TE DEUM ("Te Dezon, laudomus," "We praise thee, 0 God"), a well-known Latin hymn of the Western Church—so called from its first words—sung at the end of matins on all feasts except Inno cents' Day, and on all Sundays except during penitential seasons. The hymn is one of the most simple, and at the same time most solemn and majestic, in the whole range of Latin hymnology. Its authorship is uncertain. The chronicle of Bishop Datius of Milan (died about 552), which is both unauthentic and worthless, describes the "Te Deum" as the joint production of St. Ambrose and St. Augustine, into which they both burst forth by a common inspiration on occa sion of the baptism of Augustine. Hence the "Te Deum" is commonly called the "Ambrosias Hymn." The first actual ref erence to it is in the rule of Ciesarius of Arles, who was made a bishop in 502, and it is at any rate certain that it arose as early as the 5th century, and in its mod ern form was used by Hincmar of Rheims in the 9th century. It is ascribed by
some authorities to Hilary of Arles, by others to some disciple of Cassian of Marseilles, but in no case is the evidence at all satisfactory. The hymn in its current form consists of 29 verses; the first 21 verses are uniform in the four oldest ver sions current, and it seems probable that verses 1-10 were a Greek hymn dating back to the 2d century, though Bishop John Wordsworth in Julian's "Diction ary" thinks verses 7-9 are a reminiscence of Cyprian, not vice versa, and that the Greek form of verses 1-10 is a transla tion from the Latin, not an original com position. In the Anglican morning prayer it follows the first Lesson, except when the Benedictite is preferred as its alternative. It is frequently used also in the services of both Presbyterian and Congregational Churches, and there are more than 20 metrical renderings of it in English hymnology.