Ihr Kinderlein

"Ihr Kinderlein, kommet" ("Oh, come, little children") is a German Christmas carol. The lyrics were written by Catholic priest and writer Christoph von Schmid in 1798. His poem "Die Kinder bei der Krippe" (The children at the manger) had originally eight verses and was first published in 1811. Schmid then included it in his 1818 collection Blüten dem blühenden Alter gewidmet (Flowers dedicated to the flowering age). Together with other poems from this collection, it was then set to music by Franz Xaver Luft in 1837. The music to the poem as it is known today was written by the composer Johann Abraham Peter Schulz in 1794 as a secular song named "Wie reizend, wie wonnig" (How charming, how pleasant). Around 1832, this melody was first published with Schmid's poem in a collection Sechzig deutsche Lieder für dreißig Pfennig (Sixty German songs for thirty pennies) by Friedrich Eickhoff (1807–1886). This collection was later printed in large numbers by the just founded (1835) C. Bertelsmann Verlag.