O Come, All Ye Faithful

“O Come, All Ye Faithful” began as a Latin hymn, “Adeste Fideles,” whose four original verses were published in 1751. It is usually credited to John Francis Wade, an English Catholic copyist whose manuscript of that year is held at Stonyhurst College in Lancashire, though the words have also been attributed to St. Bonaventure and to King John IV of Portugal, and the tune to Wade, John Reading and others. In London it was long known as the “Portuguese Hymn,” after the Duke of Leeds heard it sung at the Portuguese embassy chapel in 1795. Frederick Oakeley translated it into English in 1841 for his Margaret Chapel congregation; the words most people sing today join his verses to William Thomas Brooke’s and first appeared together in Murray’s Hymnal in 1852.