norbanus of embezzlement and misconduct during the war,
condemned and imprisoned. He either died during his confinement or escaped
to Smyrna.

Livy, _Epit._ 67; Valerius Maximus iv. 7. 3; Justin xxxii. 3; Aulus Gellius
iii. 9.

CAERE (mod. _Cerveteri, i.e. Caere vetus_, see below), an ancient city of
Etruria about 5 m. from the sea coast and about 20 m. N.W. of Rome, direct
from which it was reached by branch roads from the Via Aurelia and Via
Clodia. Ancient writers tell us that its original Pelasgian name was
Agylla, and that the Etruscans took it and called it Caere (when this
occurred is not known), [v.04 p.0937] but the former name lasted on into
later times as well as Caere. It was one of the twelve cities of Etruria,
and its trade, through its port Pyrgos (_q.v._), was of considerable
importance. It fought with Rome in the time of Tarquinus Priscus and
Servius Tullius, and subsequently became the refuge of the expelled
Tarquins. After the invasion of the Gauls in 390 B.C., the vestal virgins
and the sacred objects in their custody were conveyed to Caere for safety,
and from this fact some ancient authorities derive the word _caerimonia_,
ceremony. A treaty was made between Rome and Caere in the same year. In
353, however, Caere took up arms against Rome out of friendship for
Tarquinii, but was defeated, and it is probably at this time that it became
partially incorporated with the Roman state, as a community whose members
enjoyed only a restricted form of Roman citizenship, without the right to a
vote, and which was, further, without internal autonomy. The status is
known as the _ius Caeritum_, and Caere was the first of a class of such
municipalities (Th. Mommsen, _Roemische Staatsrecht_, iii. 583). In the
First Punic War, Caere furnished Rome with corn and provisions, but
otherwise, up till the end of the Republic, we only hear of prodigies being
observed at Caere and reported at Rome, the Etruscans being especially
expert in augural lore. By the time of Augustus its population had actually
fallen behind that of the Aquae Caeretanae (the sulphur springs now known
as the Bagni del Sasso, about 5 m. W.), but under either Augustus or
Tiberius its prosperity was to a certain extent restored, and inscriptions
speak of its municipal officials (the chief of them called _dictator_) and
its town council, which had the title of _senatus_. In the middle ages,
however, it sank in importance, and early in the 13th century, a part of
the inhabitants founded Caere novum (mod. _Ceri_) 3 m. to the east.

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