Hail, Holy Queen: Origins and Commentaries

For centuries, three medieval candidates contended for the authorship of the Salve Regina: Hermann Contractus of Reichenau (†1054), Adhemar of Monteil, bishop of Le Puy and preacher of the First Crusade (†1098), and the obscure Peter of Messia. The question remains technically open, although the modern consensus favors Hermann. More revealing than the authorship, however, is the liturgical course of this antiphon: adopted by the Dominicans in 1221 to close the Divine Office, by the Cistercians, and finally fixed by Pius V at Compline in the Roman Breviary, the Salve Regina became the most sung Marian text in Western liturgical history.

The Disputed Authorship of the Salve Regina: Hermann Contractus of Reichenau (†1054), Adhemar of Monteil, and the Problem of the Medieval Sources

The Salve Regina in the Eleventh Century: The Great Period of Marian Piety and the First Attestations

The Salve Regina is well attested in the eleventh century, known as the great century of Marian piety, and in a certain way it sums up the Marian devotion of that period. No age ever sang the mercy of Mary with an enthusiasm so ecstatic and so unanimous as the Middle Ages. The Gregorian melody, as old as the prayer itself, so beautiful and laden with hope, certainly contributed to its diffusion. As is well known, it has been attributed to many authors. We recall, for example, the Spanish bishop Pedro Martinez (†1000), the French bishop Adhemar (†1098), papal legate on the First Crusade, the Italian Anselm of Lucca (†1086), Saint Bernard, and others.

Today it is believed that it was almost certainly composed by Hermann of Reichenau, better known as Hermann the Lame (†1054), also the author of the Alma Redemptoris Mater. The English Jesuit Cyril Martindale fell in love with Hermann’s story after discovering, in the Oxford library, the Latin volume that recounts his life. The biographical information about Hermann on those pages, according to Martindale, does not speak of an abandoned disabled person, but of a child entrusted to the loving care of the monks, who quickly became a valued companion for the religious. This singular figure was born on July 18, 1013, the son of Eltrude and Goffredo, count of Altstausen in Swabia, and was baptized Hermann. Because of his severe physical deformity (he could neither stand upright nor walk), he received the nickname “the Lame” (from the Latin “contractus“, meaning contracted, drawn up, but also crippled).

At the age of seven he was sent to the Benedictine monastery of Reichenau, on a small island in Lake Constance, where he remained for the whole of his life, becoming a monk in 1043. The biography also reveals that Hermann was not only a highly cultivated scholar, who knew mathematics, Greek, Latin, Arabic, astronomy, and music, but also a man marked by a passionate humanity, a person who was “pleasant, friendly, always smiling. Tolerant, cheerful“, and who discovered in the monastery the beauty of friendship and the warmth of a home. To his close friend Berthold, who accompanied him daily, Hermann confided his most intimate thoughts during the days of pleurisy that would lead him to death.

His friend was moved and would cover his ears when the little monk said he was “tired of living“. “Life“, writes his biographer Berthold, “is so full of pulsing life that Hermann truly lived it […] by his courage, the beauty of his soul, his serenity in pain, his readiness to joke, the sweetness of his manners, which made him ‘loved by all’. […] Hermann proves that pain does not mean unhappiness, nor pleasure, happiness.“

The Salve Regina at Cluny (Peter the Venerable, †1156) and Its Adoption by the Mendicant Orders in the Thirteenth Century

Further information about the Salve Regina indicates that the antiphon was initially an expression of monastic piety. It was sung as a processional hymn at Cluny, in the time of Abbot Peter the Venerable (†1156), who established it for the procession of the feast of the Assumption and other great feasts. The “Statutes of the Cluniac Congregation”, drawn up around 1135, prescribed: “It has been established that on the feast of the Assumption, during the procession, the antiphon composed for the holy Mother of the Lord, which begins with the words: Salve, Regina, mater misericordiae, is to be sung by the community. The same is to be done in the processions that, from the principal church of the Apostles, proceed, according to tradition, to the church of the same Virgin Mother […]. The reason for this prescription is that, after the Creator of all things, a supreme and utmost love must be nurtured for the Mother of the Creator of the universe by every rational creature.”

The Salve was also used by the Cistercians, which explains why one of the most widespread attributions was to Saint Bernard of Clairvaux (†1153). Blessed Godfrey of Auxerre (†c. 1188), a Cistercian monk, friend and confidant of Saint Bernard, is considered the author of the oldest commentary on the Salve Regina. It is also known that the Cistercian Antiphonary, reformed between 1135 and 1145, provided for the singing of the Salve as the antiphon to the Gospel, that is, to the Benedictus or the Magnificat, on the four medieval feasts of Holy Mary:

• Purification (February 2),
• Annunciation (March 25),
• Assumption (August 15),
• Nativity (September 8).

Through a series of legislative interventions, from 1174 to 1251, the general chapters of the Order progressively broadened the use of the Salve, giving it greater importance and solemnity. Soon the Salve Regina was adopted by the mendicant Orders. In 1221 the Dominicans introduced the daily singing of the Salve after Compline, first in Bologna and then in the other convents of the Province of Lombardy, from which it quickly spread throughout the Order. In the case of the Friars Minor, it is known that, after the liturgical reform carried out by the Minister General Friar Haymo of Faversham (†1244), the Salve Regina was included among the four antiphons sung after Compline, according to the liturgical seasons of the year. Among the mendicant Orders, the Servants of Mary stood out for their frequent use of the Salve Regina. The ancient Constitutions, drawn up in 1280, prescribed in Chapter I: “The Salve Regina is not to be omitted at any time of the liturgical year at the end of each hour and after the common meal, except in the triduum of Parasceve. Every evening the Salve is to be sung with great devotion after the third reading of the Vigil of Our Lady, when this is sung. If the Vigil is not sung, the Salve Regina is to be sung at the end of Compline. All the friars present in the convent, including the provincials and other officials, are to take part from the beginning, setting aside any other commitment. And so that the friars may not offer excuses, the bell is to be rung.”

During the singing of the Salve, the Servants bowed their heads and bent one knee at the words “Salve Regina”, until the second “salve”. In the church of Santa Maria dei Servi in Bologna one may contemplate the icon of the Madonna della Salve, by an anonymous artist of the thirteenth century. Tradition says that Saint Philip Benizi (†1285) gave it to the friars of the Bolognese convent. The community would process to this icon, singing the Salve. David Maria Turoldo, the most famous friar of the Servants of Mary, in a poetic passage, suggestively presents the filial relationship between the Virgin and her Servants in connection with our antiphon: “How many friars and what a choir of voices to greet me every evening! And I, without their noticing, with a slight smile, greeted them every evening, one by one.”

In this historical evocation, we cannot fail to recall another unforgettable servant of Mary, Friar Ignacio Maria Calabuig (†2005). In his study on the Vigil of Our Lady, the eminent Mariologist and liturgist devotes a few pages to the Salve Regina and presents its content in three expressions:

“The Salve Regina, by its content, is at once an expression of greeting, a form of ‘cry’, a voice of supplication:
a) the greeting of the servants to the Queen of mercy. A solemn greeting, expressed with a happy literary arrangement: the same word opens and closes the first stanza: ‘Salve, Regina […] spes nostra, salve’.
b) a cry in the biblical-liturgical sense of the shout of an oppressed people that rises to heaven (cf. Ex 2:23; 3:9). A cry, therefore, that rises to their Advocate from the servants, oppressed by the awareness of sin and groaning in a land of exile, that she may intercede on their behalf and obtain for them deliverance and return to the homeland.
c) the supplication of the servants to the Mother of Jesus, that ‘after this exile’ she may show them the Son, the ‘blessed fruit’ of her womb”

The Salve Regina, initially an expression of monastic piety and adopted by the mendicant Orders, holds an important place in popular piety, winning great favor among the people. To meet this devotion, in the sixteenth century it was established that on feast days the antiphon should be sung immediately after Vespers and not at Compline. In the seventeenth century, in order to make the evening tribute to the Virgin more popular, the custom spread among the religious Orders of sprinkling the friars and the people with holy water during the singing of the Salve.

The Commentary of Bernard of Clairvaux (†1153): The Six Verbs of Invocation and the Theology of Mary’s Compassion in the Salve Regina

The text of the Salve Regina, as a greeting and invocation to the Virgin, closes the Liturgy of the Hours and, at Compline, is presented in these terms:

Hail, Holy Queen, 
Mother of mercy, 
our life, our sweetness, our hope, hail! 
To you do we cry, 
poor banished children of Eve. 
To you do we send up our sighs, mourning and weeping 
in this valley of tears. 
Turn then, our Advocate, 
those merciful eyes of yours 
toward us. 
And after this our exile, 
show unto us Jesus, the blessed fruit 
of your womb. 
O clement, O loving, 
O sweet Virgin Mary. 
Pray for us, O holy Mother of God, 
that we may be made worthy of the promises of Christ.

Among the commentaries that have honored the Salve Regina, those of three authors stand out: Godfrey of Auxerre (†1188), Saint Lawrence of Brindisi (†1619), and Saint Alphonsus M. de Liguori (†1787).

Godfrey of Auxerre (†1188): The First Commentary on the Salve Regina, a Homily for the Nativity of Mary at Clairvaux (1162-1165)

As mentioned, it is believed that a homily by the Cistercian monk Godfrey of Auxerre, delivered for the feast of the Nativity of Mary, probably in the years when he was abbot of Clairvaux (1162-1165), is to be regarded as the first commentary on the Salve Regina. This homily-commentary represented a significant novelty in the field of monastic homiletics, a novelty destined for lasting success. It was a novelty because Godfrey’s homilies had always commented on a biblical text, whereas on that September 8 he began to comment on a “liturgical text“, recently included in the Cistercian Antiphonary mentioned above.
In the second part of the homily, the blessed explains the three attributes that accompany the title Regina misericordiae applied to Mary, namely: “our life, our sweetness, our hope.” According to Godfrey, Mary is our life because, by the examples of her holy existence, she begets and educates for life. She is our sweetness because she brings values of immense loveliness, such as love for contemplation, the joy of remembering her, and the confidence that her merciful eyes instill in us. Mary is our hope, first of all, because she is the “hope of resurrection.”
Contemplating as already accomplished in her what we await with intimate and ardent desire, victory over death and eternal happiness, we feel encouraged and filled with confidence. She is also the “hope of mercy” because, regarding the Virgin as the icon of divine mercy, we trust that through her intercession we shall obtain what we do not deserve because of our sins and, above all, that we shall see “after this exile, Jesus, the blessed fruit of her womb.”
These three attributes echo intensely in the heart of the Christian: they refer him to the mysterious fact of his existence (life), to his need for consolation in bitterness (sweetness), to the need to live in an expectation that does not disappoint (hope). Godfrey does not confront the difficulty posed by the use of these terms applied to the Virgin. He is certainly not unaware that, strictly speaking, our life is Christ alone, He is the source of supreme sweetness, He is our only hope.
He knows this and, with the monks, sings it when, in the choral liturgy, the verses of the liturgical hymn Jesu Rex Admirabilis return: “Jesu… vita desiderabilis/… dulcedo ineffabilis/… spes paenitentium.” But for Godfrey, as for his master Bernard, all this is taken for granted: in Mary there is no light that is not a reflection of the light of Christ. The Virgin is our life, our sweetness, our hope only as an efficacious reflection of the saving action of Christ. Godfrey’s presupposition in his commentary on the Salve is familiar to medieval devotional literature: the awareness of one’s own misery and sin and, at the same time, the longing for deliverance and life. Before the throne of the Regina misericordiae, Godfrey and his monks are poor people seeking help, sinners asking for forgiveness.

Saint Lawrence of Brindisi (†1619): The Six Commentaries of the Mariale and the Capuchin Doctor’s View of Mary

Saint Lawrence, a Capuchin friar, priest, Doctor of the Church, and distinguished biblical scholar, was one of the greatest devotees of Mary that history has ever known. He is the author of 84 discourses on the Virgin, of which 6 are commentaries on the Salve Regina. The Mariale is the title given to the discourses collected and published for the first time in 1928 by the Venetian Province of the Capuchin Friars. In the six discourses on the Salve, the saint takes up the ancient question of the relationship between the titles “Queen” and “Mother” attributed to Mary: what is their origin? How are they harmonized?
More than a real problem, it is an academic question, or rather a pastoral device for illustrating the greatness of Mary and deepening her mission in the life of the Church. Saint Lawrence identifies the origin of the two titles in Mary’s likeness to God and to Christ.
God is supremely powerful (= King) and supremely good (= Father).
Analogously, Mary possesses great power (= Queen) and is full of goodness (= Mother).
To indicate Mary’s power and goodness, the saint calls the Virgin “Queen” and “Mother of Mercy“, just as the Salve begins. According to our author, God made Mary a powerful Queen and Mother of Mercy so that she might intervene on behalf of the Church and of humanity. In this perspective, he presents the exercise of Mary’s Queenship as a maternal service of mercy and effectively expresses the inner emotion that the title Mater Misericordiae arouses in the devout: “Mother of Mercy. How sweet is the name of mother! It cannot be expressed, it cannot be understood. And the Virgin is not only a mother, but the mother of mercy, supremely merciful. A mother full of clemency, of tenderness, of love.”

Saint Alphonsus M. de Liguori (†1787): The Salve Regina in “The Glories of Mary” (1750) and the Alphonsian Method of Marian Commentary

A great missionary, a zealous bishop, and a celebrated writer, he is the author of the work The Glories of Mary, published in 1750. The book met with extraordinary success and was translated into several languages. It is considered by some scholars the magnum opus of the saint, who published it after long labor and meticulous historical and theological research. For sixteen years he listened to and examined the immense tradition with the curiosity of an ardent love, with the pastoral sense of an excellent missionary, with the rigor of a theologian on whom Pius IX would confer the title of Doctor of the Church.
The work is a sign of the saint’s great devotion and an expression of gratitude to the Mother of God for the help she granted him throughout his life, as is clear from the declaration found in the “Author’s Supplication to Jesus and Mary“, placed at the beginning of the book: “To you, then, I turn, O my most sweet Lady and my Mother Mary: you know well that, after Jesus, I have placed in you all the hope of my eternal salvation. For all my good, my conversion, my vocation to leave the world, and all the other graces I have received from God, I acknowledge that they were all given to me through you.”
The volume is divided into two parts: the first comprises a broad commentary on the Salve Regina, and the second presents “The Virtues of Mary.” In the commentary on the Salve Regina, which constitutes the most important part of the famous book, Saint Alphonsus describes in a vivid, at times dramatic, way the many interventions of the Virgin on behalf of the faithful. Mary obtains pardon for them, reconciles them with God; if sin separates and drives away from God, she brings near, reconciles, and unites. She intervenes to keep the converted sinner in grace: she invites him to prayer, obtains light and strength for him, keeps him from falling again, and obtains for him the gift of final perseverance. As a powerful advocate and merciful mother, Mary does not refuse to plead the causes of the most wretched. She is always attentive to see, to have compassion, and to come to their aid, especially in moments of danger and, above all, at the hour of death: then she is more present than ever to comfort her devotees, to defend them from the evil one, to save them from hell, and to lead them with her into paradise for the eternal encounter with God.

The Salve Regina in the Contemporary Liturgy: Compline, the Roman Breviary, and the Relevance of the Medieval Antiphon

Let us now come to the third point: the value and the meaning of the Salve Regina for our time. We have mentioned that, by its language and cultic attitude, by the social setting it reflects, and by the theological conception to which it refers, the Salve Regina is a typical expression of the Middle Ages. From that period it expresses perennial religious values:

• the awareness of the need for mercy.
• the awareness of being in a land of exile.
• living in a world as a place for building up the Kingdom.
• the longing to contemplate the face of Christ.
• trust in the Mother of Mercy, to whom God entrusted a special mission of grace and intercession on behalf of His people.

Because of such values, the Salve Regina was and is loved by generations of the faithful. It is an authentic prayer on the lips of those who first prayed it, and it rings true, despite cultural changes, on the lips of the faithful of our own time. The Christian people invoke the Mother of Mercy because they recognize in her the mercy of the Father in maternal form, made up of tenderness, gratuitousness, generosity, and welcome. The demonstrations of this fact sometimes take on a public character. Let us think, for example, of the ex-votos and the votive plaques hung on the walls of shrines: they attest that Mary shows her mercy by helping in dangers, obtaining healings and graces.
The title “Mother of Mercy“, present in the Salve Regina, celebrates precisely this. In the first place, because she is the Mother of Him who is Mercy, Christ, as Saint John Paul II affirms in the encyclical Dives in misericordia. Sent into the world by God, Christ becomes man out of love for humanity, in order to share its pain, loneliness, fear, and death. Furthermore, because this title reminds us that Jesus on Calvary offered the Church a mother: “Behold your Mother” (Jn 19:25), as guide and consolation for her children on pilgrimage on earth, and entrusted His brothers and sisters to her: “Woman, behold your son” (Jn 19:26), all of them made her beloved children, also in need of a mother beside His cross.

For devout people, to turn trustingly to the Mother of Mercy is not only a request for intercession for their sins, but above all a plea for her help in becoming merciful, according to the command of the Son, Jesus: “Be merciful, as your Father is merciful” (Lk 6:36). This attitude is required by the Lord of those to whom He grants mercy. Let us, then, ask a simple question: what does it mean for us to be merciful? Literally, it means to have a heart sensitive to the miseries of others, ready to come to their aid.
It is the attitude of the good Samaritan who, finding by the roadside a mistreated foreigner of another religious faith, feels compassion (cf. Lk 10:33), feels a pain in his heart that leads him to a series of acts of assistance. It means noticing the other instead of “passing by“, being sensitive to his needs, helping him concretely, employing one’s own means, time, strength, and even life. Aware that, on the path of conformity to Christ, we are subject to falls and errors, we implore the help of her who, like no one else, experienced the mercy of God: she felt herself looked upon with love and loved by Him (Lk 1:48), proclaiming in the Magnificat that His mercy “extends from generation to generation” (Lk 1:50).

Therefore, in praying and singing to the Mother of Mercy through the Salve Regina, we can commit ourselves to following Christ, the way that the Mother of God teaches us to walk: “Do whatever He tells you” (Jn 2:5). As if to say: This Son of mine may tell you something that seems strange to you, but trust, as I learned to trust, even when His words seemed strange to me (cf. Lk 2:49-50). Indeed, the Son says something quite strange to the servants: the guests want wine, and you bring them water. They trust, and the “great sign” occurs: the water of the Law (“it served for the ablutions of the Jews“: Jn 2:6), when brought to the steward, becomes wine. “Do whatever He tells you” (Jn 2:5).
How?
By abandoning feelings of anger and purposes of revenge against those who afflict us, by resuming interrupted dialogues, by overcoming evil with good, hatred with love, by meeting indifference with love, offense with forgiveness, ingratitude with gratitude.

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To deepen devotion to the Virgin Mary through prayer, consult the Apostolic Exhortation Marialis Cultus of Pope Paul VI.