8, is a song cycle of six lieder related to Christmas by Peter Cornelius, who set his own poems for voice and piano between 1856 and 1870.

It incorporates in the piano accompaniment Philipp Nicolai's hymn "Wie schön leuchtet der Morgenstern".

Cornelius, who was also a gifted writer and had first pursued a career as an actor, wrote the poems for the song cycle on six topics.

After the premiere on 29 January 1871, a review in the Neue Zeitschrift für Musik noted a rich creative mind whose work reached the depth of the human soul ("Ein reicher, schöpferisch begabter Geist tritt uns darin entgegen, ein Künstler, dessen Werk unmittelbar begeisternd in das Tiefste der Menschenseele hineingreift.").

The second version of song "Die Könige" incorporates in the piano the melody of Philipp Nicolai's hymn "Wie schön leuchtet der Morgenstern" in slow motion.

[4] In "Die Hirten" Gottwald took Liszt's suggestion fürther to quote the melody of the Christmas carol "Den die Hirten lobeten sehre" ("Quem pastores laudavere", shortened to Quempas) in the choral accompaniment.