page_title: Myles Coverdale
section_title: Legacy
hierarchical_section_title: Myles Coverdale / Legacy
caption_attribution_description: English: Fragment of Miles Coverdale's Hymbook, Oxford, Bodleian Library, Vet. A. 1. e. 125, fol. 11v. Hymn based on the Paternoster to the tune and partly translating the Paternoster hymn by the German Reformer Ambrosius Moibanus: Ach Vater unser, der du bist im Himmelreich.
context_page_description: Myles Coverdale, first name also spelt Miles, was an English ecclesiastical reformer chiefly known as a Bible translator, preacher and, briefly, Bishop of Exeter. Regarding his probable birth county, Daniell cites John Bale, author of a sixteenth century scriptorium, giving it as Yorkshire. Having studied philosophy and theology in Cambridge, Coverdale became an Augustinian friar and went to the house of his order, also in Cambridge. In 1514 John Underwood, a suffragan bishop and archdeacon of Norfolk, ordained him priest in Norwich. He was at the house of the Augustinians when in about 1520, Robert Barnes returned from Louvain to become its prior. In 1535, Coverdale produced the first complete printed translation of the Bible into English. His theological development is a paradigm of the progress of the English Reformation from 1530 to 1552. By the time of his death, he had transitioned into an early Puritan, affiliated to Calvin, yet still advocating the teachings of Augustine.
context_section_description: Coverdale's legacy has been far-reaching, especially that of his first complete English Bible of 1535.
  For the 400th anniversary of the Authorised King James Bible, in 2011, the Church of England issued a resolution, which was endorsed by the General Synod. Starting with the Coverdale Bible, the text included a brief description of the continuing significance of the Authorised King James Bible (1611) and its immediate antecedents:
  The Coverdale Bible (1535)
  Matthew’s Bible (1537)
  The Great Bible (1539)
  The Geneva Bible (1557 – New Testament, 1560 – whole Bible)
  The Bishops’ Bible (1568)
  The Rheims-Douai Bible (1582 – New Testament, 1609–1610 – whole Bible)
  The Authorised King James Bible (1611)
  As indicated above, Coverdale was involved with the first four of the above. He was partially responsible for Matthew's Bible. In addition to those mentioned above, he produced a diglot New Testament in 1538. He was extensively involved with editing and producing the Great Bible. He was also part of the group of "Geneva Exiles" who produced the Geneva Bible – the edition preferred, some ninety-five years later, by Oliver Cromwell's army and his parliamentarians.
  Coverdale's translation of the Psalms (based on Luther's version and the Latin Vulgate) have a particular importance in the history of the English Bible. His translation is still used in the Anglican Book of Common Prayer. It is the most familiar translation for many in the Anglican Communion worldwide, particularly those in collegiate and cathedral churches. Many musical settings of the psalms also make use of the Coverdale translation. For example Coverdale's renderings are used in Handel's Messiah, based on the Prayer Book Psalter rather than the King James Bible version.
  His translation of the Roman Canon is still used in some Anglican and Anglican Use Roman Catholic churches.
  Less well known is Coverdale’s early involvement in hymn books. Celia Hughes believes that in the days of renewed biblical suppression after 1543, the most important work of Coverdale, apart from his principal Bible translation, was his “Ghostly Psalms and Spiritual Songs” . This she calls “the first English hymn book” and “the only one until the publication of the collection by Sternhold and Hopkins.”  (This was more than twenty years later). The undated print probably was done parallel to his Bible translation in 1535. Coverdale’s first three hymns are based on the Latin Veni Creator Spiritus, preceding its other English translations such as that of 1625 by Bishop J. Cosin by more than ninety years. However, the majority of the hymns are based on the Protestant hymnbooks from Germany, particularly Johann Walter's settings of Martin Luther's hymns such as Ein feste Burg. Coverdale intended his “godly songs” for “our young men ... and our women spinning at the wheels.”  Thus Hughes argues that he realised that for the less-privileged, his scriptural teaching could be learnt and retained more readily by song rather than by direct access to the Bible, which could often be prohibited. However, his hymnbook also ended up on the list of forbidden books in 1539 and only one complete copy of it survives which is today held in The Queen's College, Oxford. Two fragments survived as binding material and are now in the Bodleian Library, Oxford, and in the Beinecke Library, Yale.
  Coverdale is honoured, together with William Tyndale, with a feast day on the liturgical calendar of the Episcopal Church (USA) on 6 October. His extensive contacts with English and Continental Reformers was integral to the development of successive versions of the bible in the English language.
caption: Fragment of Miles Coverdale's Goostly Psalmes and Spirituall Songes in the Bodleian Library, Oxford
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