Text and Illustrations from Wikipedia - the free encyclopaedia,
unless otherwise stated.
Attributed to Hans Memling (circa 1440-1494).
"Last Judgement Triptych" (central panel) in
Muzeum Narodowe, Gdansk, Poland.
Date: 16 June 2006 (original upload date).
Author: Original uploader was Stroika at en.wikipedia.
Permission: PD-US; PD-ART.
(Wikimedia Commons)
Dies Irae.
Available on YouTube at
"Dies Irae" (Day of Wrath) is a 13th-Century Latin Hymn, attributed to, either, Thomas of Celano, of the Franciscan Order (1200 – circa 1265), or Latino Malabranca Orsini (+1294), Lector at the Dominican studium at Santa Sabina, the forerunner of the Pontifical University of Saint Thomas Aquinas, Angelicum, in Rome.
It is a Mediaeval Latin poem, characterised by its accentual stress and its rhymed lines. The metre is trochaic. The poem describes the Day of Judgment, the last trumpet summoning Souls, before the Throne of God, where the Saved will be delivered, and the Unsaved cast into eternal flames.
The Hymn is best known from its use as a Sequence in the Roman Catholic Requiem Mass (Mass for the Dead or Funeral Mass). An English version is found in various Anglican Communion Missals.
The "Dies Irae" was used in the Roman Liturgy, as the Sequence for the Requiem Mass, for centuries, as evidenced by the important place it holds in musical settings, such as those by Mozart and Verdi. It appears in the Roman Missal of 1962 (the last edition before revisions from the Second Vatican Council were implemented). As such, it is still heard in Churches where the Tridentine Latin Liturgy is celebrated. It also forms part of the Traditional Liturgy of All Souls' Day.
