Church of England Hymnals

Although the Church of England has no "official" hymnal, over the years it has produced several books of hymns often regarded as standards in their field. Arguably, the best known of these is Hymns Ancient and Modern.

The beginnings of this great work are a little unclear, but the idea of producing a standard collection of the most serviceable hymns for widepread use is often attributed to the Rev. F. H. Murray, Rector of Chislehurst, in 1857. The idea was soon taken up by several other hymn writers of the time and with the collaboration of a number of hymn book proprietors, the first edition of Hymns Ancient and Modern was launched in 1861, and contained 273 hymns. By 1868, new editions of the book contained 386 hymns and in 1875 a revised edition contained no less than 473 hymns. By 1889 a supplement to the book was added bring the total number of hymns to 638.

Hymns Ancient and Modern was a great success due to many reasons. It contained many of the most popular and widely appreciated tunes of the day, it was comprehensive though not exhaustive, and it portrayed a great sense of unity in the compilation to the extent that it appeared that one man could have sat and compiled the entire volume.

In the period it was first released, perhaps only one volume can be said to rival Hymns Ancient and Modern, namely Church Hymns, produced by the SPCK and made available in 1870. Church Hymns was based on an earlier work, Hymns and Psalms, and was very popular in its earlier editions, though later revisions were a lot less popular.