William Kethe

William Kethe was a sixteenth-century Protestant minister and metrical psalm writer whose birthplace and birth year remain uncertain. The Canterbury Dictionary of Hymnology considers an eastern Scottish origin probable. During the reign of Mary I he joined the Marian exiles, appearing at Frankfurt in 1555 and Geneva in 1557, where he became part of the English-speaking Reformed community associated with John Knox. He was sent to other exile communities in Basel and Strasbourg and contributed twenty-five metrical psalms to the Anglo-Genevan psalter tradition.

After Elizabeth I's accession, Kethe returned to England and in 1561 became rector of Child Okeford in Dorset. He also served as a chaplain with English forces connected with the Earl of Warwick, including at Le Havre in 1563. A surviving sermon preached at Blandford Forum in 1571 confirms his continuing ministry in Dorset. He died before June 6, 1594.

His Psalm 100 paraphrase, “All People That on Earth Do Dwell,” is the work by which he is chiefly remembered. Although some early psalters created attribution confusion, the Scottish Psalter and later hymnological research strongly associate the text with Kethe. It was written to fit the Genevan melody now called OLD HUNDREDTH and became the most durable of his metrical psalms.