the words to the star spangled banner song

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O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave. But the fate of national anthems is that their opening. No refuge could save the hireling and slaveįrom the terror of flight or the gloom of the grave,Īnd the star-spangled banner in triumph doth wave Francis Scott Key wrote the words to the United States national anthem, The Star-Spangled Banner. Their blood has wash’d out their foul footstep’s pollution.

That the havoc of war and the battle’s confusionĪ home and a Country should leave us no more? O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave!Īnd where is that band who so vauntingly swore, ’Tis the star-spangled banner - O long may it wave

In full glory reflected now shines in the stream, Now it catches the gleam of the morning’s first beam, What is that which the breeze, o’er the towering steep,Īs it fitfully blows, half conceals, half discloses? Where the foe’s haughty host in dread silence reposes, On the shore dimly seen through the mists of the deep O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave? O say does that star-spangled banner yet wave Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there, O’er the ramparts we watch’d were so gallantly streaming?Īnd the rocket’s red glare, the bombs bursting in air, Whose broad stripes and bright stars through the perilous fight What so proudly we hail’d at the twilight’s last gleaming, O say can you see, by the dawn’s early light, The lyrics vivid description of the battle. Friederich, the music is played as it would have been heard in 1854. The melody comes from an English drinking tune titled The Anacreontic Song, also called To Anacreon in Heaven. It became immensely popular in the North during the Civil War, and thus forbidden by the Confederacy, which rejected both the song and the flag. This 19th century version (MP3) of the Star-Spangled Banner was performed on original instruments from the National Museum of American History's collection. The rise of The Star-Spangled Banner from popular hit to de facto and then official national anthem is tied up in war. Shortly afterward, two Baltimore newspapers published it, and by mid-October it had appeared in at least seventeen other papers in cities up and down the East Coast. A local printer issued the new song as a broadside. Back in Baltimore, he completed the four verses (PDF) and copied them onto a sheet of paper, probably making more than one copy. Inspired by the sight of the American flag flying over Fort McHenry the morning after the bombardment, he scribbled the initial verse of his song on the back of a letter. Francis Scott Key was a gifted amateur poet.

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