Prosody (Greek)


Prosody is the theory and practice of versification.

Prosody

Greek poetry is based on syllable length, not on syllable stress, as in English. The two syllable lengths in Greek poetry are long and short. It is probable that in the natural spoken language there were also syllables of intermediate length, as in the first syllable of words such as τέκνα /tékna/ 'children', where a short vowel is followed by a plosive + liquid combination; but for poetic purposes such syllables were treated as either long or short. Thus in the opening speech of the play Oedipus Tyrannus, Sophocles treats the first syllable of τέκνα /tékna/ as long in line 1, but as short in line 6.
Different kinds of poetry characteristically use different patterns of long and short syllables. These patterns are known as meters. For example, the epic poems of Homer were composed using the pattern | – u u | – u u | – u u | – u u | – u u | – – |
It would appear that most Ancient Greek poetry, including the poems of Homer, was composed to be sung to music, and it is generally assumed by those who have reconstructed the surviving fragments of Greek music, such as the Seikilos epitaph, that a short syllable was sung to a short note, while the long syllables were sung to longer notes, or to a group of two or three short notes.
The word-accents in Greek poetry did not affect the meter, but contributed to the melody, in that syllables with an acute accent tended to be sung on a higher pitch, and those with a circumflex were sung on two notes, the first higher than the second.

Determining Quantity

There are rules that determine the length of any given syllable. A syllable is said to be "long by nature" if it contains a long vowel or a diphthong:
A syllable is said to be "long by position" if the vowel precedes the consonants ζ /zd/, ξ /ks/ or ψ /ps/ or two other consonants. However, two consonants will not necessarily produce a long syllable if the combination is a plosive followed by a liquid or a nasal.
The final syllable of a line, even if short by nature, is always considered long, as in the opening line of Euripides' play The Bacchae:

| – – u – | – – u – | – – u – |
"I, the son of Zeus, have come to this land of the Thebans"
When a single consonant comes between two vowels, such as in the word χθόνα, the consonant is considered to belong to the second syllable: χθό-να. A syllable which ends in a vowel in this way, like χθό-, is said to be an "open syllable". If however the consonant is one of ζ, ξ and ψ, it counts as two consonants, and a word like ἄξιος is divided into syllables as ak-si-os, with the first syllable closed. A short syllable is a syllable which is open and which has a short vowel, such as khtho- or di-.
If a word ends in a short vowel + consonant, such as ἄξιος, the final syllable will be treated as long by position if the next word starts with a consonant; but if the next word starts with a vowel, the consonant will be taken as part of the next syllable and the final syllable of the word will be considered short, for example ἄξιός ἐστι, syllabified as ak-si-o-ses-ti.

Exceptions

The ancient prosodists divided lines of verse into 'feet', each foot consisting usually of 3 or 4 syllables. These can be seen as roughly equivalent to bars in a line of music. The different varieties of feet were given different names, as follows:

Disyllables

Macron and breve notation: = long syllable, = short syllable
pyrrhus, dibrach
iamb //
trochee/ //, choree
spondee

Trisyllables

Tetrasyllables

Non-lyric meters

Non-lyric meters are those used for narrative, funeral elegies, the dialogue of tragedies, pastoral poetry, and didactic poetry. A characteristic of these metres is that every line is the same length throughout the poem.

Dactylic

Hexameter

The earliest Greek poetry, namely the poems ascribed to Homer and Hesiod, is written in dactylic hexameters, of which the basic scheme is as follows:
In this meter any of the pairs of short syllables can be replaced by a long syllable, although this is rare in the fifth foot.
The opening lines of Homer's epic poem the Iliad are scanned as follows:
In order to accommodate the words to the meter, Homer often varies them. Thus in the above extract, the final two vowels of Πηληϊάδεω are merged into one by synizesis, the first vowel of ὀλομένην "destructive" is lengthened to make οὐλομένην, the name "Achilles" is sometimes pronounced with a double and sometimes with a single "l" Ἀχιλλεύς, Ἀχιλῆος, and so on. He also uses the past tense of verbs sometimes with the augment ἐ-, e.g. ἔθηκε, and sometimes without it, e.g. τεῦχε.
The line is divided into six feet, known as dactyls and spondees. In this opening passage of the Iliad, dactyls and spondees are equally common, although overall in Greek hexameters, the dactylic foot is slightly more common, while in Latin hexameters the spondee is more common. The fifth foot in Greek hexameters is nearly always a dactyl; in Homer only 1 line in 18 has a spondaic fifth foot. Because the final syllable in a line is long by position, the last foot is always a spondee.
Often there is a slight pause in the line, known as a caesura, in the middle of the third foot, as in lines 1, 5, and 6 above. However, for variety the position of the caesura can change, for example to the middle of the 2nd foot, as in lines 2 and 4, or the middle of the 4th foot, as in lines 3 and 7. There is never a word-break exactly in the middle of the line, although pastoral poetry often makes a word-break between the 4th and 5th foot, known as a "bucolic caesura".

Elegiac couplet

The dactylic hexameter is also used for short epigrams, such as Simonides' epigram commemorating the Spartans who died in the battle of Thermopylae of 480 BC. In this case it is joined with a pentameter, consisting of two sections of two and a half feet each. The second half of a pentameter always has | – u u | – u u | – |, without variation.
The dactylic hexameter-pentameter couplet was also used for elegies and later, in writers such as Callimachus in the Hellenistic period, for poems about love.

Iambic

Trimeter

Another very common meter, which is used in the dialogues of Greek plays, is the iambic trimeter. The basic scheme for this is as follows :
The group | x – u – | is known as a "metron", consisting of two feet. In the first and second metron, one of the two long syllables may be replaced by two short ones, making the following possible variations:
Occasionally also, especially to accommodate a proper name, as in lines 2 and 3 of the example below, the anceps syllable may be replaced by two shorts:
Unlike most other kinds of Greek poetry, it appears that the iambic trimeter was used for dialogue unaccompanied by music.
The opening lines of Euripides' play the Bacchae are scanned as follows:
The iambic trimeter is also the basic meter used in the dialogue parts of Greek comedies, such as the plays of Aristophanes and Menander. In comedy there tend to be more resolutions into short syllables than in tragedy, and the various rules of trimeter construction, such as Porson's Law, are less strictly observed. Sometimes even a short element can be replaced by two short syllables, making for example:
However, the last foot of the line is always an iamb: |.... u – |.

Tetrameter

Other meters also used for the dialogues of comedies, especially when there is a change of pace or mood. One such meter is the iambic tetrameter. This metre is generally catalectic, that is, the last syllable is removed; since the final syllable of a line always counts as long, in catalexis the formerly short penultimate is changed to a long when it becomes final, as in this extract from Aristophanes play the Clouds :
In Roman comedies this meter is known as the Iambic septenarius. There is often a break between the two halves of the line, but as the above example shows, this is not always found.

Trochaic

Occasionally, as an alternative to iambic, Greek playwrights use trochaic feet, as in the trochaic tetrameter catalectic. According to Aristotle this was the original meter used in dialogue. In the extant plays, it is more often used in comedy, although occasionally also in tragedy. The basic double foot or metron is | – u – x |. Here is an example from Aristophanes' Clouds, where the leader of the chorus of Clouds addresses the audience:
When used in tragedy, there is always a break in the middle of the line, but as can be seen above, this is not always the case in comedy.
This metre is also used in Roman comedies, where it is known as the Trochaic septenarius.
Some authors analyse this catalectic form of the meter not as trochaic but as iambic, with initial not final catalexis.
In general, however, ancient writers seem to have recognised that trochaic meters had a different character from iambic. The name "trochaic" is derived from the Greek verb τρέχω "I run" and it was considered a livelier and faster rhythm than the iambic.

Anapestic

The anapestic tetrameter catalectic is used in comedy. It is described as a 'dignified' meter and is used in Aristophanes' Clouds for the speech of the character Just Argument describing how boys were expected to behave in the good old days. It begins as follows:
Aristophanes also uses this metre for Socrates's solemn invocation summoning the Clouds in Clouds, and in the Frogs he uses it when the late poet Aeschylus is explaining his views about modern poetry.
Anapaestic verse is always found in dimeters or tetrameters, each dimeter consisting of 4 feet. The most common type of foot is the spondee, followed by the anapaest, then the dactyl. The exact proportions of the different kinds of feet differ in different authors; for example, anapaests make up 26% of the feet of anapaestic verse in Sophocles, but 39% in Aristophanes; dactyls make up 20% of anapaestic verse in Sophocles but only 6% in Aristophanes. In comedy a very small number of feet are proceleusmatic.

Eupolidean

Other meters are also occasionally found in comedy, such as the Eupolidean. This is used in the second edition of Aristophanes' Clouds when the chorus leader steps forward in the persona of the poet himself and addresses the audience. The basic meter is | x x – x | – u u – | x x – x | – u – |, where the opening of each half is generally trochaic but may occasionally be iambic. Aristophanes uses the meter only here in his extant plays, although it is found occasionally in the surviving fragments of other playwrights. In this meter there is either a break in the middle of the line, or a caesura after the first syllable of the second half. It is probable that it gets its name from the poet Eupolis, who may have used it. The speech in the Clouds starts as follows:

Lyric meters

Lyric meters are usually less regular than non-lyric meters. The lines are made up of feet of different kinds, and can be of varying lengths. Some lyric meters were used for monody, such as some of the poems of Sappho and Alcaeus; others were used for choral dances, such as the choruses of tragedies and the victory odes of Pindar.

Ionic

The basic unit of the Ionic meter is the minor Ionic foot, also called Ionic a minore or double iamb, which consists of two short and two long syllables. An Ionic line consists of two of these feet:
Occasionally a line will be catalectic, that is, missing the final syllable. Catalectic lines tend to come at the end of a period or stanza:
The process of anaclasis, the substitution for a long for a short or a short for a long, yields a second pattern called Anacreontic:
Beyond these more common feet, a great amount of variation is possible within the Ionic meter because of anaclasis, catalexis, resolution and syncopation.
This meter is used by the lyric poets Alcman, Sappho and Alcaeus and also in some of the choral songs of certain tragedies and comedies. An example is the following from Euripides' Bacchae 519-28. It is a choral song addressed to the stream Dirce, about the birth of the god Dionysus, whose mother Semele was struck by lightning. Like all choral songs in Athenian tragedy, it imitates the Doric α /ā/ in many words instead of η /ē/ :
A variation of the ionic metre involves the use of choriambic feet | – u u – |, as in this choral song from Sophocles' Oedipus Tyrannus. It starts with four choriambic dimeters, but then becomes Ionic.

Aeolic

Aeolic verse mostly refers to the type of poems written by the two well-known poets of Lesbos, Sappho and Alcaeus, which was later imitated by Latin writers such as Horace. A development of Aeolic verse, but less regular and more varied, is found in the choral odes of Pindar and Bacchylides.
The Aeolic meter is built upon two kinds of lines, the Glyconic and the Pherecratean. Both have the choriamb | – u u – | as their nucleus. The Glyconic can be represented as follows:
The Pherecratean:
An unusual feature, not found in most other types of Greek verse, is the double anceps at the beginning of the line. In Sappho and Alcaeus also the number of syllables in each line is always the same : a long syllable may not be substituted for two shorts or vice versa. In the later type of Aeolic written by Pindar, however, a long syllable may sometimes be resolved into two shorts.
Various patterns of Aeolic verse are found, some of which are named and organized here:
Further types arise when the choriamb at the centre of the verse is extended, for example to | – u u – u u – | or | – u u – – u u – – u u – |.
A simple type of Aeolic metre is the Sapphic stanza favoured by the poetess Sappho, which consists of three lines in the form | – u – x – u u – u – – | followed without a break by | – u u – – |. The most famous poem of this type, written in the Aeolic dialect spoken in Sappho's time on the island of Lesbos, is Sappho 31, which begins as follows:
Another kind of Aeolic meter, the hagesichorean, was so named by M.L. West after a line in Alcman's Partheneion, which goes:
The hagesichorean meter is used for all four lines of the famous Midnight poem attributed to Sappho:

Dactylo-epitrite

Two elements comprise dactylo-epitrite verse, the one dactylic, the other epitrite. The dactylic metron is called the Prosodiac and is variable in the number of dactyls that proceed the final spondee or long syllable. Thus it is represented as follows:
or
or
The epitrite is represented as follows:
The dactylo-epitrite meter is often used for choral songs by Pindar and Bacchylides and also in the choruses of tragedies, for example :
Meters such as the above, which consist of a mixture of dactyls and trochees, are sometimes referred to as "logaoedic", since they are halfway between the irregularity of speech and regularity of poetry.

Mixed meter

Choral song is often in a mixture of meters, such as the Partheneion of the 7th century BC Spartan poet Alcman. In the first eight lines of each stanza, trochaic rhythms predominate, mixed with the hagesichorean, which gets its name from this poem. Lines 9 to 12 of each stanza are trochaic, breaking into dactyls for the last two lines. The stanza below is part of the song only :
If φάρος "a plough " is read in the 12th line above instead of φᾶρος "a robe", the metre of the line will be
A similar mixture of trochaic and dactylic meter is also found in some of Pindar's choral odes, such as the First Olympian Ode, which begins as follows with a glyconic and a pherecratean, but soon becomes more irregular:
In his book on Pindaric metre, Kiichiro Itsumi characterises this ode as "amalgamated style", that is, a mixture of Aeolic and dactylo-epitrite rhythms.

Paeonic

The Paeonic meter is based primarily on two kinds of feet, the Cretic:
and the Bacchius:
By resolving the longs of these two feet, one may produce an additional two feet, named for the position of their long syllable, the First Paeon:
and the Fourth Paeon:
Adding an iamb to any of these creates a dochmiac. From the Cretic and the Bacchius, the Slow Dochmiacs:
and the Fast Dochmiacs:
Dochmiac rhythms are much used by the Athenian tragedians for agitated lamentations. An example is the following, from Aeschylus's play Seven Against Thebes :

Vocabulary

Anaclasis – an interchange of the final long syllable of the first metron with the opening short syllable of the second.
Catalexis – Absence of a syllable in the last foot of a verse.
Metron – Each of a series of identical or equivalent units, defined according to the number and length of syllables, into which the rhythm of a line of a particular metre is divided.
Resolution – The substitution of two short syllables for a single long one; the result of such a substitution.
Syncopation – Suppression of a short or anceps