Who hath believed our report? is found in just one source, an unfigured holograph score in the second of three volumes assembled by the minor eighteenth-century musician, William Flackton. Although the score is undated, the distinctive hook-shaped bass clef and reverse letter 'e' were discarded by Purcell in the early 1680s, so the anthem was probably composed within a year or two of his appointment to Westminster Abbey - and possibly, it has been suggested, to commemorate the martyrdom of Charles I which fell on a Sunday (30th January) in 1681. Cast in the declamatory ltalianate manner also taken up by a number of Purcell's contemporaries, including William Child [see CP 7], it demonstrates a number of features particularly associated with Purcell's writing, notably a keen and individual approach to word setting, ever responsive to the changing emotions of the text, and a characteristically pungent approach to dissonance. The anthem, part of whose familiar text was famously set by Handel in his Oratorio Messiah, is suitable for Lenten and other penitential occasions.