Who wrote the words to 'Rule Britannia'?
Rule, Britannia! opening phrase of "Rule, Britannia!" in his choral work "The Music Makers", based on Arthur O'Shaughnessy's "Ode" at the line "We fashion an empire's glory", where he also quotes "La Marseillaise". Rule, Britannia! "Rule, Britannia!" is a British patriotic song, originating from the poem "Rule, Britannia" by James Thomson and set to music by Thomas Arne in 1740. It is strongly associated with the Royal Navy, but also used by the British Army. This British national air was originally included in "Alfred", a masque about Alfred the Great co-written by Thomson and David Mallet and first performed at Cliveden, country
Rule, Britannia! the words "War shall cease, welcome peace!" Similarly, "Rule, Britannia!" was seized upon by the Jacobites, who altered Thomson's words to a pro-Jacobite version. However, Thomson's original words remained best-known. Their denunciation of "foreign tyrants" ["haughty tyrants"?] has some foundation as Great Britain's period of Parliamentary Commonwealth had decisively curbed royal prerogative, leading to the Bill of Rights of 1689 and it was on the way to developing its constitutional monarchy, in marked contrast to the Royal Absolutism still prevalent in Europe. Britain and France were at war for much of the century and hostile in between (see "Second Hundred