Transcriber’s Note

The technical nature of this text required the extensive use of characters and typographical features that are not supported in Kindle and ePub formats. The html version, available from Project Gutenberg, will provide the most useful reading experience.

The text includes a brief list of [errata], prepared by the author or printer. The uncorrected text is shown here, but the change is annotated with mouseover text which containing the corrected value. The errata relating to p. 268 and the passages regarding Bulwer are themselves, it seems, errata. There are no such page references there.

There are also a number of printer’s errors that were detected and corrected, which are also annotated using mouseover text.

This is a translation from a German original. Where there are apparent printing anomalies, an edition of the original was consulted and corrections made here. Cited materials were also occasionally consulted.

Please consult the [more detailed notes] at the end of this text for more details about corrections and other observations.

The characters used for metrical notation include a 'metrical breve', which is not widely supported. However, the Cardo TrueType font set has been found to provide good results. Also, there are numerous instances of multiple diacritical marks for most of the verse examples, which indicate rhythms and stresses. These may not display consistently for all letters in all browsers.

The cover image has been fabricated and is placed in the public domain.

A HISTORY OF
ENGLISH VERSIFICATION

BY

JAKOB SCHIPPER, Ph.D.

PROFESSOR OF ENGLISH PHILOLOGY IN THE UNIVERSITY OF VIENNA
MEMBER OF THE KAISERLICHE AKADEMIE DER WISSENSCHAFTEN, VIENNA
HON. D.LITT. OXON.; HON. LITT.D. CANTAB.
HON. LL.D. EDINBURGH AND ABERDEEN
HONORARY MEMBER OF THE MODERN LANGUAGE ASSOCIATION OF AMERICA

OXFORD
AT THE CLARENDON PRESS
1910

HENRY FROWDE, M.A.

PUBLISHER TO THE UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD
LONDON, EDINBURGH, NEW YORK
TORONTO AND MELBOURNE

PREFACE

It is now more than twenty years since a reviewer of the author’s Englische Metrik, in three volumes, expressed the opinion that ‘an English translation of it would do a service to English philology’. At that time, however, it seemed doubtful whether such a voluminous work, which probably would have interested only a comparatively small circle of English scholars, would have found a market. Even in Germany, although the work was favourably reviewed, and although at the time when it appeared great interest was felt in metrical research, the sale was comparatively slow.

Much livelier, on the other hand, was the demand for an abridged edition of it which appeared under the title Grundriss der englischen Metrik (Wien, 1895). It was therefore found possible, several years after its publication, to make arrangements with the Delegates of the Clarendon Press for an English edition of this smaller book. Unfortunately, however, the printing of the manuscript, which was submitted to the supervision of the late Professor York Powell, was delayed, first by the illness and the untimely death of that eminent scholar, and afterwards by other circumstances which it is not necessary to mention here.

On the whole the English text of the present volume is a close rendering of the German book, except in the first few chapters, which have been somewhat more fully worked out. It may also be mentioned that one or two modern English poets who seemed to be unduly neglected in the German book have received a larger share of attention in the English edition. Some errors of the original work have, of course, also been corrected here.

The treatment of the subject in this handbook is the same as in the author’s larger work. The systematic arrangement of the different kinds of verse in Book I, and of the varieties of stanzas in Book II, will enable the reader easily to find the appropriate place for any new forms of verse or stanza that may come in his way, and will also facilitate the use of the large German work, to which frequent references are given, for the benefit of those students who may desire more detailed information.

From the Preface to the German edition of the present work some remarks on the accents, chiefly in Part II of Book I, may be repeated here in order to prevent misunderstanding.

These accents on particular syllables in equal-measured rhythms are merely meant to facilitate the scansion of the verse according to the author’s view of its rhythmical movement, and to enable the student to apprehend more readily the precise meaning of the descriptions. They are by no means intended to dictate a schematic scansion to the reader, as it is obvious that the finer shades of the rhythm cannot be indicated by such a mode of accentuation. The safer and easier way undoubtedly would have been to put no accents at all; but this would have been less convenient for the reader, to whose own judgement it may be left in every case to be guided by the accents just so far as he may think proper.

In making this statement, however, I may be allowed to mention that none of the English friends who kindly assisted me in revising my manuscript has found fault with my system of accentuation.

My sincerest thanks for their kind help and advice are due to Dr. Francis J. Curtis, now Professor of English Philology in the Mercantile Academy at Frankfort on the Main, and in a still higher degree to Dr. James Morison, of Shotover Cottage, Headington Quarry, Oxford, Examiner in Sanskrit and German, both of them formerly Lectors of English in the University of Vienna. I am under equally great obligations to Dr. Henry Bradley, to whose care the final revision of the MS. was entrusted by the Delegates of the Clarendon Press, and who also had the great kindness to superintend the printing of it. To him I am indebted for several useful suggestions regarding the typographical arrangement, and still more for his valuable help in regard to the style of the book. To the Delegates and the Secretary of the Clarendon Press I feel greatly obliged not only for undertaking the publication, but also for the patient consideration they have shown me during the slow progress of this work.

J. SCHIPPER.

Vienna, Feb. 6, 1910.

CONTENTS

LIST OF EDITIONS REFERRED TO

The quotations of Old English poetry are taken from Grein-Wülker, Bibliothek der Angelsächsischen Poesie, Strassburg, 1883–94. For the Middle English poets the editions used have been specified in the text. Most of the poets of the Modern English period down to the eighteenth century are quoted from the collection of R. Anderson, The Works of the British Poets, Edinburgh, 1795 (15 vols.), which is cited (under the title Poets) by volume and page. The remaining Modern English poets are quoted (except when some other edition is specified) from the editions mentioned in the following list.

Arnold, Matthew. Poetical Works, London, Macmillan & Co., 1890. 8vo.

Beaumont, Francis, and Fletcher, John. Dramatick Works, London, 1778. 10 vols. 8vo.

Bowles, W. L. Sonnets and other Poems. London, 1802–3. 2 vols. 8vo.

Browning, Elizabeth Barrett. Poetical Works. London, Chapman & Hall, 1866. 5 vols. 8vo.

Browning, Robert. Poetical Works. London, Smith, Elder & Co., 1868. 6 vols. 8vo.

Bulwer Lytton, Sir E. (afterwards Lord Lytton). The Lost Tales of Miletus. London, John Murray, 1866. 8vo.

Burns, Robert. Complete Works, ed. Alexander Smith. London, Macmillan & Co., 1870. (Globe Edition.)

Byron, Lord. Poetical Works. London, H. Frowde, 1896. 8vo. (Oxford Edition.)

Campbell, Thomas. Poetical Works, ed. W.A. Hill. London, G. Bell & Sons, 1875.

Coleridge, Samuel Taylor. Poems, ed. Derwent and Sara Coleridge. London, E. Moxon & Co., 1863.

Cowper, William. Poetical Works, ed. W. Benham. London, Macmillan & Co., 1870. (Globe Edition.)

Dryden, John. Comedies, Tragedies, and Operas. London, 1701. fol.

—— —— Poetical Works, ed. W. D. Christie. London, Macmillan & Co., 1870. (Globe Edition.)

Fletcher, John. See [Beaumont].

Goldsmith, Oliver. Miscellaneous Works, ed. Prof. Masson. London, Macmillan & Co., 1871. 8vo. (Globe Edition.)

Gorboduc, or Ferrex and Porrex, a Tragedy, by Thomas Norton and Thomas Sackville, ed. L. Toulmin Smith. (Englische Sprach- und Litteraturdenkmale des 16., 17. und 18. Jahrhunderts, herausgegeben von K. Vollmöller, I.) Heilbronn, Gebr. Henninger 1883. 8vo.

Hemans, Felicia. The Works of Mrs. Hemans, with a Memoir of her life by her sister. Edinburgh, W. Blackwood & Sons, 1839. 7 vols.

Herbert, George. Works, ed. R. A. Willmott. London, G. Routledge & Co., 1854. 8vo.

Hymns, Ancient and Modern, for Use in the Services of the Church. Revised and Enlarged Edition. London, n.d.

Jonson, Ben. Chiefly cited from the edition in Poets iv. 532–618 (see the note prefixed to this list); less frequently (after Wilke, Metr. Unters. zu B. J., Halle, 1884) from the folio edition, London, 1816 (vol. i), or from the edition by Barry Cornwall, London, 1842. A few of the references are to the edition of F. Cunningham, London, J.C. Hotten, n.d. (3 vols.)

Keats, John. Poetical Works. London, F. Warne & Co. (Chandos Classics.)

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth. Poetical Works. Edinburgh, W. P. Nimmo. 8vo. (Crown Edition.)

Lytton. See [Bulwer Lytton].

Marlowe, Christopher. Works, ed. A. Dyce. London, 1850. 3 vols. 8vo.

—— —— Works, ed. F. Cunningham. London, F. Warne & Co., 1870. 8vo.

Massinger, Philip. Plays, ed. F. Cunningham. London, F. Warne & Co., 1870. 8vo.

Milton, John. Poetical Works, ed. D. Masson. London, Macmillan & Co., 1874. 3 vols. 8vo.

—— —— English Poems, ed. R.C. Browne. Second Edition. Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1872. 3 vols. 8vo. Moore, Thomas. Poetical Works. London, Longmans, 1867. 8vo.

Morris, William. Love is Enough. Third Edition. London, Ellis & White, 1873. 8vo.

Norton, Thomas. See [Gorboduc].

Percy, Thomas. Reliques of Ancient Poetry. London, H. Washbourne, 1847. 3 vols. 8vo.

Poe, Edgar Allan. Poetical Works. London, Sampson Low, Son & Co., 1858. 8vo.

Pope, Alexander. Poetical Works, ed. A. W. Ward. London, Macmillan & Co., 1870. 8vo. (Globe Edition.)

Rossetti, Dante Gabriel. Poems. London, F. S. Ellis, 1870.

Sackville, Thomas, and Norton, Thomas. See [Gorboduc].

Scott, Sir Walter. Poetical Works, ed. F. T. Palgrave. London, Macmillan & Co., 1869. 8vo. (Globe Edition.)

Shakespeare, William. Works, ed. W. G. Clark and W. Aldis Wright. London and Cambridge, Macmillan & Co., 1866. 8vo. (Globe Edition.)

Shelley, Percy Bysshe. Poetical Works. London, Chatto & Windus, 1873–1875. 3 vols. 8vo. (Golden Library.)

Sidney, Sir Philip. Arcadia. London, 1633. fol.

—— —— Complete Poems, ed. A. B. Grosart. 1873. 2 vols.

Southey, Robert. Poetical Works. London, Longman, Orme, Brown, Green & Longmans, 1837. 10 vols. 8vo.

Spenser, Edmund. Complete Works, ed. R. Morris. London, Macmillan & Co., 1869. 8vo. (Globe Edition.)

Surrey, Henry Howard, Earl of. Poems. London, Bell & Daldy. 8vo. (Aldine Edition.)

Swinburne, Algernon Charles. Poems and Ballads. Third Edition. London, J. C. Hotten, 1868. 8vo.

—— —— Poems and Ballads, Second Series. Fourth Edition. London, Chatto & Windus, 1884. 8vo.

—— —— A Century of Roundels. London, Chatto & Windus, 1883. 8vo.

—— —— A Midsummer Holiday and other Poems. London, Chatto & Windus, 1884. 8vo.

Tennyson, Alfred. Works. London, Kegan Paul & Co., 1880. 8vo.

Thackeray, William Makepeace. Ballads and The Rose and the Ring. London, Smith, Elder & Co., 1879. 8vo.

Tusser, Thomas. Five Hundred Pointes of Good Husbandrie, ed. W. Payne and S.J. Herrtage, English Dialect Soc., 1878.

Wordsworth, William. Poetical Works, ed. W. Knight. Edinburgh, W. Paterson, 1886. 8 vols. 8vo.

Wyatt, Sir Thomas. Poetical Works. London, Bell & Daldy. (Aldine Edition.) The references marked N. are to vol. ii. of The Works of Surrey and Wyatt, ed. Nott, London, 1815. 2 vols. 4to.

ERRATA

P. 268. In the references to Bulwer, for p. 227 read p. 147; for p. 217 read p. 140; for p. 71 read p. 45; for p. 115 read p. 73.

[P. 315, l. 14.] For p. 123 read p. 78.

[P. 340, l. 34.] For p. 273 read p. 72.

[P. 353, l. 15.] For 89 read 5.

[P. 381, l. 12.] For ii. 137–40 read Poetical Works, London, 1891, pp. 330–32.

BOOK I. THE LINE

PART I. THE NATIVE METRE

CHAPTER I
GENERAL INTRODUCTION TO THE SCIENCE OF
METRE AND THE STRUCTURE OF VERSE

§ 1. The study of English Metre is an integral part of English Philology. It is indispensable to the investigator of the history of the language, since it supplies sometimes the only (or at all events the surest) means of restoring the older pronunciation of word-stems, and of inflexional terminations. In many cases, indeed, the very existence of such terminations can be proved only by the ascertained requirements of metre. As an aid to the study of English literature in its aesthetic aspects the science of metre is no less important. It exhibits the gradual development of the artistic forms of poetical composition, explains the conditions under which they took their rise, and by formulating the laws of their structure affords valuable help in the textual criticism of poems which have been transmitted in a corrupt or imperfect condition.

§ 2. The object of the science of metre is to describe and analyse the various rhythmical forms of speech that are characteristic of poetry in contradistinction to prose.

Poetry is one of the fine arts, and the fine arts admit of a division into Plastic and Rhythmic; the Plastic arts comprehending Sculpture, Architecture, and Painting, the Rhythmic arts, on the other hand, comprehending Dancing, Music, and Poetry. The chief points of difference between these classes are as follows. In the first place, the productions of the Plastic arts can be enjoyed by the beholder directly on their completion by the artist without the interposition of any help, while those of the Rhythmic arts demand, after the original creative artist has done his work, the services of a second or executive artist, who is usually termed the performer, in order that these productions may be fully enjoyed by the spectator or hearer. A piece of music requires a singer or player, a pantomime a dancer, and poetry a reciter or actor. In early times the function of executive artist was commonly discharged by the creative artist himself. In the second place, the Plastic arts have no concern with the relations of time; a work of painting or sculpture presents to the beholder an unchanging object or represents a single moment of action. The Rhythmic arts, on the other hand, are, in their very essence, connected with temporal succession. Dancing implies a succession of movements of the human body, Music a succession of inarticulate sounds, Poetry a succession of articulate sounds or words and syllables. The Plastic arts, therefore, may be called the arts of space and rest, and the Rhythmic arts the arts of time and movement. In this definition, it must be remembered, the intrinsic quality of the movements in each of these rhythmical arts is left out of account; in the case of poetry, for instance, it does not take into consideration the choice and position of the words, nor the thought expressed by them; it is restricted to the external characteristic which these arts have in common.

§ 3. This common characteristic, however, requires to be defined somewhat more precisely. It is not merely succession of movements, but succession of different kinds of movement in a definite and recurring order. In the dance, the measure, or succession and alternation of quick and slow movements in regular and fixed order, is the essential point. This is also the foundation of music and poetry. But another elementary principle enters into these two arts. They are not founded, as dancing is, upon mere silent movements, but on movements of audible sounds, whether inarticulate, as in music, or articulate, as in poetry. These sounds are not all on a level in respect of their audibility, but vary in intensity: broadly speaking, they may be said to be either loud or soft. There is, it is true, something analogous to this in the movements of the dance; the steps differ in degree of intensity or force. Dancing indeed may be looked upon as the typical form and source of all rhythmic movement. Scherer brings this point out very well.[1] He says: ‘Rhythm is produced by regular movements of the body. Walking becomes dancing by a definite relation of the steps to one another—of long and short in time or fast and slow in motion. A regular rhythm has never been reached by races among which irregular jumping, instead of walking, has been the original form of the dance. Each pair of steps forms a unity, and a repetition begins with the third step. This unity is the bar or measure. The physical difference between the comparative strength of the right foot and the weakness of the left foot is the origin of the distinction between elevation and depression, i.e. between relatively loud and soft, the “good” and the “bad” part of the measure.’

Westphal[2] gives a similar explanation: ‘That the stamp of the foot or the clap of the hands in beating time coincides with the strong part of the measure, and the raising of the foot or hand coincides with the weak part of it, originates, without doubt, in the ancient orchestic.’ At the strong part of the bar the dancer puts his foot to the ground and raises it at the weak part. This is the meaning and original Greek usage of the terms ‘arsis’ and ‘thesis’, which are nowadays used in an exactly opposite sense. Arsis in its ancient signification meant the raising of the foot or hand, to indicate the weak part of the measure; thesis was the putting down of the foot, or the stamp, to mark the strong part of the measure. Now, however, it is almost the universal custom to use arsis to indicate the syllable uttered with a raised or loud voice, and thesis to indicate the syllable uttered with lower or soft voice. From the practice of beating time the term ictus is also borrowed; it is commonly used to designate the increase of voice which occurs at the strong, or so-called rhythmical accent.

All rhythm therefore in our dancing, poetry, and music, comes to us from ancient times, and is of the same nature in these three arts: it is regular order in the succession of different kinds of motion.

§ 4. The distinction between prose and poetry in their external aspects may be stated thus: in prose the words follow each other in an order determined entirely, or almost entirely, by the sense, while in poetry the order is largely determined by fixed and regular rhythmic schemes.

Even in prose a certain influence of rhythmical order may be sometimes observable, and where this is marked we have what is called rhythmical or artistic prose. But in such prose the rhythmic order must be so loosely constructed that it does not at once obtrude itself on the ear, or recur regularly as it does in poetry. Wherever we have intelligible words following each other in groups marked by a rhythmical order which is at once recognizable as intentionally chosen with a view to symmetry, there we may be said to have poetry, at least on its formal side. Poetical rhythm may accordingly be defined as a special symmetry, easily recognizable as such, in the succession of syllables of differing phonetic quality, which convey a sense, and are so arranged as to be uttered in divisions of time which are symmetrical in their relation to one another.

§ 5. At this point we have to note that there are two kinds of phonetic difference between syllables, either of which may serve as a foundation for rhythm. In the first place, syllables differ in respect of their quantity; they are either ‘long’ or ‘short’, according to the length of time required to pronounce them. In the second place, they differ in respect of the greater or less degree of force or stress with which they are uttered; or, as it is commonly expressed, in respect of their accent.

All the poetic rhythms of the Indogermanic or Aryan languages are based on one or other of these phonetic qualities of syllables, one group observing mainly the quantitative, and the other the accentual principle. Sanskrit, Greek, and Roman poetry is regulated by the principle of the quantity of the syllable, while the Teutonic nations follow the principle of stress or accent.[3] With the Greeks, Romans, and Hindoos the natural quantity of the syllables is made the basis of the rhythmic measures, the rhythmical ictus being fixed without regard to the word-accent. Among the Teutonic nations, on the other hand, the rhythmical ictus coincides normally with the word-accent, and the order in which long and short syllables succeed each other is (with certain exceptions in the early stages of the language) left to be determined by the poet’s sense of harmony or euphony.

§ 6. Before going further it will be well to define exactly the meaning of the word accent, and to give an account of its different uses. Accent is generally defined as ‘the stronger emphasis put on a syllable, the stress laid on it’, or, as Sweet[4] puts it, ‘the comparative force with which the separate syllables of a sound-group are pronounced.’ According to Brücke[5] it is produced by increasing the pressure of the breath. The stronger the pressure with which the air passes from the lungs through the glottis, the louder will be the tone of voice, the louder will be the sound of the consonants which the stream of air produces in the cavity of the mouth. This increase of tone and sound is what is called ‘accent’. Brücke seems to use tone and sound as almost synonymous, but in metric we must distinguish between them. Sound (sonus) is the more general, tone (τόνος) the more specific expression. Sound, in this general sense, may have a stronger or weaker tone. This strengthening of the tone is usually, not invariably, accompanied by a rise in the pitch of the voice, just as the weakening of the tone is accompanied by a lowering of the pitch. In the Teutonic languages these variations of stress or accent serve to bring into prominence the relative importance logically of the various syllables of which words are composed. As an almost invariable rule, the accent falls in these languages on the root-syllable, which determines the sense of the word, and not on the formative elements which modify that sense. This accent is an expiratory or stress accent.

It must be noted that we cannot, using the term in this sense, speak of the accent of a monosyllabic word when isolated, but only of its sound; nor can we use the word accent with reference to two or more syllables in juxtaposition, when they are all uttered with precisely the same force of voice. The term is significant only in relation to a variation in the audible stress with which the different syllables of a word or a sentence are spoken. This variation of stress affects monosyllables only in connected speech, where they receive an accentuation relative to the other words of the sentence. An absolute uniformity of stress in a sentence is unnatural, though the amount of variation in stress differs greatly in different languages. ‘The distinctions of stress in some languages are less marked than in others. Thus in French the syllables are all pronounced with a nearly uniform stress, the strong syllables rising only a little above the general level, its occurrence being also uncertain and fluctuating. This makes Frenchmen unable without systematic training to master the accentuation of foreign languages.’[6] English and the other Teutonic languages, on the other hand, show a marked tendency to alternate weak and strong stress.

§ 7. With regard to the function which it discharges in connected speech, we may classify accent or stress under four different categories. First comes what may be called the syntactical accent, which marks the logical importance of a word in relation to other words of the sentence. In a sentence like ‘the birds are singing’, the substantive ‘birds’ has, as denoting the subject of the sentence, the strongest accent; next in logical or syntactical importance comes the word ‘singing’, denoting an activity of the subject, and this has a comparatively strong accent; the auxiliary ‘are’ being a word of minor importance is uttered with very little force of voice; the article ‘the’, being the least emphatic or significant, is uttered accordingly with the slightest perceptible stress of all.

Secondly, we have the rhetorical accent, or as it might be called, the subjective accent, inasmuch as it depends upon the emphasis which the speaker wishes to give to that particular word of the sentence which he desires to bring prominently before the hearer. Thus in the sentence, ‘you have done this,’ the rhetorical accent may fall on any of the four words which the speaker desires to bring into prominence, e.g. ‘yóu (and no one else) have done this,’ or ‘you háve done this (though you deny it), or you have dóne this’ (you have not left it undone), or, finally, ‘you have done thís’ (and not what you were told). This kind of accent could also be termed the emphatic accent.

Thirdly, we have the rhythmical accent, which properly speaking belongs to poetry only, and often gives a word or syllable an amount of stress which it would not naturally have in prose, as, for instance, in the following line of Hamlet (iii. iii. 27)—

My lord, he’s going to his mother’s closet,

the unimportant word ‘to’ receives a stronger accent, due to the influence of the rhythm, than it would have in prose. Similarly in the following line of Chaucer’s Troilus and Cryseide, l. 1816—

For thóusandés his hóndes máden dýe,

the inflexional syllable es was certainly not ordinarily pronounced with so much stress as it must have here under the influence of the accent as determined by the rhythm of the line. Or again the word ‘writyng’, in the following couplet of Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales (Prol. 325–6)—

Therto he couthe endite and make a thing,

Ther couthe no wight pynche at his writyng,

was certainly not pronounced in ordinary speech with the same stress on the last syllable as is here demanded both by the rhythm and rhyme.

As a rule, however, the rhythmical accent in English coincides with the fourth kind of accent, the etymological or word-accent, which we now have to deal with, and in greater detail.

Just as the different words of a sentence are pronounced, as we have seen, with varying degrees of stress, so similarly the different syllables of a single word are uttered with a varying intensity of the force of the breath. One of the syllables of the individual word is always marked off from the rest by a greater force of tone, and these others are again differentiated from each other by subordinate gradations of intensity of utterance, which may sometimes be so weak as to lead to a certain amount of indistinctness, especially in English. In the Teutonic languages, the root-syllable, as the most important element of the word, and that which conveys the meaning, always bears the chief accent, the other syllables bearing accents which are subordinate to this chief accent. As the etymology of a word is always closely associated with the form of the root-syllable, this syllabic accent may be called the etymological accent. It naturally happens that this syllabic accent coincides very often with the syntactical accent, as the syntactical stress must be laid on the syllable which has the etymological accent.

The degrees of stress on the various syllables may be as many in number as the number of the syllables of the word in question. It is sufficient, however, for purposes of metre and historical grammar, to distinguish only four degrees of accent in polysyllabic words. These four degrees of syllabic and etymological accent are as follows: 1. the chief accent (Hochton, Hauptton); 2. the subsidiary accent (Tiefton, Nebenton); 3. the absence of accent, or the unaccented degree (Tonlosigkeit); 4. the mute degree, or absence of sound (Stummheit). These last three varieties of accent arise from the nature of the Teutonic accent, which is, it must always be remembered, a stress-accent in which the volume of breath is expended mainly on the first or chief syllable. The full meaning of these terms can most easily be explained and understood by means of examples chosen either from English or German, whose accentual basis is essentially the same. In the word, wonderful, the first syllable has the chief accent (1), the last has the subsidiary accent (2), and the middle syllable is unaccented (3). The fourth or mute degree may be seen in such a word as wondrous, shortened from wonderous. This fuller form may still be used, for metrical purposes, as a trisyllable in which the first syllable has the chief accent, the last the subsidiary accent, and the middle syllable is unaccented, though audible. The usual pronunciation is, however, in agreement with the usual spelling, disyllabic, and is wondrous; in other words, the vowel e which originally formed the middle syllable, has been dropped altogether in speech as in writing. From the point of view of the accent, it has passed from the unaccented state to the state of muteness; but may be restored to the unaccented, though audible, state, wherever emphasis or metre requires the full syllable. We have the line: ‘And it grew wondrous cold,’ for which we might have ‘The cold grew wonderous’. In other cases the vowel is retained in writing but is often dropped in colloquial pronunciation, or for metrical convenience. Thus, in Shakespeare, we find sometimes the full form—

why the sepulchre

Has oped his ponderous and marble jaws.

Hamlet, I. iv. 50.

and sometimes the curtailed form—

To draw with idle spiders’ strings

Most ponderous and substantial things.

Measure for Measure, III. ii. 290.

This passing of an unaccented syllable into complete muteness is very frequent in English, as compared with other cognate languages. It has led, in the historical development of the language, to a gradual weakening, and finally, in many instances, to a total loss of the inflexional endings. Very frequently, an inflexional vowel that has become mute is retained in the current spelling; thus in the verbal forms gives, lives, the e of the termination, though no longer pronounced, is still retained in writing. Sometimes, in poetical texts, it is omitted, but its position is indicated by an apostrophe, as in the spellings robb’d, belov’d. In many words, on the other hand, the silent vowel has ceased to be written, as in grown, sworn, of which the original forms were growen, sworen

§ 8. Written marks to indicate the position of the accent were employed in early German poetry as early as the first half of the ninth century, when they were introduced, it is supposed, by Hrabanus Maurus of Fulda and his pupil Otfrid. The similar marks that are found in certain Early English MSS., as the Ormulum, are usually signs of vowel-quantity. They may possibly have sometimes been intended to denote stress, but their use for this purpose is so irregular and uncertain that they give little help towards determining the varying degrees of accent in words during the earliest stages of the language. For this purpose we must look for other and less ambiguous means, and these are found (in the case of Old English words and forms) first, in the alliteration, secondly, in comparison with related words of the other Teutonic languages, and, thirdly, in the development in the later stages of English itself. After the Norman Conquest, the introduction of rhyme, and of new forms of metre imitated from the French and mediaeval Latin poetry, affords further help in investigating the different degrees of syllabic accent in Middle English words. None of these means, however, can be considered as yielding results of absolute certainty, chiefly because during this period the accentuation of the language was passing through a stage of transition or compromise between the radically different principles which characterize the Romanic and Teutonic families of languages. This will be explained more fully in a subsequent chapter.

Notwithstanding this period of fluctuation the fundamental law of accentuation remained unaltered, namely, that the chief accent falls on the root of the word, which is in most cases the first syllable. For purposes of notation the acute (´) will be used in this work to denote the chief accent, the grave (`) the subsidiary accent of the single word; to indicate the rhythmical or metrical accent the acute alone will be sufficient.

§ 9. In English poetry, as in the poetry of the other Teutonic nations, the rhythmical accent coincides normally with the syllabic or etymological accent, and this, therefore, determines and regulates the rhythm. In the oldest form of Teutonic poetry, the original alliterative line, the rhythm is indicated by a definite number of strongly accented syllables, accompanied by a less definite number of syllables which do not bear the same emphatic stress. This principle of versification prevails not only in Old English and Old and Middle High German poetry, but also, to a certain extent, in the period of Middle English, where, in the same manner, the number of beats or accented syllables indicates the number of ‘feet’ or metrical units, and a single strongly accented syllable can by itself constitute a ‘foot’. This practice is a feature which distinguishes early English and German poetry, not only from the classical poetry, in which a foot or measure must consist of at least two syllables, but also from that of the Romanic, modern German, and modern English languages, which has been influenced by classical example, and in which, accordingly, a foot must contain one accented and at least one unaccented syllable following one another in a regular order. The classical terms ‘foot’ and ‘measure’ have, in their strict sense, relation to the quantity of the syllables, and can therefore be applied to the modern metres only by analogy. In poetry which is based on the principle of accent or stress, the proper term is bar (in German Takt). The general resemblances between modern accentual and ancient quantitative metres are, however, so strong, that it is hardly desirable to discontinue the application of old and generally understood technical terms of the classical versification to modern metres, provided the fundamental distinction between quantity and accent is always borne in mind.

Setting aside for the present the old Teutonic alliterative line, in which a ‘bar’ might permissibly consist of a single syllable, we may retain the names of the feet of the classical quantitative versification for the ‘bars’ of modern versification, using them in modified senses. A group consisting of one unaccented followed by an accented syllable may be called an iambus; one accented followed by an unaccented syllable a trochee; two unaccented syllables followed by an accented syllable an anapaest; one accented syllable followed by two unaccented syllables a dactyl. These four measures might also be described according to the length of the intervals separating the accents, and according as the rhythm is ascending (passing from an unaccented to an accented syllable) or descending (passing from an accented to an unaccented syllable). We should then have the terms, (1) ascending disyllabic (iambus), (2) descending disyllabic (trochee), (3) ascending trisyllabic (anapaest), and (4) descending trisyllabic (dactyl).[7] But we may agree with Prof. Mayor that ‘it is certainly more convenient to speak of iambic than of ascending disyllabic’.[8] It is, however, only in the case of these four feet or measures that it is desirable to adhere to the terminology of the ancient metres, and as a matter of fact iambus, trochee, anapaest, and dactyl are the only names of classical feet that are commonly recognized in English prosody.[9] As to the employment in the treatment of English metre of less familiar technical terms derived from classical prosody, we agree with Prof. Mayor, when he says: ‘I can sympathize with Mr. Ellis in his objection to the classicists who would force upon us such terms as choriambic and proceleusmatic to explain the rhythm of Milton. I do not deny that the effect of his rhythm might sometimes be represented by such terms; but if we seriously adopt them to explain his metre, we are attempting an impossibility, to express in technical language the infinite variety of measured sound which a genius like Milton could draw out of the little five-stringed instrument on which he chose to play.’ The use of these and other classical terms is justifiable only when we have to deal with professed imitations of ancient forms of verse in English.

Whatever names may be chosen to denote the metrical forms, the measure or foot always remains the unity which is the basis of all modern metrical systems, and of all investigation into metre. For a line or verse is built up by the succession of a limited number of feet or measures, equal or unequal. With regard to the limit of the number of feet permissible in a line or verse, no fixed rule can be laid down. In no case must a line contain more feet than the ear may without difficulty apprehend as a rhythmic whole; or, if the number of feet is too great for this, the line must be divided by a pause or break (caesura) into two or more parts which we may then call rhythmical sections. This break is a characteristic mark of the typical Old English alliterative line, which is made up of two rhythmical sections. The structure of this verse was at one time obscured through the practice of printing each of these sections by itself as a short line; but Grimm’s example is now universally followed, and the two sections are printed as parts of one long line.[10] Before entering into a detailed consideration of the alliterative long line, it will be needful to make a few general remarks on rhyme and its different species.

§ 10. Modern metre is not only differentiated from metre of the classical languages by the principle of accent as opposed to quantity; it has added a new metrical principle foreign to the ancient systems. This principle is Rhyme. Instances of what looks like rhyme are found in the classical poets from Homer onwards, but they are sporadic, and are probably due to accident.[11]

Rhyme was not in use as an accessory to metre in Latin till the quantitative principle had given way to the accentual principle in the later hymns of the Church, and it has passed thence into all European systems of metre.

In our poetry it serves a twofold purpose: it is used either simply as an ornament, or as a tie to connect single lines into the larger metrical unity of stanza or stave, by the recurrence of similar sounds at various intervals.

In its widest sense rhyme is an agreement or consonance of sounds in syllables or words, and falls into several subdivisions, according to the extent and position of this agreement. As to its position, this consonance may occur in the beginning of a syllable or word, or in the middle, or in both middle and end at the same time. As to its extent, it may comprehend one or two or more syllables. Out of these various possibilities of likeness or consonance there arise three chief kinds of rhyme in this wide sense, alliteration, assonance, and end-rhyme, or rhyme simply in the more limited and usual acceptation of the word.

§ 11. This last, end-rhyme, or full-rhyme, or rhyme proper, consists in a perfect agreement or consonance of syllables or words except in their initial sounds, which as a rule are different. Generally speaking, the agreement of sounds falls on the last accented syllable of a word, or on the last accented syllable and a following unaccented syllable or syllables. End-rhyme or full-rhyme seems to have arisen independently and without historical connexion in several nations, but as far as our present purpose goes we may confine ourselves to its development in Europe among the nations of Romanic speech at the beginning of the Middle Ages. Its adoption into all modern literature is due to the extensive use made of it in the hymns of the Church. Full-rhyme or end-rhyme therefore is a characteristic of modern European poetry, and though it cannot be denied that unrhymed verse, or blank verse, is much used in English poetry, the fact remains that this metre is an exotic product of the Renaissance, and has never become thoroughly popular. Its use is limited to certain kinds of poetic composition, whereas rhyme prevails over the wider part of the realm of modern poetry.

§ 12. The second kind of rhyme (taking the word in its broader sense), namely, vocalic assonance, is of minor importance in the treatment of English metre. It consists in a similarity between the vowel-sounds only of different words; the surrounding consonants do not count. The following groups of words are assonant together: give, thick, fish, win; sell, step, net; thorn, storm, horse. This kind of rhyme was very popular among the Romanic nations, and among them alone. Its first beginnings are found in the Latin ecclesiastical hymns, and these soon developed into real or full-rhyme.[12] It passed thence into Provençal, Old French, and Spanish poetry, and has continued in use in the last named. It is very rarely found in English verse, it has in fact never been used deliberately, as far as we know, except in certain recent experiments in metre. Where it does seem to occur it is safest to look upon it as imperfect rhyme only. Instances are found in the Early English metrical romances, Lives of Saints, and popular ballad poetry, where the technique of the metre is not of a high order; examples such as flete, wepe; brake, gate; slepe, ymete from King Horn might be looked on as assonances, but were probably intended for real rhymes. The consistent use of the full-rhyme being difficult, the poets, in such instances as these, contented themselves with the simpler harmony between the vowels alone, which represents a transition stage between the older rhymeless alliterative verse, and the newer Romanic metres with real and complete rhyme. Another possible form of assonance, in which the consonants alone agree while the vowels may differ, might be called consonantal assonance as distinguished from vocalic assonance, or assonance simply. This form of assonance is not found in English poetry, though it is employed in Celtic and Icelandic metres.[13]

§ 13. The third species of rhyme, to use the word still in its widest sense, is known as alliteration (German Stabreim or Anreim). It is common to all Teutonic nations, and is found fully developed in the oldest poetical monuments of Old Norse, Old High German, Old Saxon, and Old English. Even in classical poetry, especially in the remains of archaic Latin, it is not unfrequently met with, but serves only as a means for giving to combinations of words a rhetorical emphasis, and is not a formal principle of the metre bound by strict rules, as it is in Teutonic poetry. Alliteration consists in a consonance or agreement of the sounds at the beginning of a word or syllable, as in love and liking, house and home, woe and weal. The alliteration of vowels and diphthongs has this peculiarity that the agreement need not be exact as in ‛apt alliteration’s artful aid’, but can exist, at least in the oldest stages of the language, between all vowels indiscriminately. Thus in the oldest English not only were ellen and ende, ǣnig and ǣr, ēac and ēage alliterations, but age and īdel, ǣnig and ellen, eallum and æðelingum were employed in the strictest forms of verse as words which perfectly alliterated with each other.

This apparent confusion of vowel-sounds so different in their quantity and quality is probably to be explained by the fact that originally in English, as now in German, all the vowels were preceded by a ‘glottal catch’ which is the real alliterating sound.[14] The harmony or consonance of the unlike vowels is hardly perceptible in Modern English and does not count as alliteration.

The most general law of the normal alliterative line is that three or at least two of the four strongly accented syllables which occur in every long line (two in each section) must begin with an alliterative letter, for example, in the following Old English lines:

wereda wuldorcining | wordum hērigen. Gen. 2.

mōdum lufien | he is mægna spēd. Gen. 3.

æsc bið oferhēah | eldum dȳre.Run. 26.

on andsware | and on elne strong. Gū. 264.

or in early Modern English:

For myschefe will mayster us | yf measure us forsake.Skelton, Magnif. 156.

How sodenly worldly| welth doth dekay.ib. 1518.

I am your eldest son| Esau by name.Dodsl. Coll. ii. 249.

The history of the primitive alliterative line follows very different lines of development in the various Teutonic nations. In Old High German, after a period in which the strict laws of the verse were largely neglected, it was abandoned in favour of rhyme by Otfrid (circa 868). In Old English it kept its place as the only form of verse for all classes of poetical composition, and continued in use, even after the introduction of Romanic forms of metre, during the Middle English period, and did not totally die out till the beginning of the seventeenth century. The partial revival of it is due to the increased interest in Old English studies, but has been confined largely to translations. As an occasional rhetorical or stylistic ornament of both rhymed and unrhymed verse, alliteration has always been made use of by English poets.

CHAPTER II
THE ALLITERATIVE VERSE IN OLD ENGLISH

§ 14. General remarks. It is highly probable that alliteration was the earliest kind of poetic form employed by the English people. There is no trace in the extant monuments of the language of any more primitive or simpler system. A predilection for alliteration existed even in prose, as in the names of heroes and families like Scyld and Sceaf, Hengist and Horsa, Finn and Folcwald, pairs that alliterate in the same way as the family names of other Teutonic nations: the names of the three sons of Mannus, Ingo, Isto, Irmino, conform to this type.[15] The earliest monuments of Old English poetry, as the fragmentary hymn of Cædmon in the More MS. (Cambridge) and the inscription on the Ruthwell Cross, are composed in the long alliterative line. The great body of Old English verse is in this metre, the only exceptions being the ‘Rhyming Poem’ (in the Exeter Book),[16] and a few other late pieces, in which alliteration and rhyme are combined. This Old English poetry, therefore, together with the Old Norse and Old Saxon remains (the Heliand with 5,985 lines, and the recently discovered fragment of the Old Saxon Genesis, edited by Zangemeister and Braune, 1894, with 335 lines), affords ample and trustworthy material for determining the laws of the alliterative verse as used by the Teutonic nations. In comparison with these the remains of Old High German alliterative verse are both scanty and lax in structure.

§ 15. Theories on the metrical form of the alliterative line. Notwithstanding their comparative scantiness, the Old High German fragments (Hildebrandslied, Wessobrunner Gebet, Muspilli and two magical formulae, with a total of some 110 lines) formed the basis of the earliest theories of the laws of the accentuation and general character of the original alliterative line. They were assumed to have preserved the features of the primitive metre, and conclusions were drawn from them as to the typical form of the verse. When examined closely, the Old High German remains (and this is true also of the longer monuments in Old Saxon) are found to differ widely from Old Norse and Old English verse in one respect. While the general and dominating features of the line remain the same, the Old High German and Old Saxon lines are much longer than the Old Norse or Old English lines. In Old Norse or Old English the half line frequently contains no more than four syllables, in marked contrast to Old High German and Old Saxon, where the half line or section is considerably longer.

The first attempt at a theory of the metrical structure of the alliterative line was made by Lachmann. He based his theory on the form of verse created by Otfrid, in imitation of Latin models, which consists of a long line of eight accents, separated by leonine rhyme into two sections each of four accents alternately strong and weak.[17] The laws of the rhyming and strophic verse of Otfrid were applied by Lachmann to the purely alliterative verses of the Old High German Hildebrandslied, and this system of scanning was further applied by his followers to the alliterative verse of Old English, the true nature of which was long misunderstood on the Continent. In England itself a sounder view of the native alliterative verse was propounded by Bishop Percy as early as 1765, in his Essay on the Metre of Pierce Plowman published along with his well-known Reliques of Ancient English Poetry, not to speak of the earlier writings of G. Gascoigne (1575) and James VI (1585). But the number and authority of some of Lachmann’s followers are such that some detailed account of their theories must be given.[18]

§ 16. The four-beat theory of the alliterative verse, based on the assumption that each of the two sections must have had four accented syllables to bring out a regular rhythm, was applied by Lachmann himself only to the Old High German Hildebrandslied,[19] while on the other hand he recognized a freer variety with two chief accents only in each section, for the Old Norse, Old Saxon, and Old English. The four-beat theory was further applied to the Old High German Muspilli by Bartsch,[20] and to the rest of the smaller relics of Old High German verse by Müllenhoff.[21] The next step was to bring the Old Saxon Heliand and the Old English Beowulf under this system of scansion; and this was taken by M. Heyne in 1866 and 1867. But the metre of Beowulf does not differ from that of the other alliterative poems in Old English, and these in their turn were claimed for the four-beat theory by Schubert,[22] but with this important modification, made before by Bartsch, that side by side with the usual four-beat sections there were also to be found sections of three beats only. One obvious difficulty in applying the theory of four strongly marked beats to the Old English half-lines or hemistichs is this, that in Old English these hemistichs consist in very many cases of not more than four syllables altogether, each one of which would on this theory have an accent to itself. To meet these cases E. Jessen[23] started the theory that in certain cases pauses had to be substituted for ‘beats not realized’. A further modification of the four-beat doctrine was introduced by Amelung,[24] who maintained that in the metre of the Heliand each hemistich had two primary or chief accents and two secondary or subordinate accents. In order to bring the verse under this scansion he assumes that certain syllables admitted of being lengthened. He further regarded the Heliand verse as a metre regulated by strict time, and not as a measure intended for free recitation and depending only on the number of accented syllables.

A few other more recent attempts at solving the problem must be mentioned before we pass on to explain and discuss Sievers’s system in the next paragraph. The views of Prof. Möller of Copenhagen[25] have found an adherent in Lawrence, from whose book[26] we may quote the following summary of Möller’s theory. According to Prof. Möller the hemistich consists theoretically of two measures (Takte), each of four morae ×́××̀× (a mora, ×, being the time required for one short syllable), and therefore the whole verse of four measures, thus:

×́××̀×|×́××̀×||×́××̀×|×́××̀×||.

Where, in a verse, the morae are not filled by actual syllables, their time must be occupied by rests (represented by r*) in reciting, by holding on the note in singing.[27] A long syllable, ——, is equivalent to two morae. Thus v. 208 of Beowulf

súnd-wùdu. sṓhtè. sécg. wī́sàde.

would be symbolically represented as follows:

–́×̀×|–́×̀ r ||–́ rr |–́×̀×.

According to this system the pause at secg will be twice as long as that at sōhte, whilst at wudu there will be no real pause and the point will merely indicate the end of the measure.

Others reverted to the view of Bartsch and Schubert that there could be hemistichs with only three accents alongside of the hemistichs with the normal number of four. Among these may be mentioned H. Hirt,[28] whose view is that three beats to a hemistich is the normal number, four being less usual, the long line having thus mostly six beats, against the eight of Lachmann’s theory; K. Fuhr,[29] who holds that every hemistich, whether it stands first or second in the verse, has four beats if the last syllable is unaccented (klingend; in that case the final unaccented syllable receives a secondary rhythmical accent, for example, fḗond máncýnnès) and has three beats if it is accented (stumpf, for example, fýrst fórð gewā́t, or múrnénde mṓd, &c.); and B. ten Brink,[30] who calls the hemistichs with four beats full or ‘complete’ (e.g. hȳ́ràn scóldè, but admits hemistichs with three beats only, calling them ‘incomplete’ from the want of a secondary accent (e.g. twélf wíntra tī́d, hā́m gesṓhte, &c.). The four-beat theory was reverted to by M. Kaluza, who endeavours to reconcile it with the results of Sievers and others.[31] A somewhat similar view is taken by R. Kögel.[32] Trautmann[33] takes Amelung’s view that certain words and syllables must be lengthened in order to get the four accented syllables necessary for each hemistich. Thus, according to Trautmann’s scansion,

sprécað fǽgeré befóran

would run ×́×|×́×|×́×|⏑́× and

ónd þú him méte sýlest

would also have the formula ×́×|×́×|×́×|⏑́×,

ond being protracted to two units. Another instance of this lengthening would, on this theory, occur in the final syllable of the word radores in the hemistich únder rádorès rýne, while in a section like gūð-rinc monig, or of fold-grǽfe, the words rinc and of would be extended to two, and gūð and fold would each be extended to four units, in order to fit in with the scansion ×́×|×́×|×́×|⏑́×. Most of the partisans of the four-beat theory for the hemistich agree in making two of these beats primary, and two secondary; Trautmann, however, does not seem to recognize any such difference in the force of the four accents. All the supporters of the four-beat theory have this in common, that the rhythm of the verse is assumed to be based on time (taktierend), but in other respects differ widely from each other; Hirt, for example, in his last discussion of the subject,[34] claiming that his own view is fundamentally different from that of Kaluza, which again he looks on as at variance with those of Möller and Heusler.

§ 17. The two-beat theory, on the other hand, is that each of the two hemistichs of the alliterative line need have only two accented syllables. In England this view was taken by two sixteenth-century writers on verse, George Gascoigne[35] who quotes the line,

No wight in this world, that wealth can attain,

giving as the accentual scheme ` ´ ` ` ´ ` ´ ` ` ´; and by King James VI, whose example is—

Fetching fude for to feid it fast furth of the Farie.[36]

In 1765, Percy, in his Essay on Pierce Plowman’s Visions, pointed out ‘that the author of this poem will not be found to have invented any new mode of versification, as some have supposed, but only to have retained that of the old Saxon and Gothick poets, which was probably never wholly laid aside, but occasionally used at different intervals’. After quoting[37] two Old Norse, he gives two Old English verses:—

Sceop þa and scyrede scyppend ure (Gen. 65),

ham and heahsetl heofena rices (ib. 33);

he continues: ‘Now if we examine the versification of Pierce Plowman’s Visions’ (from which he quotes the beginning—

In a somer season | when softe was the sonne

I schop me into a schroud | a scheep as I were, &c.)

‘we shall find it constructed exactly by these rules’, which are, in his own words, ‘that every distich [i.e. complete long line] should contain at least three words beginning with the same letter or sound; two of these correspondent sounds might be placed either in the first or second line of the distich, and one in the other, but all three were not regularly to be crowded into one line.’ He then goes on to quote further specimens of alliterative verse from Pierce the Ploughman’s Crede, The Sege of Jerusalem, The Chevalere Assigne, Death and Liffe and Scottish Fielde, which latter ends with a rhyming couplet:

And his ancestors of old time | have yearded theire longe

Before William conquerour | this cuntry did inhabitt.

Jesus bring them to blisse | that brought us forth of bale,

That hath hearkened me heare | or heard my tale.

Taken as a whole his dissertation on the history of alliterative verse is remarkably correct, and his final remarks are noteworthy:

Thus we have traced the alliterative measure so low as the sixteenth century. It is remarkable that all such poets as used this kind of metre, retained along with it many peculiar Saxon idioms, particularly such as were appropriated to poetry: this deserves the attention of those who are desirous to recover the laws of the ancient Saxon poesy, usually given up as inexplicable: I am of opinion that they will find what they seek in the metre of Pierce Plowman. About the beginning of the sixteenth century this kind of versification began to change its form; the author of Scottish Field, we see, concludes his poem with a couplet of rhymes; this was an innovation[38] that did but prepare the way for the general admission of that more modish ornament. When rhyme began to be superadded, all the niceties of alliteration were at first retained with it: the song of Little John Nobody exhibits this union very closely.... To proceed; the old uncouth verse of the ancient writers would no longer go down without the more fashionable ornament of rhyme, and therefore rhyme was superadded. This correspondence of final sounds engrossing the whole attention of the poet and fully satisfying the reader, the internal imbellishment of alliteration was no longer studied, and thus was this kind of metre at length swallowed up and lost in our common burlesque alexandrine, now never used but in songs and pieces of low humour, as in the following ballad; and that well-known doggrel:

‘A cobler there was and he lived in a stall’.

Now it is clear that this verse is of exactly the same structure as the verses quoted by Gascoigne:

No wight in this world that wealth can attayne,

Ùnléss hè bèléue, thàt áll ìs bùt vaýne,

where the scheme of accents is Gascoigne’s own, showing that he read them as verses of four accents in all, two in each hemistich. They show the same rhythmical structure as the ‘tumbling’ or alliterative line given by James VI[39] (1585):

Fetching fude for to feid it fast furth of the Farie,

and described by him as having ‘twa [feit, i.e. syllables] short, and ane lang throuch all the lyne’, in other words with four accented syllables in the verse.

Percy detected very acutely that the Middle English alliterative line stood in close connexion with the Old English alliterative line, and suggested as highly probable that the metre of Pierce Plowman would give a key to the rhythm of that older form of verse, which would have to be read with two accented syllables in the hemistich, and therefore four in the whole line.

Had this essay of Percy’s been known to Lachmann’s followers, many of the forced attempts at reconciling the Old English verse with a scheme that involved a fixed number of syllables in the line would not have been made. Lachmann himself, it must be remembered, admitted the two-beat scansion for Old Norse, Old Saxon, and Old English. Meanwhile other investigators were at work on independent lines. In 1844 A. Schmeller, the editor of the Heliand, formulated the law that, in the Teutonic languages, it is the force with which the different syllables are uttered that regulates the rhythm of the verse, and not the number or length of the syllables (which are of minor importance), and established the fact that this alliterative verse was not meant to be sung but to be recited.[40] He does not enter into the details of the rhythm of the verse, except by pointing out the two-beat cadence of each section. Somewhat later, W. Wackernagel[41] declared himself in favour of the two-beat theory for all Teutonic alliterative verse. In every hemistich of the verse there are according to Wackernagel two syllables with a grammatical or logical emphasis, and consequently a strong accent, the number of less strongly accented syllables not being fixed. The two-beat theory was again ably supported by F. Vetter[42] and by K. Hildebrand, who approached the subject by a study of the Old Norse alliterative verse,[43] and by M. Rieger in his instructive essay on Old Saxon and Old English versification.[44] In this essay Rieger pointed out the rules prevailing in the poetry of those two closely related Teutonic nations, dealt with the distribution and quality of the alliteration, the relation of the alliteration to the noun, adjective, and verb, and to the order of words, with the caesura and the close of the verse, and, finally, with the question of the accented syllables and the limits of the use of unaccented syllables.[45] Other scholars, as Horn, Ries, and Sievers, contributed further elucidations of the details of this metre on the basis of Rieger’s researches.[46]

Next to Rieger’s short essay the most important contribution made to the accurate and scientific study of alliterative verse was that made by Sievers in his article on the rhythm of the Germanic alliterative verse.[47] In this he shows, to use his own words, ‘that a statistical classification of groups of words with their natural accentuation in both sections of the alliterative line makes it clear that this metre, in spite of its variety, is not so irregular as to the unaccented syllables at the beginning or in the middle of the verse as has been commonly thought, but that it has a range of a limited number of definite forms which may be all reduced to five primary types.’ These five types or chief variations in the relative position of the accented and unaccented syllables are, as Sievers points out, of such a nature and so arbitrarily combined in the verse, that they cannot possibly be regarded as symmetrical feet of a line evenly measured and counted by the number of syllables. ‘The fundamental principle, therefore, of the structure of the alliterative line, as we find it in historical times, is that of a free change of rhythm which can only be understood if the verse was meant to be recited, not to be sung.’[48] Soon after the publication of Sievers’s essay on the rhythm of the Germanic verse, the first part of which contained a complete classification of all the forms of the line occurring in Beowulf, other scholars applied his method and confirmed his results by examining in detail the other important Old English texts; Luick dealt with Judith,[49] Frucht with the poems of Cynewulf,[50] and Cremer with Andreas, &c.[51] Sievers himself, after contributing to the pages of Paul’s Grundriss der germanischen Philologie a concise account of his theories and results, expounded them in greater detail in his work on Old Germanic Metre[52] in which he emphasizes the fact that his five-type theory cannot properly be called a theory at all, but is simply an expression of the rules of the alliterative verse obtained by a statistical method of observation. In spite of the criticisms of his opponents, Möller, Heusler, Hirt, Fuhr, and others, he maintained his former views. In principle these views are in conformity with the manner of reading or scanning the alliterative verse explained by English writers on the subject from the sixteenth century downwards, though their terminology naturally is not the same as Sievers’s. We may, therefore, accept them on the whole as sound.

It would be out of place here to enter into the question of prehistoric forms of Teutonic poetry. It will be enough to say that in Sievers’s opinion a primitive form of this poetry was composed in strophes or stanzas, intended to be sung and not merely to be recited; that at a very early period this sung strophic poetry gave way to a recited stichic form suitable to epic narrations; and that his five-type forms are the result of this development. As all the attempts to show that certain Old English poems were originally composed in strophic form[53] have proved failures, we may confidently assent to Sievers’s conclusion that the alliterative lines (as a rule) followed one upon another in unbroken succession, and that in historic times they were not composed in even and symmetrical measures (taktierend), and were not meant to be sung to fixed tunes.

The impossibility of assuming such symmetrical measures for the Old English poetry is evident from the mere fact that the end of the line does not as a rule coincide with the end of the sentence, as would certainly be the case had the lines been arranged in staves or stanzas meant for singing. The structure of the alliterative line obeys only the requirements of free recitation and is built up of two hemistichs which have a rhythmical likeness to one another resulting from the presence in each of two accented syllables, but which need not have, and as a matter of fact very rarely have, complete identity of rhythm, because the number and situation of the unaccented syllables may vary greatly in the two sections.

§ 18. Accentuation of Old English. As the versification of Old English is based on the natural accentuation of the language, it will be necessary to state the laws of this accentuation before giving an account of the five types to which the structure of the hemistich has been reduced.

In simple polysyllables the chief or primary accent, in this work marked by an acute (´), is as a rule on the root-syllable, and the inflexional and other elements of the word have a less marked accent varying from a secondary accent, here marked by a grave (`), to the weakest grade of accent, which is generally left unmarked: thus wúldor, héofon, wī́tig, wúnode, ǽðelingas, &c.

In the alliterative line, as a general rule, only syllables with the chief accent carry either the alliterating sounds or the four rhythmical accents of the verse. All other syllables, even those with secondary accent, count ordinarily as the ‘theses’ (Senkungen) of the verse[54]:

síndon þā béarwas blḗdum gehóngene

wlítigum wǽstmum: þǣr nō wániað ṓ

hā́lge under héofonum hóltes frǽtwe.

Phoenix 71–73.

In compound words (certain combinations with unaccented prefixes excepted) the first element of the compound (which modifies or determines the meaning of the second element) has the primary accent, the second element having only a secondary accent, e.g. wúldor-cỳning, hḗah-sètl, sṓð-fæ̀st.[55] If therefore the compound has, as is mostly the case, only one alliterative sound, that alliteration must necessarily fall on the first part of the compound:

wī́tig wúldorcyning wórlde and héofona.Dan. 427.

Sometimes it happens that in hemistichs of no great length the second part of the compound carries one of the two rhythmical accents of the hemistich, e.g.

on hḗah-sétle héofones wáldend.Cri. 555.

and in a particular form of alliteration[56] it may even contain one of the alliterating sounds, as in the verse:

hwæt! we Gā́rdéna in gēardágum.Beow. 1.

The less strongly accented derivational and inflexional suffixes, though they are not allowed to alliterate, may occasionally have the rhythmical accent, on condition that they immediately follow upon a long accented syllable, e.g.

mid Wýlfíngum, þā hine Wára cýn. Beow. 461.

ne méahte ic æt hílde mid Hrúntínge. ib. 1659.

The rhythmical value of syllables with a secondary accent will be considered more fully later on.

These general rules for the accent of compound words formed of noun + noun or adjective + noun require modification for the cases where a prefix (adverb or preposition) stands in close juxtaposition with a verb or noun. The preposition standing before and depending on a noun coalesces so closely with it that the two words express a single notion, the noun having the chief accent, e.g. onwég, āwég (away), ætsómne (together), ofdū́ne (down), toníhte (to-night), onmíddum (amid); examples in verse are:

gebād wíntra wórn ǣr he onwég hwúrfe. Beow. 264.

sī́d ætsómne þā gesúndrod wǽs. Gen. 162.

But while the prepositional prefix thus does not carry the alliteration owing to its want of accent, some of the adverbs used in composition are accented, others are unaccented, and others again may be treated either way. When the adverbial prefix originally stood by itself side by side with the verb, and may in certain cases still be disjoined from it, it has then the primary accent, because it is felt as a modifying element of the compound. When, however, the prefix and the verb have become so intimately united as to express one single notion, the verb takes the accent and the prefix is treated as proclitic, and there is a third class of these compounds which are used indifferently with accent on the prefix or on the verb.

Some of the commonest prefixes used in alliteration are[57]: and, æfter, eft, ed, fore, forð, from, hider, in, hin, mid, mis, niðer, ongēan, or, up, ūt, efne, as in compounds like ándswarian, íngong, ǽfterweard, &c.:

on ándswáre and on élne stróng. Gū. 264.

ǽðelīc íngong éal wæs gebúnden. Cri. 308.

and ḗac þāra ýfela órsorh wúnað. Met. vii. 43.

ú plang gestṓd wið Ísrahḗlum.Ex. 303.

Prefixes which do not take the alliteration are: ā, ge, for, geond, oð, e.g.

āhōn and āhébban on hḗahne bḗam. Jul. 228.

hǽfde þā gefóhten fóremǣrne blǣ́d. Jud. 122.

brónde forbǽrnan ne on bǣ́l hládan. Beow. 2126.

The following fluctuate: æt, an, bī (big), bi (be), of, ofer, on, tō, under, þurh, wið, wiðer, ymb. These are generally accented and alliterate, if compounded with substantives or adjectives, but are not accented and do not alliterate if compounded with verbs or other particles,[58] e.g. óferhēah, óferhȳd, but ofercúman, oferbī́dan. The following lines will illustrate this:

(a) prefixes which alliterate:

þāra þe þurh óferhȳ́d úpāstī́geð. Dan. 495.

átol is þīn ónsēon hábbað we éalle swā́. Satan 61.

ýmbe-síttendra ǣ́nig þā́ra. Beow. 2734.

(b) prefixes which do not alliterate:

oððæt he þā býsgu oferbíden hæfde. Gū. 518.

ne wíllað ēow ondrǣ́dan dḗade fḗðan. Exod. 266.

sýmbel ymbsǣ́ton sǣ́grunde nḗah. Beow. 564.[59]

When prepositions precede other prepositions or adverbs in composition, the accent rests on that part of the whole compound which is felt to be the most important. Such compounds fall into three classes: (i) if a preposition or adverb is preceded by the prepositions be, on, tō, þurh, wið, these latter are not accented, since they only slightly modify the sense of the following adverb. Compounds of this kind are: beǣ́ftan, befóran, begéondan, behíndan, beínnan, benéoðan, búfan, bútan, onúfan, onúppan, tōfóran, wiðínnan, wiðū́tan, undernéoðan.[60] Only the second part of the compound is allowed to alliterate in these words:

he fḗāra súm befóran géngde. Beow. 1412.

ne þe behíndan lǣ́t þonne þu héonan cýrre. Cri. 155.

Most of these words do not seem to occur in the poetry.

(ii) In compounds of þǣr + preposition the preposition is accented and takes the alliteration:

swā́ he þǣrínne ándlangne dǽg.Beow. 2115.

þe þǣrón síndon ḗce drýhten.Hy. iv. 3.

(iii) weard, as in æfterweard, foreweard, hindanweard, niðerweard, ufeweard, &c., is not accented:

hwít híndanweard and se háls grḗne. Ph. 298.

níodoweard and úfeweard and þæt nebb líxeð. ib. 299.

fḗðe-géstum flét ínnanweard. Beow. 1977.

§ 19. The secondary accent. The secondary or subordinate accent is of as great importance as the chief or primary accent in determining the rhythmical character of the alliterative line. It is found in the following classes of words:

(i) In all compounds of noun + noun, or adjective + noun, or adjective + adjective, the second element of the compound has the subordinate accent, e.g. hēah-sètl, gū́ð-rinc, hríng-nèt, sṓð-fæ̀st. Syllables with this secondary accent are necessary in certain cases as links between the arsis and thesis, as in forms like þégn Hrṓðgā̀res (–́|–́×̀×) or fýrst fórð gewā̀t (–́|–́××̀).

(ii) In proper names like Hrṓðgā̀r, Bḗowùlf, Hýgelā̀c, this secondary accent may sometimes count as one of the four chief metrical accents of the line, as in

béornas on bláncum þǣr wæs Béowúlfes.Beow. 857.

contrasted with

éorl Béowùlfes éalde lā́fe. Beow. 797.

(iii) When the second element has ceased to be felt as a distinct part of the compound, and is little more than a suffix, it loses the secondary accent altogether; as hlā́ford, ǣ́ghwylc, ínwit, and the large class of words compounded with -līc and sum.

þæt he Héardrḗde hlā́ford wǣ́re. Beow. 2375.

lúfsum and lī́ðe lḗofum monnum. Cri. 914.

(iv) In words of three syllables, the second syllable when long and following a long root-syllable with the chief accent, has, especially in the early stage of Old English, a well-marked secondary accent: thus, ǣ́rèsta, ṓðèrra, sémnìnga, éhtènde; the third syllable in words of the form ǽðelìnga gets the same secondary accent. This secondary accent can count as one of the four rhythmic accents of the line, e.g.

þā ǣ́réstan ǣ́lda cýnnes.Gū. 948.

sígefolca swḗg oð þæt sémnínga.Beow. 644.

Words of this class, not compounded, are comparatively rare, but compounds with secondary accent are frequent.

These second syllables with a marked secondary accent in the best examples of Old English verse mostly form by themselves a member of the verse, i.e. are not treated as simple theses as in certain compositions of later date, e.g.

dȳ́gelra gescéafta. Creat. 18.

ā́genne brðor.Metr. ix. 28.

(v) After a long root-syllable of a trisyllabic word a short second syllable (whether its vowel was originally short or long) may bear one of the chief accents of the line, e.g. bōcère, bíscòpe:

þǣr bíscéopas and bṓcéras. An. 607.

or may stand in the thesis and be unaccented, as

gódes bísceope þā spræc gū́ðcýning. Gen. 2123.

This shows that in common speech these syllables had only a slight secondary accent.

(vi) Final syllables (whether long or short) are as a rule not accented even though a long root-syllable precede them.

§ 20. Division and metrical value of syllables. Some other points must be noticed with reference to the division and metrical value of the syllables of some classes of words.

The formative element i in the present stem of the second class of weak verbs always counts as a syllable when it follows a long root-syllable, thus fund-i-an, fund-i-ende not fund-yan, &c. In verbs with a short root-syllable it is metrically indifferent whether this i is treated as forming a syllable by itself or coalescing as a consonant with the following vowel, so that we may divide either ner-i-an, or ner-yan; in verbs of the first and third class the consonantal pronunciation was according to Sievers probably the usual one, hence neryan (nerian), lifyan (lifᵹan), but for verbs of the second class the syllable remained vocalic, thus þolian.[61]

In foreign names like Assyria, Eusebius, the i is generally treated as a vowel, but in longer words possibly as a consonant, as Macedonya (Macedonia). As to the epenthetic vowels developed from a w, the question whether we are to pronounce gearowe or gearwe, bealowes or bealwes cannot be decided by metre. Syllabic l,m, n (l̥, m̥, n̥) following a short root-vowel lose their syllabic character, thus sĕtl, hræ̆gl, swĕfn are monosyllables, but er coming from original r as in wæter, leger may be either consonantal or vocalic. After a long root-syllable vocalic pronunciation is the rule, but occasionally words of this kind, as túngl, bṓsm, tā́cn, are used as monosyllables, and the l, m, and n are consonants. Hiatus is allowed; but in many cases elision of an unaccented syllable takes place, though no fixed rule can be laid down owing to the fluctuating number of unaccented syllables permissible in the hemistich or whole line. In some cases the metre requires us to expunge vowels which have crept into the texts by the carelessness of copyists, e.g. we must write ḗðles instead of ḗðeles, éngles instead of éngeles, dḗofles instead of dḗofeles, and in other cases we must restore the older and fuller forms such as ṓðerra for ṓðrā, eṓwere for ḗowre.[62] The resolution of long syllables with the chief accent in the arsis, and of long syllables with the secondary accent in the thesis, affects very greatly the number of syllables in the line. Instead of the one long syllable which as a rule bears one of the four chief accents of the verse, we not unfrequently meet with a short accented syllable plus an unaccented syllable either long or short (⏑́×́). This is what is termed the resolution of an accented syllable. A word accordingly like fároðe with one short accented syllable and two unaccented syllables has the same rhythmical value as fṓron with one long accented and one unaccented syllable, or a combination like se þe wæs is rhythmically equivalent to sécg wæs.

§ 21. We now come to the structure of the whole alliterative line. The regular alliterative line or verse is made up of two hemistichs or sections. These two sections are separated from each other by a pause or break, but united by means of alliteration so that they form a rhythmical unity. Each hemistich must have two syllables which predominate over the rest in virtue of their logical and syntactical importance and have on this account a stronger stress. These stressed syllables, four in number for the whole line, count as the rhythmical accents of the verse. The force given to these accented syllables is more marked when they carry at the same time the alliteration, which happens at least once in each hemistich, frequently twice in the first and once in the second hemistich, and in a number of instances twice in both hemistichs. The effect of the emphasis given to these four words or syllables by the syntax, etymology, rhythm, and sometimes alliteration, is that the other words and syllables may for metrical purposes be looked upon as in comparison unaccented, even though they may have a main or secondary word-accent.

In certain cases, in consequence of the particular structure of the hemistich, there is found a rhythmical secondary accent, generally coinciding with an etymological secondary accent, or with a monosyllable, or with the root-syllable of a disyllabic word. Sievers looks on these syllables as having in the rhythm of the verse the nature of a minor arsis (Nebenhebung); they rather belong to the class of syllables standing in thesis but with a slight degree of accent (tieftonige Senkung).

The two sections of the alliterative line rarely exhibit a strict symmetry as to the number of the unaccented syllables and their position with regard to the accented syllables. In the great majority of cases their similarity consists merely in their having each two accented syllables, their divergence in other respects being very considerable. It is to be noted that certain combinations of accented and unaccented syllables occur with more frequency in one hemistich than in the other, or are even limited to one of the two hemistichs only.

Besides the ordinary or normal alliterative line with four accents, there exists in Old English and in other West-Germanic poetry a variety of the alliterative line called the lengthened line (Schwellvers or Streckvers). In this line each hemistich has three accented syllables, the unaccented syllables standing in the same relation to the accented ones as they do in the normal two-beat hemistich.

§ 22. The structure of the hemistich in the normal alliterative line. The normal hemistich consists of four, seldom of five members[63] (Glieder), two of which are strongly accented (arses), the others unaccented or less strongly accented (theses). Each arsis is formed, as a rule, of a long accented syllable (–́), but the second part of a compound, and (less frequently) the second syllable with a secondary accent of a trisyllabic or disyllabic word, is allowed to stand as an arsis. By resolution a long accented syllable may be replaced by two short syllables, the first of which is accented. This is denoted by the symbol ⏑́×. The less strongly accented members of the hemistich fall into two classes according as they are unaccented or have the secondary accent. This division depends ultimately on the logical or etymological importance of the syllables. Unaccented syllables (marked in Sievers’s notation by ×) whether long or short by etymology, are mostly inflexional endings, formative elements, or proclitic and enclitic words.

Secondarily accented verse-members, mostly monosyllabic and long (denoted by ×̀, and occasionally, when short, by ⏑̀), are root-syllables in the second part of compounds, long second syllables of trisyllabic words whose root-syllable is long, and other syllables where in ordinary speech the presence of a secondary accent is unmistakable. The rhythmical value of these syllables with secondary accent is not always the same. When they stand in a foot or measure of two members and are preceded by an accented syllable they count as simply unaccented, and the foot is practically identical with the normal type represented by the notation –́× (as in the hemistich wī́sra wórda), but these half-accented syllables may be called heavy theses, and the feet which contain them may be denoted by the formula –́×̀, as in wí̄sfæ̀st wórdum (–́×̀|–́×). A hemistich like the last is called by Sievers strengthened (gesteigert), or if it has two heavy unaccented syllables in both feet, doubly strengthened, as in the section gū́ðrìnc góldwlànc (–́×̀|–́×̀). In these examples the occurrence of a heavy unaccented syllable is permissible but not necessary; but in feet or measures of three members they are obligatory, being required as an intermediate degree between the arsis and thesis, or strongly accented and unaccented member, as in þégn Hrṓðgā́res (–́|–́××̀), or fýrst fórð gewà̄t (–́|–́××̀), or hḗalǣ̀rna mǣ́st (–́×̀×|–́). In these cases Sievers gives the verse-member with this secondary accent the character of a subordinate arsis, or beat (Nebenhebung). But it is better, in view of the strongly marked two-beat swing of the hemistich, to look on such members with a secondary accent as having only the rhythmical value of unaccented syllables, and to call them theses with a slight accent. The two-beat rhythm of the hemistich is its main characteristic, for though the two beats are not always of exactly equal force[64] they are always prominently distinguished from the unaccented members of the hemistich, the rhythm of which would be marred by the introduction of an additional beat however slightly marked.

Cases in which the two chief beats of the hemistich are not of exactly the same force occur when two accented syllables, either both with chief accent or one with chief and the other with secondary accent, stand in immediate juxtaposition, not separated by an unaccented syllable. The second of these two accented syllables may be a short syllable with chief accent, instead of a long syllable as is the rule. But in either case, whether long or short, this second beat following at once on the first beat is usually uttered with somewhat less force than the first, as can be seen from examples like gebū́n hǽfdon, Beow. 117; tō hā́m fáran, 121; mid ǣ́rdǽge, 126. The second beat rarely predominates over the first. The cause of this variation in the force of the two beats is to be sought in the laws of the syntactical accent.

In other respects verse-members with a secondary accent obey the same laws as those with a primary accent. They usually consist of one long syllable, but if a member which has the arsis immediately precedes, a short syllable with a secondary accent may be substituted. Resolution of such verse members is rare, which shows that they are more closely related to the thesis than to the arsis of the hemistich. One unaccented syllable is sufficient to form the thesis (×), but the thesis may also have two or more unaccented syllables (××,×××..), their number increasing in proportion to their shortness and the ease with which they can be pronounced, provided always that no secondary accent intervenes. All of these unaccented syllables are reckoned together as one thesis, as against the accented syllable or arsis. The single components of such a longer thesis may exhibit a certain gradation of force when compared with one another, but this degree of force must never equal the force with which the arsis is pronounced, though we sometimes find that, owing to the varying character of the syntactical or sentence accent, a monosyllable which in one case stands in the thesis, may in another connexion bear the secondary or even the primary accent.

§ 23. The number of the unaccented syllables of the thesis was formerly believed to depend entirely on the choice of the individual poet.[65] Sievers first put this matter in its right light by the statistics of the metre.[66] He showed that the hemistich of the Old English alliterative line is similar to the Old Norse four-syllable verse, and is as a rule of a trochaic rhythm (–́×–́×). The proof of this is that in Beowulf, for instance, there are 592 hemistichs of the type –́×|–́× (as hȳ́ran scólde, 10), and that in the same text there are 238 of the type –́××|–́× (as gṓde gewýrcean, 20; hḗold þenden lī́fde, 57), making 830 hemistichs with trochaic or dactylic rhythm, as against eleven hemistichs of similar structure but with an unaccented syllable at the beginning, ×|–́×(×)|–́×, and even four or five of these eleven are of doubtful correctness. From these figures it seems almost beyond doubt that in the type –́×(×)|–́× the licence of letting the hemistich begin with an unaccented syllable before the first accented syllable was, generally speaking, avoided. On the other hand, when the first accented syllable is short with only one unaccented syllable as thesis (⏑́×), we find this initial unaccented syllable to be the rule, as genúmen hǽfdon Beow. 3167 (×|⏑́×|–́×), of which form there are 130 examples, while, as Rieger noticed, ⏑́×|–́× is rare, as in cýning mǣ́nan Beow. 3173. It is perhaps still more remarkable that while the form –́××|–́× occurs some 238 times, a verse of the form ×|⏑́××|–́× is never found at all. The numerical proportion of the form –́×|–́× (592 cases) to –́××|–́× (238 cases) is roughly 5 to 2, and that of ×|⏑́×|–́× (130 cases) to ×|⏑́××|–́× (no cases) is 130 to nothing. The quantity of the second arsis is, as bearing on the prefixing of unaccented syllables to the hemistich, much less important than the quantity of the first arsis. Hemistichs of the type –́×|⏑́× occur 34 times, and in 29 cases the last unaccented syllable is a full word, either a monosyllable or a part of a compound. The same type, with an initial unaccented syllable ×|–́×|⏑́× also occurs 34 times, but then the last syllable is quite unaccented. The proportion of the form –́×|–́× to the form ×|–́×|–́× is 592 to 11, and that of the form –́×|⏑́× to ×–́×|⏑́× is 34 to 34, a noticeable difference.

Further, it was formerly supposed that the number of unaccented syllables following the accented syllable was indifferent. This is not the case. The form –́××|–́× is found 238 times, and the form –́×|–́×× only 22 times. Many of the examples of the latter form are doubtful, but even counting all these the proportion of the two forms is 11 to 1.

If the two accented syllables are not separated by an unaccented syllable, that is to say, if the two beats are in immediate juxtaposition, then either two unaccented syllables must stand after the second arsis, thus –́|–́×× (a form that occurs 120 times in Beowulf), or an unaccented syllable must precede the first arsis and one unaccented syllable must follow the second arsis, thus ×–́|–́× (127 times in Beowulf), or with the second arsis short ×–́|⏑́× (257 times); the form –́|–́× does not occur.

From these statistics it results that hemistichs of the form –́×|–́× are met with about 17 times to one occurrence of the form –́×|⏑́×, and that on the other hand, the form ×–́|⏑́× is about twice as frequent as ×–́|–́×.