nd appropriate liturgies for the various other
services, that were held on the Sabbath day. Independent collections were
almost simultaneously published by Hans Tausen, Arvid Petersen and
others. And, as these different collections all circulated throughout the
country, the result was confusing. At a meeting in Copenhagen of
Evangelical leaders from all parts of the country, it was decided to
revise the various collections and to combine them into one hymnal. This
first common hymnal for the Danish church appeared in 1531, and served as
the hymnal of the church till 1544, when it was revised and enlarged by
Hans Tausen. Tausen's hymnal was replaced in 1569 by _The Danish
Psalmbook_, compiled by Hans Thomisson, a pastor of the Church of Our
Lady at Copenhagen, and the ablest translator and hymnwriter of the
Reformation period. _Hans Thomisson's Hymnal_--as it was popularly
named--was beyond question the finest hymnal of the transition period. It
was exceptionally well printed, contained 268 hymns, set to their
appropriate tunes, and served through innumerable reprints as the hymnal
of the Danish church for more than 150 years.

Thus the Reformation, in less than fifty years, had produced an
acceptable hymnal and had established congregational singing as an
indispensable part of the church service. The great upheaval had failed,
nevertheless, to produce a single hymnwriter of outstanding merit. The
leaders in the movement were able men, striving earnestly to satisfy a
pressing need. But they were not poets. Their work consisted of passable
translations, selections from Pre-Reformation material and a few original
hymns by Claus Mortensen, Arvid Petersen, Hans Thomisson and others. It
represented an honest effort, but failed to attain greatness. People
loved their new hymns, however, and clung to them despite their halting
metres and crude style, even when newer and much finer songs were
available. But when these at last had gained acceptance, the old hymns
gradually disappeared, and very few of them are now included in the
Danish hymnal. The Reformation produced a worthy hymnal, but none of the
great hymnwriters whose splendid work later won Danish hymnody an
honorable place in the church.

Hans Chrestensen Sthen, the first notable hymnwriter of the Danish
church, was already on the scene, however, when Hans Thomisson's Hymnal
left the printers. He is thought to have been born at Roskilde about
1540; but neither the date