Blessed Virgin Mary (Roman Catholic) - Marian Prayers, Poems and Hymns

Marian Prayers, Poems and Hymns

See also Hymns to Mary and Marian litanies

Throughout the centuries the veneration of the Virgin Mary has given rise to a number of poems and hymns, as well as prayers. Author Emily Shapcote lists 150 Marian poems and hymns in her book Mary the Perfect Woman. Such prayers and poems go as far back as the 3rd century, but enjoyed a rapid growth during the 11th and 12th centuries. Some of the best poetry written in honor of the Blessed virgin comes from this period of the Middle Ages.

The Catechism of the Catholic Church (item 2679) emphasizes the importance of Marian prayers and states:

Mary is the perfect prayer, a figure of the Church.... We can pray with and to her. The prayer of the Church is sustained by the prayer of Mary and united with it in hope.

The earliest known Marian prayer is the Sub tuum praesidium, or Beneath Thy Protection, a text for which was rediscovered in 1917 on a papyrus in Egypt dated to c. 250. The papyrus contains the prayer in Greek and is the earliest known reference to the title Theotokos (confirmed by the Council of Ephesus in 431):

Beneath your compassion, We take refuge, O Mother of God: do not despise our petitions in time of trouble: but rescue us from dangers, only pure, only blessed one.

While the Regina Coelorum goes back to the 4th century, the Regina Coeli was composed towards the end of the 11th century. The first part of the Hail Mary, based on the salutation of angle Gabriel in the Visitation was introduced in the 11tth century, although its current form can be traced to the 16th century.

During the 11th century, as the number of monasteries grew, so did Marian prayers. In this period the Little Office of the Blessed Virgin Mary was introduced and was modeled after the Divine office but was much shorter. It was adopted not only by monks but by pious people who could read. And the growth of the Tertiary orders helped spread its use. During the First Crusade, Pope Urban II ordered it to be said for the success of the Christians. In this period, Hermannus Contractus (Herman the Cripple) at the abbey of Reichenau composed the Alma Redemptoris Mater and hymns to Mary became part of daily life at monasteries such as the Benedictine Abbey of Cluny in France.

In the 12th century Bernard of Clairvaux gave sermons (De duodecim stellis), from which an extract has been taken by the Roman Catholic Church and used in the Offices of the Compassion and of the Seven Dolours. Saint Bernard wrote:

Take away Mary, this star of the sea, the sea truly great and wide: what is left but enveloping darkness and the shadow of death and the densest blackness?

Stronger evidences are discernible in the pious meditations on the Ave Maria and the Salve Regina, usually attributed either to St. Anselm of Lucca (d. 1080) or St. Bernard; and also in the large book "De laudibus B. Mariae Virginis" (Douai, 1625) by Richard de Saint-Laurent.

Other famous Marian prayers include the Magnificat, the Angelus and the Litany of the Blessed Virgin Mary. Marian hymns include O Mary, we Crown Thee With Blossoms Today, Hail Queen of Heaven, the Regina Coeli, and the Ave Maria.