The origin of rhythmical verse in late Latin

p. v

STATE OF THE PROBLEM THE MATERIAL Tables of metrical faults and of conflicts of accent and ictus in the iambic dimeter in the trochaic tetrameter. in the sapphic in the asclepiadean THE ACCENTUAL THEORY. • Lewis' views. • General form. .

p. vi

This thesis gradually occupied by the unstable syllables Table for the iambic dimeter "" Accentual results of this shifting in the iambic dimeter. in the trochaic tetrameter. trochaic tetrameter . • in the iambic trimeter Comparison with metres having no undetermined theses II.

p. vii

The treatment of short syllables directly before and after the accent 76 Local peculiarities 77 77 Difference between formal and informal composition Difference in treatment between the iambic dimeter and trochaic tetrameter and iambic trimeter . · GENERAL SUMMARY APPENDIX I.

p. 2

They contain specimens of the iambic dimeter, trochaic tetrameter catalectic, sapphic and asclepiadean.

p. 3

In the tables of the trochaic tetrameter, the metrical specimens from Seneca to Fortunatus are arranged chronologically, and all the other specimens of this metre, as well as those of the sapphic and asclepiadean, are arranged according to stages of development.

p. 5

Metrical hymns of the Carolingian period all those in Poetae Lat. medii aevi I-III (Dümmler and Traube). Trochaic Tetrameter. Seneca (Leo). Florus Baehrens P. L.

p. 11

Further, as is seen from the tables just presented, there is a large body of hymns (Iambic Dimeter C and D, Trochaic Tetrameter B and C), which are neither wholly quan- titative nor wholly rhythmical, but evidently represent a transi- tional stage and plainly suggest a gradual development from the quantitative to the rhythmical form.

p. 13

13 - in the metres examined by him, the number of conflicts between accent and ictus did not materially decrease anywhere except in the trochaic tetrameter, the iambic verses continuing to have a considerable proportion of conflicts even in their rhythmical form (cf. these metres in the tables).

For with the exception of the trochaic tetrameter and, to a less degree, the iambic trimeter, every rhythmical verse - form shows abundant and regular conflicts between accent and ictus, and it is surely contrary to common sense to suppose that the accent caused rhythmical poetry, when rhythmical poetry itself is not accentual to any marked degree.

Iambic Dimeter B 2 and C, Trochaic Tetrameter A and B in the tables). In fact in both the trochaic tetrameter, which reached the highest accentual character, and in the iambic dimeter, which took some steps in this direction, no progress seems to have been made by the rhythmical hymns over the more advanced metrical ones; rather, if anything, the 1) This is of course not to be interpreted as excluding the possibility of a resolution of the long syllable in the arsis.

p. 14

Our tables (as well as his) show that to the latter class of hymns belong only those in trochaic tetrameter, while the iambic dimeter and the second half of the asclepiadean belong to the former, and the sapphic, the first half of the asclepiadean and, as Meyer has shown, the hexameter, do not make any appreciable effort at avoiding conflict in either their metrical or their rhythmical forms.

p. 15

When that happened, or even if the first syllable of the iambic dimeter was merely considered an anacrusis, the verse was practically trochaic, and the same characteristics might be expected as are found in the second half of the trochaic tetrameter. ――― But in spite of the variety which thus exists within the sep- arate metres, the general statement is no doubt true, that the degree of harmony attained between word-accent and verse - ictus depends upon the kind of metre used, and is not the result of a common influence like the accent, which would affect all kinds of verse alike.

p. 17

But the fact in the case is that in those quantitative iambic dimeters and second parts of trochaic tetrameters which show an agreement of accent and ictus at the end, there is no possible chance for a conflict of accent and ictus in other words than those of two syllables, since a word of three or more syllables never has the accent on a short syllable unless this syllable is followed by another short, and for words of this kind there is no place in the metrical form of the verses mentioned.

The divided form of the first part of the trochaic tetrameter (-_ ~ || _ ~ _ ~) which had become almost the only form used by the time of Fortunatus, does not admit conflicts at all, except when a monosyllable stands before the caesura, and then only in words of two syllables.

p. 19

For instance, it is usually greater in the third arsis of the iambic dimeter and the third and seventh arses of the trochaic tetrameter, and it is hardly ever found in the last thesis of either kind of verse.

p. 21

And more than that, some- times the same men who wrote metrical hexameters and penta- meters, also wrote rhythmical iambic dimeters or trochaic tetra- meters. This was the practice of Aldhelm, Boniface, Paulus Diaconus, Petrus Diaconus and probably of Bede ¹). With the writers of the Carolingian period, there was the further distinction that the iambic dimeter was usually employed in its metrical form, while the iambic trimeter and trochaic tetrameter were more often used in their rhythmical forms.

p. 33

The earliest specimens of popular verse which have been con- sidered in close connection with the later rhythmical poetry, are a small number of trochaic tetrameters and septenarii, mostly found in Suetonius' Lives of the Caesars.

p. 38

The usual form of the popular trochaic tetrameter appears to have been something like the old comic form of this verse.

E. nos. 234-247 and 117—211)¹). - 1) The two late examples of popular songs (Vopiscus, Vita Aureliani, 6), which are usually considered in this connection, need liberal padding before they can pose as trochaic tetrameters or septenarii even of a degenerate kind.

p. 39

The iambic tri- meter (senarius) as well as the catalectic trochaic tetrameter (septenarius) exists abundantly in both the strict and the free. form.

p. 40

Of the inscriptions in trochaic tetrameter (septenarii), those from Pompeii have already been mentioned in another connection (pp. 34 & 37).

p. 41

On the other hand the iambic trimeter was very little used in the hymns, and then only in its strict form, though the inscriptions show it to have been quite frequently employed by the people. The trochaic tetrameter, as far as the inscriptions show, was much less of a favorite.

The same is true of the trochaic tetrameter, with the difference that the change is less marked, because the strict form of this metre never admitted re- solution even to the same extent as the iambic metres.

p. 42

With these exceptions ¹), the tables of unmetrical scansion from the inscriptions include all the iambic trimeters (senarii), iambic dimeters and trochaic tetrameters (sep- tenarii) found in Bücheler, Carmina Epigraphica; further, all the that were very often introduced between the time when the verses were originally composed, and the time when they were cut into the stone.

p. 45

In fact the part of the trimeter after the caesura is in all respects equivalent to the se- cond half of the trochaic tetrameter catalectic. This method of construction of course tends to bring a larger number of final syllables into the thesis. The trochaic tetrameter inscriptions, where the rhythm is completely trochaic, have all their unmetrical final syllables in thesis.

p. 54

The end had indeed almost been reached, when the proportion of lines whose undetermined thesis was not filled by an unstable syllable had decreased from 38% to 8%. In the trochaic tetrameter the decrease was still more marked, as the following table will show:

p. 55

When the final syllable stands in the thesis, the iambic dimeter would have the form -- || U and the trochaic tetrameter would be cut into its four dipodies, If the syllable preceding the accent in words of either three or four syllables stands in the undetermined thesis, the lines would have the form and || ~ - ~ || - ~ - || respectively.

p. 57

57 able space. In the trochaic tetrameter and the iambic trimeter this difficulty did not exist on account of the greater length of these lines.

And besides that, just as in the dimeter of the first type, there is in all the rest of the trochaic tetrameter of this, the prevalent type, no good place for a word of the type, which just fits the end.

The actual occurrence of conflict in the trochaic tetrameter, in the different stages of its development, is as follows: 5. 6. 7.

p. 58

The iambic trimeter had its undetermined theses, one of which had always stood before the caesura, making the second half of the verse equivalent to the second half of the trochaic tetrameter catalectic. In this part the conflicts would then of course practically be confined to one foot, the fourth of the trimeter (corresponding to the sixth of the tetrameter).

p. 60

Both these syllables have the ictus, the former being made still more prominent, on the side toward the end of the verse, by the two short syllables 1) The numerical preponderance gained in the course of time by that form of trochaic tetrameter in which the verse is cut into its dipodies, was no doubt to some extent due to the identity of three of these parts. 2) As an illustration, the first two stanzas of the former hymn may be given.

p. 63

Then the rhythm at the end of the iambic dimeter, of the two halves of the trochaic tetrameter, of the iambic trimeter and of the second half of the asclepiadean naturally remained as it had been before, since in these positions the accent had in the metrical forms always coincided or had come to coincide with the ictus.

p. 69

Of the rhythmical hymns which grew out of the trochaic tetrameter this is not true, to be sure, but neither is it true of any of the later metrical specimens in this metre. For certain reasons which we mentioned on p. 57, the trochaic tetrameter developed along this line more rapidly than the iambic dimeter, so that the former verse had completely finished its accentual development before rhythmical hymn-writing began.

p. 73

These latter verses had, besides, another advantage in the brevity of the recurring parts, which in the trochaic tetrameter had come to consist, for the most part of four, respectively three syllables.

p. 78

To make the list complete, we have a cosmography, a Frankish product of about the seventh century, which is written in unutterably bar- barous trochaic tetrameters (printed by Pertz, Abhandl. d. Berl.

It is really what we ought to expect, for a short verse which was so late in reaching its full accentual development, and which always showed great irregularity in the relation between accent and ictus in its first half, was naturally open to the peculiarities of scansion just mentioned to a greater extent than the longer and more ac- centual measures which grew out of the trochaic tetrameter and the iambic trimeter. This fact, together with the restrictions which the extensive employment of the iambic dimeter in the bymns placed upon its free rhythmical development, had the result, in the Carolingian period, of quite a general return to the met- rical form of this metre.

p. 79

The coincidence of accent and ictus, which is usually consid- ered to be the chief distinguishing feature of rhythmical poetry, is merely a phenomenon appearing in certain classes of verse, such as the iambic dimeter and trimeter, the trochaic tetrameter and the second half of the asclepiadean, where circumstances were peculiarly favorable to its development.

p. 80

So in the iambic dimeter conflict was practically confined to the first two feet, in the trochaic tetra- meter to the first, second and sixth, and in the iambic trimeter to the first and fourth.

p. 81

The same tendency to division and the repetition of like parts no doubt had its share in helping to establish in the middle of the first half of the trochaic tetrameter the caesura which clung to that part of the verse throughout its rhythmical career.