The book of Wardā is a collection of liturgical hymns, called ʿonyātā, appointed for various feasts and seasons of the ecclesiastical year of the East Syriac churches. The vast majority of these hymns are attributed to Gīwargīs Wardā, an otherwise unknown author said to hail from Arbela, presumably active in the second half of the thirteenth century. The ʿonītā genre is a descendant of the venerable madrašā, and more specifically the sogītā, though it has incorporated elements from the memrā genre as well.The present study focuses on the cycle of penitential ʿonyātā explicitly attributed to Wardā himself and found in the manuscript Mingana Syr 214, a late, though representative, exemplar of the Wardā collection. The hymns studied are appointed for the "Rogation of the Ninevites," a three-day fast occurring three weeks before the beginning of Lent. Though all the hymns belong to the same genre, they demonstrate a wide range of content: retelling of biblical stories, commentaries on the Lord's Prayer, lamentations over natural disasters, and more general themes of repentance.The Syriac text of the hymns in Mingana Syr 214 and an English translation accompany the study. Though not strictly speaking a critical edition, the Syriac text indicates textual variations in other manuscripts where such are known. The study investigates Wardā's use of biblical material and his familiarity with traditions found in Jewish, Islamic, and apocryphal sources.