Was born (according to Wood) in Hampshire, or as Holinshed says, at Southampton; but Atkins (“Hist. of Gloucestershire”) affirms that he was born at Awre, twelve miles from Gloucester. He studied at Oxford, but not long enough to take any degree. The office of groom of the robes to Henry VIII was secured to him, and he was continued in the same office by Edward VI. He died in 1549. He versified fifty-one of the Psalms, which were first printed by Edward Whitchurch, 1549, with the title “All such Psalms as Thomas Sternehold, late Groom of the Kinges Majestyes Robes, did in his Lyfetyme Drawe into English Metre.” He was succeeded in the translation by John Hopkins (fifty-eight psalms), William Whittingham (five psalms), Thomas Norton (twenty-seven psalms), Robert Wisdome (Psa. xxv) and others. The complete version was entitled “The Whole Book of Psalms, Collected into English Metre by T. Sternhold, J. Hopkins, and others, etc.” (printed in 1562, by John Day). “Certain Chapters of the Proverbs, etc.,” is ascribed to him, but the authenticity is doubted.
Who first translated into English certaine Psalmes of Dauid.
About this time, David’s Psalms were translated into English metre, and (if not publicly commanded) generally permitted to be sung in all churches. The work was performed by Thomas Sternhold, (an Hampshire-man, esquire, and of the Privy Chamber to king Edward VI. who for his part translated thirty-seven selected Psalms,) John Hopkins, Robert Wisedome, &c., men whose piety was better than their poetry; and they had drank more of Jordan than of Helicon. These Psalms were therefore translated, to make them more portable in people’s memories, (verses being twice as light as the selfsame bulk in prose,) as also to raise men’s affections, the better to enable them to practise the apostle’s precept: “Is any merry? let him sing psalms,” James v. 13. Yet this work met afterwards with some frowns in the faces of great clergymen, who were rather contented, than well pleased, with the singing of them in churches: I will not say, because they misliked so much liberty should be allowed the laity (Rome only can be guilty of so great envy) as to sing in churches: rather, because they conceived these singing-psalms erected in cor-rivality and opposition to the reading-psalms, which were formerly sung in cathedral churches; or else, the child was disliked for the mother’s sake; because such translators, though branched hither, had their root in Geneva.
Thomas Sternhold, an associate with John Hopkins, in one of the worst of many bad Translations of the psalms of David: yet in regard, as first made choice of, they have hitherto obtained to be the only psalms sung in all parochial churches, (it hath long heartily been wished a better choice were made) he hath therefore perhaps been thought worthy to be mentioned among the poets that flourished in Q. Mary’s, and the beginning of Q. Elizabeth’s reign.
But being a most zealous Reformer, and a very strict liver, he became so scandaliz’d at the amorous and obscene Songs used in the Court, that he forsooth turn’d into English Metre 51 of David’s Psalms, and caused Musical Notes to be set to them, thinking thereby that the Courtiers would sing them instead of their Sonnets, but did not, only some few excepted. However, the Poetry and Music being admirable, and the best that was made and composed in those times, they were thought fit afterwards to be sung in all Parochial Churches, as they do yet continue.
The pious Thomas Sternhold and John Hopkins are the only immortal translators of David’s Psalms.
It certainly is not easy to discover the grand features of Hebrew poetry through the muddy medium of this translation; but it is a curious repertory, and highly characteristic of the time in which it was written. Metre was the universal vehicle of devotion. Our poets were inspired with a real and fervent enthusiasm; and though the tameness and insipidity of the language in which they vented this inspiration may surprise and disgust a modern reader, it was probably once thought to derive grandeur and sanctity from its subject.
With the best intentions and the worst taste, degraded the spirit of Hebrew psalmody by flat and homely phraseology; and mistaking vulgarity for simplicity, turned into bathos what they found sublime.
Though not good, it was better than the feeble modern rhymes by which it has been superseded.
Sternhold is solely remembered as the originator of the first metrical version of the Psalms which obtained general currency alike in England and Scotland…. The only one of his psalms which remains current is the simple rendering of Psalm XXIII (“My Shepherd is the Living Lord”).
