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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
Quantitative may refer to:
* Quantitative research, scientific investigation of quantitative properties
* Quantitative analysis (disambiguation)
* Quantitative verse, a metrical system in poetry
* Statistics, also known as quantitative analysis ...
and used chiefly in classical (
Ancient Greek
Ancient Greek includes the forms of the Greek language used in ancient Greece and the ancient world from around 1500 BC to 300 BC. It is often roughly divided into the following periods: Mycenaean Greek (), Dark Ages (), the Archaic peri ...
and
Latin
Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...
) 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 favorite of
Catullus
Gaius Valerius Catullus (; 84 - 54 BCE), often referred to simply as Catullus (, ), was a Latin poet of the late Roman Republic who wrote chiefly in the neoteric style of poetry, focusing on personal life rather than classical heroes. His s ...
who realized the Aeolic base as
– –
or
– ×
or
× –
, but not as
× ×
;
for example, in the first poem in his collection (with formal equivalent, substituting English stress for Latin length):
Alcaic ( la, hendecasyllabus alcaicus):
× – u – × – u u – u –
Here the Aeolic base is truncated to a single anceps. This meter typically appears as the first two lines of an
Alcaic stanza.
(For an English example, see
§English, below.)
Sapphic ( la, hendecasyllabus sapphicus):
– u – × – u u – u – –
Again, the Aeolic base is truncated. This meter typically appears as the first three lines of a
Sapphic stanza, though it has served in stichic verse, for example by
Seneca
Seneca may refer to:
People and language
* Seneca (name), a list of people with either the given name or surname
* Seneca people, one of the six Iroquois tribes of North America
** Seneca language, the language of the Seneca people
Places Extrat ...
and
Boethius
Anicius Manlius Severinus Boethius, commonly known as Boethius (; Latin: ''Boetius''; 480 – 524 AD), was a Roman senator, consul, ''magister officiorum'', historian, and philosopher of the Early Middle Ages. He was a central figure in the tr ...
.
Sappho
Sappho (; el, Σαπφώ ''Sapphō'' ; Aeolic Greek ''Psápphō''; c. 630 – c. 570 BC) was an Archaic Greek poet from Eresos or Mytilene on the island of Lesbos. Sappho is known for her Greek lyric, lyric poetry, written to be sung while ...
wrote many of the stanzas subsequently named after her, for example (with formal equivalent, substituting English stress for Greek length):
Italian
The hendecasyllable ( it, endecasillabo) is the principal metre in
Italian poetry. Its defining feature is a constant stress on the tenth syllable, so that the number of syllables in the verse may vary, equaling eleven in the usual case where the final word is stressed on the penultimate syllable. The verse also has a stress preceding the
caesura
image:Music-caesura.svg, 300px, An example of a caesura in modern western music notation
A caesura (, . caesuras or caesurae; Latin for "cutting"), also written cæsura and cesura, is a Metre (poetry), metrical pause or break in a Verse (poetry), ...
, on either the fourth or sixth syllable. The first case is called ''endecasillabo a minore'', or lesser hendecasyllable, and has the first
hemistich equivalent to a ''
quinario''; the second is called ''endecasillabo a maiore'', or greater hendecasyllable, and has a ''
settenario'' as the first hemistich.
[Claudio Ciociola (2010]
"Endecasillabo"
''Enciclopedia dell'Italiano'' (in Italian). Accessed March 2013.
There is a strong tendency for hendecasyllabic lines to end with feminine rhymes (causing the total number of syllables to be eleven, hence the name), but ten-syllable lines (''"Ciò che 'n grembo a Benaco star non può"'') and twelve-syllable lines (''"Ergasto mio, perché solingo e tacito"'') are encountered as well. Lines of ten or twelve syllables are more common in rhymed verse; ''
versi sciolti'', which rely more heavily on a pleasant rhythm for effect, tend toward a stricter eleven-syllable format. As a novelty, lines longer than twelve syllables can be created by the use of certain verb forms and affixed enclitic pronouns (''"Ottima è l'acqua; ma le piante abbeverinosene."'').
Additional accents beyond the two mandatory ones provide rhythmic variation and allow the poet to express thematic effects. A line in which accents fall consistently on even-numbered syllables (''"Al còr gentìl rempàira sèmpre amóre"'') is called iambic (''giambico'') and may be a greater or lesser hendecasyllable. This line is the simplest, commonest and most musical but may become repetitive, especially in longer works. Lesser hendecasyllables often have an accent on the seventh syllable (''"fàtta di giòco in figùra d'amóre"''). Such a line is called dactylic (''dattilico'') and its less pronounced rhythm is considered particularly appropriate for representing dialogue. Another kind of greater hendecasyllable has an accent on the third syllable (''"Se Mercé fosse amìca a' miei disìri"'') and is known as
anapestic
An anapaest (; also spelled anapæst or anapest, also called antidactylus) is a metrical foot used in formal poetry. In classical quantitative meters it consists of two short syllables followed by a long one; in accentual stress meters it consist ...
(''anapestico''). This sort of line has a
crescendo effect and gives the poem a sense of speed and fluidity.
It is considered improper for the lesser hendecasyllable to use a word accented on its antepenultimate syllable (''parola sdrucciola'') for its mid-line stress. A line like ''"Più non sfavìllano quegli òcchi néri"'', which delays the caesura until after the sixth syllable, is not considered a valid hendecasyllable.
Most classical Italian poems are composed in hendecasyllables, including the major works of
Dante
Dante Alighieri (; – 14 September 1321), probably baptized Durante di Alighiero degli Alighieri and often referred to as Dante (, ), was an Italian poet, writer and philosopher. His ''Divine Comedy'', originally called (modern Italian: '' ...
,
Francesco Petrarca,
Ludovico Ariosto
Ludovico Ariosto (; 8 September 1474 – 6 July 1533) was an Italian poet. He is best known as the author of the romance epic ''Orlando Furioso'' (1516). The poem, a continuation of Matteo Maria Boiardo's ''Orlando Innamorato'', describes the ...
, and
Torquato Tasso
Torquato Tasso ( , also , ; 11 March 154425 April 1595) was an Italian poet of the 16th century, known for his 1591 poem ''Gerusalemme liberata'' (Jerusalem Delivered), in which he depicts a highly imaginative version of the combats between ...
. The rhyme systems used include
terza rima,
ottava,
sonnet
A sonnet is a poetic form that originated in the poetry composed at the Court of the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick II in the Sicilian city of Palermo. The 13th-century poet and notary Giacomo da Lentini is credited with the sonnet's invention, ...
and
canzone, and some verse forms use a mixture of hendecasyllables and shorter lines. From the early 16th century onward, hendecasyllables are often used without a strict system, with few or no rhymes, both in poetry and in drama. This is known as ''verso sciolto''. An early example is ''Le Api'' ("the bees") by
Giovanni di Bernardo Rucellai, written around 1517 and published in 1525 (with formal equivalent paraphrase which mirrors the original's syllabic counts, varied caesurae, and line- and hemistich-final stress profiles):
Like other early Italian-language
tragedies
Tragedy (from the grc-gre, τραγῳδία, ''tragōidia'', ''tragōidia'') is a genre of drama based on human suffering and, mainly, the terrible or sorrowful events that befall a main character. Traditionally, the intention of tragedy ...
, the ''Sophonisba'' of
Gian Giorgio Trissino (1515) is in blank hendecasyllables. Later examples can be found in the ''Canti'' of
Giacomo Leopardi
Count Giacomo Taldegardo Francesco di Sales Saverio Pietro Leopardi (, ; 29 June 1798 – 14 June 1837) was an Italian philosopher, poet, essayist, and philologist. He is considered the greatest Italian poet of the nineteenth century and one of ...
, where hendecasyllables are alternated with ''settenari''.
Polish
The hendecasyllabic metre ( pl, jedenastozgłoskowiec) was very popular in Polish poetry, especially in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, owing to strong Italian literary influence. It was used by
Jan Kochanowski,
[Compare: Summary n:Lucylla Pszczołowska, Wiersz polski. Zarys historyczny, Wrocław 1997, p. 398.] Piotr Kochanowski
Piotr Kochanowski (1566–1620) was a Polish nobleman, poet and translator. He belonged to a family of writers. He was a son of Mikołaj Kochanowski and a nephew of Jan Kochanowski. He was born in 1566 in Sycyna. He is famous for his translation ...
(who translated ''
Jerusalem Delivered'' by
Torquato Tasso
Torquato Tasso ( , also , ; 11 March 154425 April 1595) was an Italian poet of the 16th century, known for his 1591 poem ''Gerusalemme liberata'' (Jerusalem Delivered), in which he depicts a highly imaginative version of the combats between ...
),
Sebastian Grabowiecki
Sebastian Grabowiecki (c. 1543 – 1607) was a Polish Catholic priest and poet. He was the author of ''Setnik rymów duchownych'' and ''Setnik rymów duchownych wtóry'' (''Spiritual Rhymes'' parts 1 and 2). His work, focused entirely on reli ...
,
Wespazjan Kochowski
Wespazjan (Vespasian) Kochowski (coat of arms: Nieczuja) (1633 in Gaj, a village which no longer exists, near Waśniów in Sandomierz Land – June 6, 1700 in Kraków) was one of the most noted historians and poets of Polish Baroque, the mo ...
and
Stanisław Herakliusz Lubomirski
Prince Stanisław Herakliusz Lubomirski a.k.a. "Mirobulius Tassalinus" (4 March 1642 – 17 January 1702) was a Polish noble, politician, patron of the arts and writer.
Biography
Lubomirski was the son of Marshal and Hetman Jerzy Sebastian L ...
. The greatest Polish Romantic poet,
Adam Mickiewicz, set his poem
Grażyna
Grażyna is a Polish feminine given name. The name was created by the Polish poet Adam Mickiewicz for the main character of his 1823 poem '' Grażyna''. The name is derived from the Lithuanian adjective ''gražus'', meaning "pretty", "beautiful". ...
in this measure. The Polish hendecasyllable is widely used when translating English
blank verse.
The eleven-syllable line is normally a line of 5+6 syllables with medial
caesura
image:Music-caesura.svg, 300px, An example of a caesura in modern western music notation
A caesura (, . caesuras or caesurae; Latin for "cutting"), also written cæsura and cesura, is a Metre (poetry), metrical pause or break in a Verse (poetry), ...
, primary stresses on the fourth and tenth syllables, and feminine endings on both half-lines.
Although the form can accommodate a fully iambic line, there is no such tendency in practice, word stresses falling variously on any of the initial syllables of each half-line.
o o o S s , o o o o S s
o=any syllable, S=stressed syllable, s=unstressed syllable
A popular form of Polish literature that employs the hendecasyllable is the
Sapphic stanza: 11/11/11/5.
The Polish hendecasyllable is often combined with an 8-syllable line: 11a/8b/11a/8b. Such a stanza was used by Mickiewicz in his ballads, as in the following example (with formal equivalent paraphrase):
Portuguese
The hendecasyllable ( pt, hendecassílabo) is a common meter in Portuguese poetry. The best-known Portuguese poem composed in hendecasyllables is
Luís de Camões' ''
Lusiads'', which begins as follows:
In Portuguese, the hendecasyllable meter is often called "decasyllable" (''decassílabo''), even when the work in question uses overwhelmingly feminine rhymes (as is the case with the ''Lusiads''). This is due to Portuguese prosody considering verses to end at the last stressed syllable, thus the aforementioned verses are effectively decasyllabic according to Portuguese scansion.
Spanish
The hendecasyllable ( es, endecasílabo) is less pervasive in
Spanish poetry
This article concerns poetry in Spain.
Medieval Spain
The Medieval period covers 400 years of different poetry texts and can be broken up into five categories.
Primitive lyrics
Since the findings of the Kharjas, which are mainly two, three, o ...
than in Italian or Portuguese, but it is commonly used with Italianate verse forms like sonnets and
ottava rima
Ottava rima is a rhyming stanza form of Italian origin. Originally used for long poems on heroic themes, it later came to be popular in the writing of mock-heroic works. Its earliest known use is in the writings of Giovanni Boccaccio.
The otta ...
(as found, for example, in
Alonso de Ercilla
Alonso de Ercilla y Zúñiga (7 August 153329 November 1594) was a Spanish soldier and poet, born in Madrid. While in Chile (1556–63) he fought against the Araucanians (Mapuche), and there he began the epic poem ''La Araucana'', considered one o ...
's epic ''
La Araucana
''La Araucana'' (also known in English as ''The Araucaniad'') is a 16th-century epic poem in Spanish by Alonso de Ercilla, about the Spanish Conquest of Chile. It was considered the national epic of the Captaincy General of Chile and one of the ...
'').
Spanish dramatists often use hendecasyllables in tandem with shorter lines like heptasyllables, as can be seen in Rosaura's opening speech from
Calderón
Calderón () is a Spanish and Sefardi occupational surname. It is derived from the Vulgar Latin "''caldaria''" ("cauldron") and refers to the occupation of tinker.
Calderón, or Calderon, may refer to:
* Alberto Calderón, Argentine mathematician ...
's ''
La vida es sueño'':
English
The term "hendecasyllable" most often refers to an imitation of Greek or Latin metrical lines, notably by
Alfred Tennyson,
Swinburne
Algernon Charles Swinburne (5 April 1837 – 10 April 1909) was an English poet, playwright, novelist, and critic. He wrote several novels and collections of poetry such as ''Poems and Ballads'', and contributed to the famous Eleventh Edition ...
, and
Robert Frost
Robert Lee Frost (March26, 1874January29, 1963) was an American poet. His work was initially published in England before it was published in the United States. Known for his realistic depictions of rural life and his command of American colloq ...
("For Once Then Something"). Contemporary American poets
Annie Finch ("Lucid Waking") and
Patricia Smith ("The Reemergence of the Noose") have published recent examples. In English, which lacks phonemic length, poets typically substitute stressed syllables for ''long'', and unstressed syllables for ''short''. Tennyson, however, attempted to maintain the quantitative features of the meter (while supporting them with concurrent stress) in his
Alcaic stanzas, the first two lines of which are Alcaic hendecasyllables:
Occasionally "hendecasyllable" is used to denote a line of
iambic pentameter
Iambic pentameter () is a type of metric line used in traditional English poetry and verse drama. The term describes the rhythm, or meter, established by the words in that line; rhythm is measured in small groups of syllables called "feet". "Iambi ...
with a
feminine ending, as in the first line of
John Keats
John Keats (31 October 1795 – 23 February 1821) was an English poet of the second generation of Romantic poets, with Lord Byron and Percy Bysshe Shelley. His poems had been in publication for less than four years when he died of tuberculo ...
's ''
Endymion Endymion primarily refers to:
* Endymion (mythology), an Ancient Greek shepherd
* ''Endymion'' (poem), by John Keats
Endymion may also refer to:
Fictional characters
* Prince Endymion, a character in the ''Sailor Moon'' anime franchise
* Raul ...
'': "A thing of beauty is a joy for ever".
See also
*
Hexasyllable {{Unreferenced, date=May 2021
The hexasyllable or hexasyllabic verse is a line of verse with six syllables.
The orphan hexasyllable is a metric specificity of certain French epic poems. This kind of verse in the Garin de Monglane's Song in a 14t ...
*
Octosyllable The octosyllable or octosyllabic verse is a line of verse with eight syllables. It is equivalent to tetrameter verse in trochees in languages with a stress accent. Its first occurrence is in a 10th-century Old French saint's legend, the '' Vie de ...
*
Decasyllable
Decasyllable (Italian: ''decasillabo'', French: ''décasyllabe'', Serbian: ''десетерац'', ''deseterac'') is a poetic meter of ten syllables used in poetic traditions of syllabic verse. In languages with a stress accent (accentual ve ...
*
Dodecasyllable
References
{{reflist
Further reading
Italian texts
*Raffaele Spongano, ''Nozioni ed esempi di metrica italiana'', Bologna, R. Pàtron, 1966
*Angelo Marchese, ''Dizionario di retorica e di stilistica'', Milano, Mondadori, 1978
*Mario Pazzaglia, ''Manuale di metrica italiana'', Firenze, Sansoni, 1990
Polish texts
* Wiktor Jarosław Darasz, ''Mały przewodnik po wierszu polskim'', Kraków 2003.
Types of verses
Sonnet studies
la:Hendecasyllabi