"Hail, Queen of Heaven, the Ocean Star" is a

Marian hymn Marian hymns are Christian songs focused on Mary, mother of Jesus. They are used in both devotional and liturgical services, particularly by the Roman Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, Anglican, and Lutheran churches. They are often used in the mont ...

written by Father

John Lingard John Lingard (5 February 1771 – 17 July 1851) was an English Roman Catholic priest and historian, the author of ''The History of England, From the First Invasion by the Romans to the Accession of Henry VIII'', an eight-volume work published i ...

(1771–1851), a Catholic priest and historian who, through the works of

William Cobbett William Cobbett (9 March 1763 – 18 June 1835) was an English pamphleteer, journalist, politician, and farmer born in Farnham, Surrey. He was one of an agrarian faction seeking to reform Parliament, abolish "rotten boroughs", restrain foreign ...

, helped to smooth the passage of the

Catholic Emancipation Catholic emancipation or Catholic relief was a process in the kingdoms of Great Britain and Ireland, and later the combined United Kingdom in the late 18th century and early 19th century, that involved reducing and removing many of the restricti ...

Act in England.

History

Loosely based on the medieval Latin plainchant , the hymn is generally sung to the modified traditional English melody ''Stella''. This melody was published in 1851 by Henri Frederick Hemy in his "''Easy Hymn Tunes for Catholic Schools''". The name ''Stella'' comes from the village of that name near Newcastle-upon-Tyne where Hemy was the organist in a local church. According to one account, after playing the organ for evening benediction on Sunday at Stella, he called into the (old) Board Inn at the foot of Stella Lane with some companions and seated at the piano first played his rendition of the tune. J. Vincent Higginson described it as "one of the oldest English vernacular hymns commonly found in Catholic hymnals."Budwey, Stephanie. ''Sing of Mary: Giving Voice to Marian Theology and Devotion'', Liturgical Press, 2014

Nautical imagery

A ship was an early Christian symbol. The word "nave", used to describe the main body of a church, is from the medieval

Latin Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...

word ''navis'', meaning "ship", possibly with some reference to the "Ship of St Peter" or the Ark of Noah.

Catherine of Siena Catherine of Siena (Italian: ''Caterina da Siena''; 25 March 1347 – 29 April 1380), a member of the Third Order of Saint Dominic, was a mystic, activist, and author who had a great influence on Italian literature and on the Catholic Church ...

described the Church as a ship.Wiseman, Denis Vincent O.P., "Mary in the Life and Thought of Catherine of Siena", ''Marian Library Studies'', n.s.27, 2005-2006
/ref> The image was transferred to the individual travelling on life's stormy or tempestuous seas. This motif of a ship can also be found in the first stanza of ''Mother Dear, O Pray For Me'', as well as in Matthew 8:22-34, where Christ calmed the storm for his apostles who were travelling by boat, and walked on the water with St Peter. Moreover, in Matthew 4:18-22, it says that many of the apostles were fishermen and that Christ made St Peter and St Andrew fishers of men.

Music

Tolkien

Much has been written of the influence of

Tolkien John Ronald Reuel Tolkien (, ; 3 January 1892 – 2 September 1973) was an English writer and philologist. He was the author of the high fantasy works '' The Hobbit'' and ''The Lord of the Rings''. From 1925 to 1945, Tolkien was the Rawl ...

's Catholicism on the imagery he employs. In his

legendarium Tolkien's legendarium is the body of J. R. R. Tolkien's mythopoeic writing, unpublished in his lifetime, that forms the background to his ''The Lord of the Rings'', and which his son Christopher summarized in his compilation of ''The Silmaril ...

, Varda, also known as Elbereth, is one of the Valar and the highest of the "guardians".

Peter Kreeft Peter John Kreeft (; born March 16, 1937) is a professor of philosophy at Boston College and The King's College. A convert to Roman Catholicism, he is the author of over eighty books on Christian philosophy, theology and apologetics. He also f ...

sees her as one of the clearest reflections of Roman Catholic Marian devotion in Tolkien's work. Peter Kreeft, ''The Philosophy of Tolkien: The Worldview Behind The Lord of the Rings'' (2005)
p. 75
citing ''

Letters Letter, letters, or literature may refer to: Characters typeface * Letter (alphabet), a character representing one or more of the sounds used in speech; any of the symbols of an alphabet. * Letterform, the graphic form of a letter of the alphabe ...

'' (ed. 1981) no. 213, p. 288, San Francisco, Ignatius Press, 2005, Both

Marjorie Burns Marjorie Burns is a scholar of English literature, best known for her studies of J. R. R. Tolkien. Biography Marjorie Jean Burns was born in 1940. She gained her PhD at the University of California, Berkeley. She is an emeritus professor of En ...

and

Stratford Caldecott Stratford Caldecott (26 November 1953 - 17 July 2014) was a Catholic author, editor, publisher, and blogger. His work spanned subjects as diverse as literature, education, theology, apologetics, economics, environmental stewardship, sacred geome ...

see in the Elvish hymn '' A Elbereth Gilthoniel'' an echo of the Marian hymn, ''Hail Queen of Heaven''.Burns, Marjorie. "Saintly and Distant Mothers", Kerry, Paul E., ''The Ring and the Cross: Christianity and The Lord of the Rings'', p. 251, Rowman & Littlefield, 2011
According to Caldecott, "Tolkien would have been familiar with one of the most popular Catholic hymns from his childhood, the tone and mood of which are markedly close to those of Tolkien’s song to Elbereth."

O Elbereth! Gilthoniel!
We still remember, we who dwell
In this far land beneath the trees,
Thy Starlight on the Western seas.Caldecott, Stratford. "The Lord & Lady of the Rings", ''Touchstone'', January/February 2002
/ref>

References

{{Reflist

External links

Sheet Music at Hymnary

St. Charles' Choir rendition
Marian hymns 19th-century hymns