Most public domain Christmas carols are hundreds of years old. This one is thousands of years old, written while the Roman Empire was still intact, during the reign of Emperor Theodosius by Aurelius Prudentius Clemens, while Latin was still a living language. I’ve sung it in the original, except for the last verse in English.

This is the world’s oldest Christmas carol (that is still sung.) In English it goes by “Of the Father’s Love Begotten.” Mode V, key of Eb.

There’s no tempo, because musical notation of the time period (called neume, the predecessor of modern notation) did not incorporate rhythms.

Corde natus ex parentis
Ante mundi exordium
A et O cognominatus,
ipse fons et clausula
Omnium quæ sunt, fuerunt,
quæque post futura sunt.
Sæculorum sæculis.

Ipse iussit et creata,
dixit ipse et facta sunt,
Terra, cælum, fossa ponti,
trina rerum machina,
Quæque in his vigent sub alto
solis et lunæ globo.
Sæculorum sæculis.

Corporis formam caduci,
membra morti obnoxia
Induit, ne gens periret
primoplasti ex germine,
Merserat quem lex profundo
noxialis tartaro.
Sæculorum sæculis.

O that birth forever blessèd,
When the virgin, full of grace,
By the Holy Ghost conceiving,
Bore the Saviour of our race;
And the Babe, the world’s Redeemer,
First revealed His sacred face,
evermore and evermore!