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Author. ?Hermann the Cripple (Hermannus Contractus). According to Raby, the evidence is insufficient to prove his authorship. Hermann (101354), a monk of Reichenau, was a cripple 'who passed a life of pain and trial, and though he could hardly raise his voice above a whisper, he was able to make his mark as a teacher and a man of universal learning' (Raby, p. 225). He was the composer of some sequences.

Metre. Hexameter.

Use. From the beginning of Advent to 2 February. 1. pervia, passable, affording a passage through and, here, with the further idea of affording entrance to all, accessible to all. Fit porta Christi pervia/Referta

plena gratia. In these lines of a fragmentary hymn our Lady is styled pervia as the one through whom the Saviour came to men; here she is so called as the one through whom all men may approach God.

2. manes; i.e. is (the gate of heaven and the star of the sea). The Alma borrows many ideas from the Ave maris stella, 94. Cadenti with populo, fallen rather than falling.

3. curat, strives; genuisti; it is hard to re-produce in English the play on genuisti and Genitorem. Genitor is used of God the Father in 71, 16 and of an earthly father in 110, 13. Here the Son is Genitor as being Mary's, tuum, Creator.

Author. Unknown. It is a metrical adaptation of the antiphon: Ave regina caelorum, ave domina angelorum, salve radix sancta ex qua mundo lux est orta; gaude gloriosa, super omnes speciosa. Vale, valde decora, et pro nobis semper Christum exora. (Cf. Daniel, II, 319.)

This antiphon seems to have been used in some places in the twelfth century as the antiphon for None on the feast of the Assumption. For this the titles given to our Lady are most appropriate, and the last lines, with their Vale and exora, peculiarly so. (Dom B. Capelle, in Les Questions Liturgiques et Paroissiales, March 1950, pp. 33-5). The Collect after the Ave regina suggests such a connection as, with memoriam agimus for festivitatem praevenimus, it is the same as the Post-Communion of the Vigil of the Assumption. The Ave was later put into its present form and used as one of the seasonal antiphons. It must be admitted that it is not so well suited to its

season as the others are to theirs.

Metre. Trochaic dimeter, accentual, though the first two lines are dactylic.

Use. From Compline of 2 February to Wednesday in Holy Week.

3. radix; cf. 97, 7, note. Our Lady is called radix as the representative of the house of Jesse and David from whom was born the Saviour, the Root of Jesse.

4. This line is closely connected in the antiphon with radix, which the added porta rather hides. The reference here is to Is. II, 10 and in line 3 to Is. II, I as well.

Porta creates something of a difficulty. Our Lady is usually called the gate of heaven, as in 30, 2, and such an interpretation is often given of this line. But some prefer to think of our Lady here as the gate of morning, and perhaps that makes porta and orta go together better.

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Author. Unknown. It is thought to be an adaptation of the Christmas antiphon: Maria Virgo semper laetare, quae meruisti Christum portare, caeli et terrae conditorem, quia de tuo utero protulisti mundi salvatorem. According to the famous Jesuit hymnologist Blume, the earliest copy of the Regina is in an antiphonary in the Vatican Library, whose date is between 1170 and the early years of the next century and in which it occurs as an antiphon of the ordinary paschal Vespers.

At the present day it still figures in the Breviary as an antiphon, in the Little Office of our Lady.

It was used by the Franciscans as one of the seasonal antiphons as early as 1249. Its use as a substitute for the Angelus dates from Benedict XIV in 1743.

The supposed connection of the Regina with St Gregory is a myth. (Cf. Thurston, Familiar Prayers, pp. 146-51).

Use. During the Paschal season.

Author. ?Hermann; cf. 30.

As the author of the words seems also to have been the author of the music, Hermann could well have been its composer; but there is no direct, early evidence to prove this.

Another candidate is Peter, bishop of Compostella (died 1000), but there is apparently little justification for this.

The date of the early MSS shows that St Bernard cannot have been its author, and the state of the MSS proves that he is not responsible for adding the last two lines to a composition already in existence. All copies have these two lines.

The last suggested author, of any importance, is Aimar or Adhémar, bishop of Le Puy (died 1098). There are two or three independent sources which connect the Salve with him so that it is sometimes called the antiphona de Podio, the antiphon of Le Puy. But, once again, the evidence is inconclusive. (Cf. Thurston, Familiar Prayers, pp. 115 ff.)

This antiphon of our Lady has always been greatly loved. Many medieval translations of it are to be found, and many elaborations of it in Latin verse were written. One of these, ascribed to St Bonaventure, is printed in Daniel, II, 323-6. In modern times also, many prayers and hymns owe their inspiration to the Salve.

Use. From Trinity Sunday until Advent.

I. mater is an addition to the original Salve, regina misericordiae. Dreves, Analecta Hymnica, I. p. 319, thought it was added in the sixteenth century, but it is found in a Horae of about the year 1340, now in the Bodleian. As the Salve is entirely about our Lady's mercy, it is a pity to lose the title Queen of mercy or to delay the mention of mercy.

2. vita. Another version, which the Carthusians use, is vitae dulcedo.

5. lacrimarum valle; cf. Ps. 83, 7. The Salve describes our life as an exile and ourselves as exiles. This line implies that our exile is also a pilgrimage, for the Psalm in the Vulgate text is about the pilgrim who goes through the Valley of Tears to reach Jerusalem. St Peter addressed his readers as 'strangers and exiles', I Pet. 2, II.

9. The version mentioned above adds benignum after ostende.

II. virgo, like mater in line 1, is an (early) addition and, like mater, tends to blur the picture. The children of Eve are sorrowful, the Child of Mary is blessed. The two mothers are mentioned by name only, and Mary receives at the end attributes which recall the opening titles. Virgo is an element foreign to the original unity.