Caedmon, (flourished 670), entered the monastery of Streaneshalch (Whitby) between 658 and 680, when he

was an elderly man. According to Bede he was an unlearned herdsman who received suddenly, in a vision,
the power of song, and later put into English verses passages translated to him from the Scriptures. Bede tells
us that Caedmon turned into English the story of Genesis and Exodus. The name Caedmon has been
conjectured to be Celtic. The poems assumed to be Caedmon poems Caedmon are: Genesis, Exodus, Daniel,
and Christ and Satan. But critical research has proved the ascription to be impossible. Perhaps the Caedmon
songs were used by later singers and left their spirit in the poems that remains; but of the originals described
by Bede we have no trace. The only work which can be attributed to him is the short "Hymn of Creation,"
quoted by Bede himself. This is all we possess of the first known English poet. It survives in several
manuscripts of Bede in various dialects.

Cynewulf:

Cynewulf (late 8th or 9th century) was identified, not certainly, but probably, with a Cynewulf who was
Bishop of Lindisfarne and lived in the middle of the eighth century. He was a wandering singer or poet who
lived a gay and secular life. The accuracy of some of his battle scenes and seascapes showed that he had
fought on land and sailed the seas. Finally, after a dream in which he had a vision of the Holy Rood, he
changed his life, became a religious poet, sang of Christ, the apostles, and the saints. His work represents an
advance in culture upon the more primitive Caedmonian poems. The poems attributed to him are: Juliana,
Elene, The Fates of the Apostles, and Christ II.

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