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Latin Prosody
Latin prosody (from Middle French ''prosodie'', from Latin ''prosōdia'', from Ancient Greek προσῳδία ''prosōidía'', "song sung to music, pronunciation of syllable") is the study of Latin poetry and its laws of meter. The following article provides an overview of those laws as practised by Latin poets in the late Roman Republic and early Roman Empire, with verses by Catullus, Horace, Virgil and Ovid as models. Except for the early Saturnian poetry, which may have been accentual, Latin poets borrowed all their verse forms from the Greeks, despite significant differences between the two languages. Latin verse: a Greek gift A brief history The start of Latin literature is usually dated to the first performance of a play by Livius Andronicus in Rome in 240 BC. Livius, a Greek slave, translated Greek New Comedy for Roman audiences. He not only established the genre fabula palliata, but also adapted meters from Greek drama to meet the needs of Latin. He set a precedent f ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Middle French
Middle French (french: moyen français) is a historical division of the French language that covers the period from the 14th to the 16th century. It is a period of transition during which: * the French language became clearly distinguished from the other competing Oïl languages, which are sometimes subsumed within the concept of Old French () * the French language was imposed as the official language of the Kingdom of France in place of Latin and other Oïl and Occitan languages * the literary development of French prepared the vocabulary and grammar for the Classical French () spoken in the 17th and 18th centuries. It is the first version of French that is largely intelligible to Modern French speakers, contrary to Old French. History The most important change found in Middle French is the complete disappearance of the noun declension system (already underway for centuries). There is no longer a distinction between nominative and oblique forms of nouns, and plurals are indi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lucretius
Titus Lucretius Carus ( , ; – ) was a Roman poet and philosopher. His only known work is the philosophical poem ''De rerum natura'', a didactic work about the tenets and philosophy of Epicureanism, and which usually is translated into English as ''On the Nature of Things''—and somewhat less often as ''On the Nature of the Universe''. Lucretius has been credited with originating the concept of the three-age system that was formalised in 1836 by C. J. Thomsen. Very little is known about Lucretius's life; the only certainty is that he was either a friend or client of Gaius Memmius, to whom the poem was addressed and dedicated. ''De rerum natura'' was a considerable influence on the Augustan poets, particularly Virgil (in his ''Aeneid'' and ''Georgics'', and to a lesser extent on the ''Eclogues'') and Horace. The work was almost lost during the Middle Ages, but was rediscovered in 1417 in a monastery in Germany by Poggio Bracciolini and it played an important role both ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Alcaeus Of Mytilene
Alcaeus of Mytilene (; grc, Ἀλκαῖος ὁ Μυτιληναῖος, ''Alkaios ho Mutilēnaios''; – BC) was a lyric poet from the Greek island of Lesbos who is credited with inventing the Alcaic stanza. He was included in the canonical list of nine lyric poets by the scholars of Hellenistic Alexandria. He was a contemporary of Sappho, with whom he may have exchanged poems. He was born into the aristocratic governing class of Mytilene, the main city of Lesbos, where he was involved in political disputes and feuds. Biography The broad outlines of the poet's life are well known. He was born into the aristocratic, warrior class that dominated Mytilene, the strongest city-state on the island of Lesbos and, by the end of the seventh century BC, the most influential of all the North Aegean Greek cities, with a strong navy and colonies securing its trade-routes in the Hellespont. The city had long been ruled by kings born to the Penthilid clan but, during the poet's life, the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Aristophanes
Aristophanes (; grc, Ἀριστοφάνης, ; c. 446 – c. 386 BC), son of Philippus, of the deme In Ancient Greece, a deme or ( grc, δῆμος, plural: demoi, δημοι) was a suburb or a subdivision of Athens and other city-states. Demes as simple subdivisions of land in the countryside seem to have existed in the 6th century BC and ear ... Kydathenaion ( la, Cydathenaeum), was a comedy, comic playwright or comedy-writer of Classical Athens, ancient Athens and a poet of Ancient Greek comedy, Old Attic Comedy. Eleven of his forty plays survive virtually complete. These provide the most valuable examples of a genre of comic drama known as Ancient Greek comedy, Old Comedy and are used to define it, along with fragments from dozens of lost plays by Aristophanes and his contemporaries. Also known as "The Father of Comedy" and "the Prince of Ancient Comedy", Aristophanes has been said to recreate the life of ancient Athens more convincingly than any other author. His pow ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Iambic Tetrameter
Iambic tetrameter is a poetic meter in ancient Greek and Latin poetry; as the name of ''a rhythm'', iambic tetrameter consists of four metra, each metron being of the form , x – u – , , consisting of a spondee and an iamb, or two iambs. There usually is a break in the centre of the line, thus the whole line is: , x – u – , x – u – , , x – u – , , x – u – , ("x" is a syllable that can be long or short, "–" is a long syllable, and "u" is a short one.) In modern English poetry, it refers to a line consisting of four iambic feet. The word "tetrameter" simply means that there are four feet in the line; ''iambic tetrameter'' is a line comprising four iambs, defined by accent. The scheme is thus: x / x / x / x / Some poetic forms rely upon the iambic tetrameter, for example triolet, Onegin stanza, In Memoriam stanza, long measure (or long meter) ballad stanza. Quantitative verse In Medieval Latin The term iambic tetrameter originally appl ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Choliamb
Choliambic verse ( grc, χωλίαμβος), also known as limping iambs or scazons or halting iambic,. is a form of meter in poetry. It is found in both Greek and Latin poetry in the classical period. Choliambic verse is sometimes called ''scazon'', or "lame iambic", because it brings the reader down on the wrong "foot" by reversing the stresses of the last few beats. It was originally pioneered by the Greek lyric poet Hipponax, who wrote "lame trochaics" as well as "lame iambics". The basic structure is much like iambic trimeter, except that the last cretic is made heavy by the insertion of a longum instead of a breve. Also, the third anceps of the iambic trimeter line must be short in limping iambs. In other words, the line scans as follows (where — is a long syllable, u is a short syllable, and x is an anceps): :x — u — , x — u — , u — — — As in all classical verse forms, the phenomenon of brevis in longo is observed, so the last syllable can actually be ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Asclepiad (poetry)
An Asclepiad (Latin: ''Asclepiadeus'') is a line of poetry following a particular metrical pattern. The form is attributed to Asclepiades of Samos and is one of the Aeolic metres. As with other Aeolic metrical lines, the asclepiad is built around a choriamb. The Asclepiad may be described as a glyconic that has been expanded with one (Lesser Asclepiad) or two (Greater Asclepiad) further choriambs. The pattern (using "-" for a long syllable, "u" for a short and "x" for an "anceps" or free syllable, which can be either - or u) is: x x - u u - - u u - u - (Lesser Asclepiad / ''Asclepiadeus minor'') x x - u u - - u u - - u u - u - (Greater Asclepiad / ''Asclepiadeus maior'') West (1982) designates the Asclepiad as a "choriambically expanded glyconic" with the notation ''glc'' (lesser) or ''gl2c'' (greater). Asclepiads were used in Latin by Horace in thirty-four of his odes, as well as by Catullus in Poem 30, and Seneca in six tragedies. Examples in English verse include p ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sapphic Stanza
The Sapphic stanza, named after Sappho, is an Aeolic verse form of four lines. Originally composed in quantitative verse and unrhymed, since the Middle Ages imitations of the form typically feature rhyme and accentual prosody. It is "the longest lived of the Classical lyric strophes in the West". Definitions In poetry, "Sapphic" may refer to three distinct but related Aeolic verse forms: # The ''greater Sapphic'', a 15-syllable line, with the structure: – u – – – , u u – , – u u – u – – –=long syllable; u=short syllable; , =caesura # The ''lesser Sapphic'', an 11-syllable line, with the structure: – u – x – u u – u – – x=anceps (either long or short) # The ''Sapphic stanza'', typically conceptualized as comprising 3 ''lesser Sapphic'' lines followed by an adonic, with the structure: – u u – – Classical Latin poets duplicated the Sapphic stanza with subtle modification. Since the Middle Ages the terms "Sapphic stanzas" or frequently simpl ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hendecasyllabic Verse
In poetry, a hendecasyllable (sometimes hendecasyllabic) is a line of eleven syllables. The term may refer to several different poetic meters, the older of which are quantitative and used chiefly in classical (Ancient Greek and Latin) poetry, and the newer of which are syllabic or accentual-syllabic and used in medieval and modern poetry. Classical In classical poetry, "hendecasyllable" or "hendecasyllabic" may refer to any of three distinct 11-syllable Aeolic meters, used first in Ancient Greece and later, with little modification, by Roman poets. Aeolic meters are characterized by an Aeolic base × × followed by a choriamb – u u –; where –=a long syllable, u=a short syllable, and ×=an anceps, that is, a syllable either long or short. The three Aeolic hendecasyllables (with base and choriamb in bold) are: Phalaecian ( la, hendecasyllabus phalaecius): × × – u u – u – u – – This is a line used only occasionally in Greek choral odes and scolia, but a favori ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Aeolic Verse
Aeolic verse is a classification of Ancient Greek lyric poetry referring to the distinct verse forms characteristic of the two great poets of Archaic Lesbos, Sappho and Alcaeus, who composed in their native Aeolic dialect. These verse forms were taken up and developed by later Greek and Roman poets and some modern European poets. General description Essential features and origin Sappho and Alcaeus' verses differ from most other Greek lyric poetry in their metrical construction: * Verses consist of a fixed number of syllables (thus, for example, no resolution, contraction, or biceps elements). * Consecutive anceps syllables may occur, especially at the beginning of the verse (where two initial anceps syllables are called the aeolic base). (This forms an exception to the principle, otherwise observed in Greek verse, that two successive unmarked elements are not permitted. Lines beginning with multiple anceps syllables are also exceptional in not being classifiable as having r ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Robin Nisbet
Robert George Murdoch Nisbet, FBA (21 May 1925 – 14 May 2013), known as Robin Nisbet, was a British classicist and academic, specializing in Latin literature. From 1970 to 1992, he was Corpus Christi Professor of Latin at the University of Oxford. He was the son of Robert G. Nisbet, who was also a classicist, lecturing at the University of Glasgow for 35 years, and author of a commentary on Cicero's speech ''De domo sua'' (1939). Robin Nisbet was educated at the Glasgow Academy, then as an undergraduate at the University of Glasgow from 1943 to 1947, before going to Balliol College, Oxford, as Snell Exhibitioner to take a further undergraduate degree. After graduating in 1951 he moved to Corpus Christi College, Oxford, where he was appointed a fellow in 1952. He was made a fellow of the British Academy The British Academy is the United Kingdom's national academy for the humanities and the social sciences. It was established in 1902 and received its royal charter in the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Callimachus
Callimachus (; ) was an ancient Greek poet, scholar and librarian who was active in Alexandria during the 3rd century BC. A representative of Ancient Greek literature of the Hellenistic period, he wrote over 800 literary works in a wide variety of genres, most of which did not survive. He espoused an aesthetic philosophy, known as Callimacheanism, which exerted a strong influence on the poets of the Roman Empire and, through them, on all subsequent Western literature. Born into a prominent family in the Greek city of Cyrene in modern-day Libya, he was educated in Alexandria, the capital of the Ptolemaic kings of Egypt. After working as a schoolteacher in the city, he came under the patronage of King Ptolemy II Philadelphus and was employed at the Library of Alexandria where he compiled the ''Pinakes'', a comprehensive catalogue of all Greek literature. He is believed to have lived into the reign of Ptolemy III Euergetes. Although Callimachus wrote prolifically in prose and p ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
