Another roundel of four-foot verses, by Lydgate (Ritson, i. 129), corresponds to a b a b a b a b a b a b a b (cf. Metrik, i, § 180); some other roundels, of a looser structure, consisting, seemingly, of ten lines, are quoted in the same place (cf. Metrik, ii, § 583).
A Modern English roundel of fourteen lines, constructed of three-foot verses, by Austin Dobson, has the scheme a b a b b a a b a b a b a b (quoted ib. § 583). The French roundel of thirteen lines may be looked upon as a preliminary form to the rondeau, which was developed from the roundel at the end of the fifteenth and the beginning of the sixteenth century.
§ 324. The rondeau is a poem consisting of thirteen lines of eight or ten syllables, or four or five measures. It has three stanzas of five, three, and five lines, rhyming on the scheme a a b b a a a b a a b b a. It has, moreover, a refrain which is formed by the first words of the first line, and recurs twice, viz. after the eighth and thirteenth verses, with which it is syntactically connected. Strictly speaking it therefore has fifteen lines, corresponding to the scheme a a b b a a a b + r a a b b a + r. The rondeau was much cultivated by the French poet, Clément Marot. It was introduced into English by Wyatt, from whom the rondeau Complaint for True Love unrequited (p. 23) may be quoted here:
This is the proper form of the rondeau. Other forms deviating from it are modelled on the schemes:
Austin Dobson, Robert Bridges, and Theo. Marzials strictly follow the form quoted above.
Another form of the rondeau entirely deviating from the above is found in Swinburne, A Century of Roundels,[208] where he combines verses of the most varied length and rhythm on the scheme A B A + b B A B A B A + b where b denotes part of a verse, rhyming with the second, but repeated from the beginning of the first verse and consisting of one or several words (cf. Metrik, ii, §§ 584, 585)
§ 325. The triolet and the villanelle are unusual forms occurring only in modern poets, e.g. Dobson and Gosse.
The triolet, found as early as in Adenet-le-Roi at the beginning of the thirteenth century, is a short poem of eight mostly octosyllabic verses, rhyming according to the formula a b a a a b a b, the first verse recurring as a refrain in the fourth, the first and second together in the seventh and eighth place. Two specimens have been quoted, Metrik, ii, § 586
§ 326. The villanelle (a peasant song, rustic ditty, from villanus) was cultivated by Jean Passerat (1534–1602); in modern poetry by Th. de Banville, L. Baulmier, &c. It mostly consists of octosyllabic verses divided into five stanzas (sometimes a larger or smaller number) of three lines plus a final stanza of four lines, the whole corresponding to the scheme a1 b a2 + a b a1 + a b a2 + a b a1 + a b a2 + a b a1 a2. Hence the first and the third verses of the first stanza are used alternately as a refrain to form the last verse of the following stanzas, while in the last stanza both verses are used in this way. A villanelle by Gosse on this model consisting of eight stanzas, perhaps the only specimen in English literature, has been quoted, Metrik, ii, § 587
§ 327. The ballade is a poetical form consisting of somewhat longer stanzas all having the same rhymes. Several varieties of it existed in Old French poetry. The two most usual forms are that with octosyllabic and that with decasyllabic lines. The first form is composed of three stanzas of eight lines on the model a b a b b c b C (cf. § 269). The rhymes in each stanza agree with those of the corresponding lines in the two others, the last line, which is identical in all the three, forming the refrain; this refrain-verse recurs also at the end of the envoi, which corresponds in its structure to the second half of the main stanza, according to the formula b c b C. The decasyllabic form has three stanzas of ten verses on the scheme a b a b b c c d c D (cf. § 271), and an envoi of five verses on the scheme c c d c D; the same rules holding good in all other respects as in the eight-lined form. It is further to be observed that the envoi began, as a rule, with one of the words Prince, Princesse, Reine, Roi, Sire, either because the poem was addressed to some personage of royal or princely rank, or because, originally, this address referred to the poet who had been crowned as ‘king’ in the last poetical contest.
In England also the ballade had become known as early as in the fourteenth century. We have a collection of ballades composed in the French language by Gower,[209] consisting of stanzas of either eight or seven (rhyme royal) decasyllabic verses with the same rhyme throughout the poem. Similar to the French are Chaucer’s English ballades in his Minor Poems, which, however, in so far differ from the regular form, that the envoi consists of five, six, or seven lines; in some of the poems even there is no envoi at all. Accurate reproductions of the Old French ballade are not found again until recent times. There are examples by Austin Dobson and especially by Swinburne (A Midsummer Holiday, London, 1884). They occur in both forms, constructed as well of four- and five-foot iambic, as of six-, seven-, or eight-foot trochaic or of five- and seven-foot iambic-anapaestic verses. (For specimens cf. Metrik, ii, § 588.)
§ 328. The Chant Royal is an extended ballade of five ten-lined ballade-stanzas (of the second form mentioned above), instead of three, together with an envoi. In Clément Marot we meet with another form of five eleven-line stanzas of decasyllabic verses also with the same rhymes throughout; the envoi having five lines. The scheme is a b a b c c d d e d E in the stanzas and d d e d E in the envoi.
A Chant Royal by Gosse, composed on this difficult model (perhaps the only specimen to be found in English poetry), is quoted Metrik, ii, § 589.
A more detailed discussion of these French poetical forms of a fixed character and of others not imitated in English poetry may be found in Kastner’s History of French Versification (Oxford, at the Clarendon Press, 1903), chapter x. Cf. also Edmund Stengel, Romanische Verslehre, in Gröber’s Grundriss der Romanischen Philologie (Strassburg, 1893), vol. ii, pp. 87 ff.
OXFORD: HORACE HART M.A.
PRINTER TO THE UNIVERSITY
NOTES
[1] Zur Geschichte der deutschen Sprache, zweite Ausgabe, p. 624, Berlin, 1868.
[2] Metrik der Griechen, 1a, 500.
[3] It should be remarked that in Sanskrit, as in the classical languages, that prominence of one of the syllables of a word, which is denoted by the term ‘accent’, was originally marked by pitch or elevation of tone, and that in the Teutonic languages the word-accent is one of stress or emphasis.
[4] Handbook of Phonetics, § 263.
[5] Die physiologischen Grundlagen der neuhochdeutschen Verskunst, 1871, p. 2.
[6] Sweet, Handbook of Phonetics, Oxford, 1877, p. 92.
[7] Cf. Transactions of the Philological Society, 1875–6, London, 1877, pp. 397 ff.; Chapters on English Metre, by Prof. J. B. Mayor, 2nd ed., pp. 5 ff.
[8] Transact., p. 398.
[9] They are used by Puttenham, The Arte of English Poesy, 1589, Arber’s reprint, p. 141.
[10] J. Grimm’s ed. of Andreas and Elene, 1840, pp. lv ff.
[11] Cf. Lehrs, de Aristarchi studiis Homericis, 1865, p. 475.
[12] Cf. J. Huemer, Untersuchungen über die ältesten lateinisch-christlichen Rhythmen, Vienna, 1879, p. 60.
[13] In the Icelandic terminology this is skothending, Möbius, Háttatal, ii, p. 2.
[14] Cf. Sievers, Altgermanische Metrik, § 18. 2.
[15] Tacitus, Germania, cap. 2.
[16] Grein-Wülker, iii. 1, p. 156.
[17] The influence of the Latin system on Otfrid is clear from his own words, I. i. 21.
[18] For a review of recent metrical theories see Sievers, Altgermanische Metrik, 1893, pp. 2–17, and his article on metre in Paul’s Grundriss, ii. 2.
[19] Cf. Lachmann, ‘Über althochdeutsche Betonung und Verskunst,’ Schriften, ii. 358 ff., and ‘Über das Hildebrandslied’, ib., ii. 407 ff.
[20] Germania, iii, p. 7.
[21] Zeitschrift für deutsches Altertum, i, p. 318, and de Carmine Wessofontano, 1861, p. 10.
[22]De Anglo-Saxonum arte metrica, 1871.
[23] ‘Grundzüge der altgermanischen Metrik,’ Zeitschrift für deutsche Philologie, ii. 114 ff.
[24] Ibid., iii. 280 ff.
[25] Zur althochdeutschen Alliterationspoesie, Kiel and Leipzig.
[26] John Lawrence, Chapters on Alliterative Verse, London, 1893; reviewed by K. Luick, Anglia, Beiblatt iv, pp. 193, 201.
[27] Möller’s own notation; Lawrence’s sign for the rest is a small point, and his sign for the end of a section is a thick point.
[28] Untersuchungen zur westgermanischen Verskunst I, Leipzig, 1889; ‘Zur Metrik des alts. und althochd. Alliterationsverses,’ Germania, xxxvi. 139 ff., 279 ff.; ‘Der altdeutsche Reimvers und sein Verhältnis zur Alliterationspoesie,’ Zeitschrift für deutsches Altertum, xxxviii. 304 ff.
[29] Die Metrik des westgermanischen Alliterationsverses, Marburg, 1892.
[30] Paul’s Grundriss der germanischen Philologie, ed. I, ii. i. 518.
[31] Der altenglische Vers: I. Kritik der bisherigen Theorien, 1894; II. Die Metrik des Beowulfliedes, 1894; III. Die Metrik der sog. Caedmonischen Dichtungen, &c., 1895. This last part is by F. Graz. These are reviewed by K. Luick, Anglia, Beiblatt iv. 294; M. Trautmann, ib., iv. 131; vi. 1–4; Saran, Zeitschrift für deutsche Philologie, xxvii. 539.
[32] Geschichte der deutschen Litteratur, 1894, i. 228, and Ergänzungsheft zu Band I, Die altsächsische Genesis, 1895, p. 28 ff.
[33] ‘Zur Kenntniss des germanischen Verses, vornehmlich des altenglischen,’ in Anglia, Beiblatt v. 87 ff.
[34] Z. f. d. A., xxxviii. 304.
[35] Certayne notes of Instruction concerning the making of verse or ryme in English, 1575; Arber’s reprint, London, 1868, p. 34.
[36] Ane Schort Treatise, conteining some Revlis and Cautelis to be obseruit and eschewit in Scottis poesie, 1585, pp. 63 ff. of Arber’s reprint. The scheme would be ` ` ´ ` ` ´ ` ` ´ ` ` ´ `.
[37] From Hickes’s Antiq. Literat. Septentrional., tom. i, p. 217.
[38] It is now well known that this innovation was introduced much earlier.
[39] From Alexander Montgomery, The Flyting, &c., l. 476.
[40] ‘Über den Versbau der alliterierenden Poesie, besonders der Altsachsen,’ Bay. Akademie der Wissenschaften, philos.-histor. Classe, iv. 1, p. 207 ff.
[41] Litteraturgeschichte, p. 45 ff., second ed., p. 57.
[42] Über die germanische Alliterationspoesie, Vienna, 1872, and Zum Muspilli, &c., Vienna, 1872.
[43] ‘Über die Verstheilung der Edda,’ Zeitschr. für deutsche Phil., Ergänzungsband, p. 74.
[44] Die Alt- und Angelsächsische Verskunst, Halle, 1876, reprinted from Z. f. d. Ph., vol. vii.
[45] The author’s larger work on English Metre was indebted in paragraphs 28–33 to Rieger’s essay; succeeding paragraphs (34–39) of the same work exhibited in detail the further development or rather decay of the Old English alliterative line.
[46] C. R. Horn, Paul und Braune’s Beiträge, v. 164; J. Ries, Quellen und Forschungen, xli. 112; E. Sievers, Zeitschr. f. deutsche Phil., xix. 43.
[47] Paul und Braune’s Beiträge, x, 1885, pp. 209–314 and 491–545.
[48] Sievers, Paul’s Grundriss, ii. 1, p. 863, or ii. 2, p. 4, second ed.
[49] Paul und Braune’s Beiträge, xi. 470.
[50] Ph. Frucht, Metrisches und Sprachliches zu Cynewulfs Elene, Juliana und Crist, Greifswald, 1887.
[51] M. Cremer, Metrische und sprachliche Untersuchung der altengl. Gedichte Andreas, Gûðlâc, Phoenix, Bonn, 1888.
[52] Altgermanische Metrik, Halle, 1893.
[53] Mainly by H. Möller, Das Volksepos in der ursprünglichen strophischen Form, Kiel, 1883.
[54] Besides the unaccented syllables of polysyllabic words, many monosyllables, such as prepositions, pronouns, &c., are unstressed, and occur only in the theses.
[55] This rule applies to modern English also, as in words like bírth-rìght.
[56] If this cross alliteration is intentional. See Sievers, Altger. Metrik, p. 41.
[57] See Koch, Historische Grammatik der englischen Sprache, Weimar, 1863, i. 156.
[58] Compare Streitberg, Urgermanische Grammatik, 1900, § 143, p. 167, or Wilmanns, Deutsche Grammatik, 1897, i, p. 407, § 349.
[59] For exceptions to these rules see Englische Metrik, i, pp. 43, 45.
[60] Koch adds wiðǽftan, wiðfóran, wiðnéoðan.
[61] Sievers, Beiträge, x. 225, and Angelsächsische Grammatik3, §§ 410, 411, 415.
[62] For details on these points and on the question of the treatment of forms in which vowel contraction is exhibited in the MSS. see Sievers, Altgermanische Metrik, §§ 74–77, and Beiträge, x. 475 ff.
[63] ‘Elements,’ Sweet, Anglo-Saxon Reader, § 365.
[64] Sievers, Altgerm. Metrik, § 9, 3. 4.
[65] See, for example, Rieger, Alt- und Angelsächsische Verskunst, p. 62.
[66] Paul-Braune’s Beiträge, x, p. 209.
[67] [67] For the type –́× × | –́see below, § 29, and Sievers, Paul-Braune’s Beiträge, x, p. 262.
[68] Sievers, Paul-Braune’s Beiträge, x, p. 262.
[69] As Sievers calls them, Altgerm. Metrik, § 13. 2; they are marked A*, B*, &c.
[70] The notation of Sievers for hemistichs with anacrusis (auftaktige Verse) is aA, aD, aE, &c.
[71] Sievers, Altgermanische Metrik, pp. 33 ff.
[72] It must be remembered that ea, eo, &c., are diphthongs, and have not the value of two vowels.
[73] Sievers, Paul-Braune’s Beiträge, x, p. 233.
[74] Here n counts as a syllable, see Sievers, Angelsächsische Gram.,§ 141, and Altgerm. Metrik, § 79.
[75] See the statistics in Sievers, Paul-Braune’s Beiträge, x, p. 290.
[76] Sievers, Paul-Braune’s Beiträge, x. 241 and 294.
[77] Sievers, Altgerm. Metrik, § 85, 2, Anm. 3.
[78] Cf. Sievers, Altgermanische Metrik, § 15, 3 c, and § 116. 9.
[79] See Max Cremer, Metrische und sprachliche Untersuchungen der altenglischen Gedichte Andreas, Gūðlāc, Phoenix, &c., 1888, pp. 31 ff.; Sievers, Altgermanische Metrik, § 86; and chiefly Eduard Sokoll, ‘Zur Technik des altgermanischen Alliterationsverses,’ in Beiträge zur neueren Philologie, Vienna, 1902, pp. 351–65.
[80] But on this last expression see Sievers, Phonetik4, § 359.
[81] Edited by Grein in Anglia, ii. 141 ff.
[82] The Old Norse hofuðstafr, Germ. Hauptstab. The alliterations in the first hemistich are called in Old Norse stuðlar (sing. stuðill) ‘supporters’, Germ. Stollen or Stützen.
[83] Sievers, Altgerm. Metrik, § 20.
[84] This is not very common in poetry of the more regular metrical structure, but is found in Ælfric’s lines, in which we find hemistichs without any alliterating letter, and others where the alliteration is continued in the following line; two-thirds, however, of his lines are formed quite correctly.
[85] Snorri, the Icelandic metrician, permits this in the case of certain monosyllabic words, but looks on it as a licence (leyfi en eigi rétt setning, Hāttatal, p. 596).
[86] The subject of the preceding paragraphs was first investigated by M. Rieger in his essay Alt- und Angelsächsische Verskunst, p. 18, where many details will be found.
[87] Cf. Sievers in Paul-Braune’s Beiträge, xii. 455; K. Luick, ib., xiii. 389, xv. 441; F. Kaufmann, ib., xv. 360; Sievers, in Paul’s Grundriss, pp. 891 ff., and in Altgermanische Metrik, §§ 88–96.
[88] In Paul-Braune’s Beiträge, xii, pp. 454, 455, Sievers gives a list of the undoubted regular lengthened verses occurring in OE. poetry.
[89] Sievers discusses the lengthened verses of these poems in Beiträge, xii. 479.
[90] Beiträge, xii. 458.
[91] Beiträge, xiii. 388, xv. 445.
[92] Altgermanische Metrik, § 94. 3.
[93] Altgermanische Metrik, § 95.
[94] See Sievers, Altgerm. Metrik, § 97.
[95] For other subdivisions of rhyme see Sievers, Altgerm. Metrik, §§ 99–102, with the treatises on the subject, and Bk. II, sect. ii, ch. 1 of this work.
[96] Some less important examples, of which the metrical character is not quite clear, are mentioned by Luick, Paul’s Grundriss, ed. 2, II. ii. p. 144.
[97] In this passage and for the future we refrain from indicating the quantity of the vowels. The rhythmic accentuation is omitted, as being very uncertain in this passage.
[98] Viz. the so-called Proverbs of King Alfred (ed. by R. Morris, E.E.T.S., vol. XLIX), and Layamon’s Brut, ed. by Sir Frederic Madden, London, 1847, 2 vols.
[99] Paul’s Grundriss, ed. 2, II. ii. p. 10, and Altgermanische Metrik, p. 139.
[100] On the nature of these rhymes, cf. § 53 and the author’s paper, ‘Metrische Randglossen,’ in Englische Studien, x. 192 ff., chiefly pp. 199–200.
[101] In Paul’s Grundriss, ed. 2, II. ii. pp. 145–7.
[102] Cf. our remarks in Book I, Part II, on the Septenary Verse in combination with other metres.
[103] Cf. Wissmann, King Horn, pp. 59–62, and Metrik, i, pp. 189–90.
[104] Signs of Death in Old Engl. Misc. (E. E. T. S.), p. 101.
[105] Cf. Hall’s edition (Clar. Press, 1901), pp. xlv-l, where our views on the origin and structure of the metre are adopted.
[106] See Paul’s Grundriss, ed. 2, II. ii. p. 156.
[107] This view has been combated by the author. The stages of the discussion are to be found in articles by Einenkel, Anglia, v. Anz. 47; Trautmann, ibid. 118; Einenkel’s edition of St. Katherine, E. E. T. S. 80; the author’s ‘Metrische Randglossen’, Engl. Studien, ix. 184; ibid. 368; and Anglia, viii. Anz. 246. According to our opinion Otfrid’s verse was never imitated in England, nor was it known at all in Old or Middle English times.
[108] This line is inaccurately quoted by King James from the poet Alexander Montgomerie, who lived at his court. It should read as follows:—
[109] Cf. the writer’s paper ‘Zur Zweihebungstheorie der alliterierenden Halbzeile’ in Englische Studien v. 488–93.
[110] Cf. Chapters on Alliterative Verse by John Lawrence, D. Litt. London: H. Frowde. 1893. 8^o (chapter iii).
[111] ‘Die englische Stabreimzeile im 14., 15., 16. Jahrhundert’ (Anglia, xi. 392–443, 553–618).
[112] Prof. Luick, in his longer treatise on the subject (Anglia, xi. 404), distinguishes between two forms of this type with anacrusis (×–́××–́) and without (–́××–́), which he calls A1 and A2, a distinction he has rightly now abandoned (Paul’s Grundriss, ed. 2, II. ii. p. 165).
[113] Also printed in Ritson’s Ancient Songs, i, p. 12; Wright’s Pol. Songs, p. 69; Mätzner’s Altenglische Sprachproben, i, p. 152; Böddeker’s Altenglische Dichtungen, Pol. Lieder, no. i.
[114] Paul’s Grundriss, ed. 2, II. ii, p. 158.
[115] Cf. Metrik, ii. 146; and Luick, Anglia, xii. 450, 451.
[116] See G. Gascoigne, Certayne Notes of Instruction concerning the making of verse or ryme in English, 1575, in Arber’s Reprints, together with The Steele Glas, &c., London, 1868, 8vo, p. 34.
[117] Bürger’s version Der Kaiser und der Abt introduces a regular alternation of masculine and feminine couplets not observed in the original metre which he is copying.
[118] Cf. the chapter on the four-foot iambic verse.
[119] Recognized by Bishop Percy (1765) as rhythmically equivalent to
and
[120] This alliterative-rhyming long line is scanned by the contemporary metrist King James VI in the manner indicated by the accents.
[121] The second of these lines is thus marked by Gascoigne as having four stresses.
[122] We retain the MS. reading; see Sievers, Altgerm. Metrik, p. 17.
[123] Horstmann, Altenglische Legenden, Neue Folge, p. 244.
[124] Percy’s Reliques, I. ii. 7.
[125] Quoted in Chambers’s Cyclop. of Eng. Lit., i. 242.
[126] Ed. by J. Schipper, Quellen und Forschungen, xx.
[127] In the ‘tumbling’—or, to use the German name, the ‘gliding’ (gleitend) caesura or rhyme.
[128] For the introduction and explanation of these technical terms cf. Fr. Diez, ‘Über den epischen Vers,’ in his Altromanische Sprachdenkmale, Bonn, 1846, 8vo, p. 53, and the author’s Englische Metrik, i, pp. 438, 441; ii, pp. 24–6.
[129] The occurrence of this licence in Chaucer’s heroic verse has been disputed by ten Brink (Chaucer’s Sprache und Verskunst, p. 176) and others, but see Metrik, i. 462–3, and Freudenberger, Ueber das Fehlen des Auftaktes in Chaucer’s heroischem Verse, Erlangen, 1889.
[130] We therefore hold ten Brink to be wrong in asserting (Chaucer’s Sprache und Verskunst, § 307, 3. Anm.) that no redundant or hypermetrical syllable is permissible in the caesural pause of Chaucer’s iambic line of five accents, although he recognizes that in lines of four accents Chaucer admits the very same irregularity, which moreover has remained in use down to the present day. Cf. Skeat, Chaucer Canon, Oxford, 1900, pp. 31–3, and Schipper in Paul’s Grundriss, ed. 2, II. ii, pp, 217–18. On this point, as also on several others, Miss M. Bentinck Smith, the translator of ten Brink’s work, is of our opinion (cf. her Remarks on Chapter III of ten Brink’s Chaucer’s Sprache und Verskunst in The Modern Language Quarterly, vol. v, No. 1, April, 1902, pp. 13–19). A contrary view with regard to ‘extra syllables’ in the heroic and the blank-verse line (sixteenth and seventeenth centuries) is taken by A. P. van Dam and Cornelis Stoffel, Chapters on English Printing, Prosody, and Pronunciation (1550–1700), Heidelberg, 1902 (Anglistische Forschungen herausgegeben von Dr. Johannes Hoops, Heft 9), pp. 48–113.
[131] Cf. the lines from Wright’s Spec. of Lyr. Poetry, p. 31, quoted on p. 98.
[132] Cf. Parson’s Prologue, 42–3.
[133] In the reading of the Bible and Liturgy the older syllabic pronunciation of certain endings is still common, and it is occasionally heard in sermons, where a more elevated and poetical kind of diction is admissible than would be used in secular oratory.
[134] See ten Brink, Chaucer’s Sprache und Verskunst, § 260.
[135] Cf. Luick, Anglia, xi. 591–2.
[136] Cf. King James I, The Kingis Quair, ed. by W. W. Skeat, 1883–4.
[137] Cf. Metrik, ii. 101–3 note.
[138] Cf. Ellis, E. E. Pr., i. 367–8.
[139] A long list of the words so treated is to be found in Abbott, Shakespearian Grammar, § 460.
[140] Cf. Abbott, § 477; Ellis, E. E. Pr., iii. 951–2; Metrik, ii, 117–18.
[141] See ten Brink, The Language and Metre of Chaucer (English transl.), § 280, where the metrical treatment of these words is described. The German term used by ten Brink is Anlehnungen.
[142] Old English Homilies, ed. R. Morris, First Series, Part I, E.E.T.S., No. 29, pp. 55–71.
[143] Cf. Charles L. Crow, On the History of the Short Couplet in Middle English. Dissert., Göttingen, 1892.
[144] Cf. John Heywood als Dramatiker, von Wilh. Swoboda, 1888, p. 83 ff.
[145] Cf. our metrical notes (‘Metrische Randglossen’) in Engl. Studien, x, p. 192 seq.
[146] In Old English Homilies, ed. R. Morris, pp. 190ff.
[147] Trautmann, Anglia, v, Anz., p. 124; Einenkel, ibid., 74; Menthel, Anglia, viii, Anz., p. 70.
[148] According to Guest (ii. 233) ‘because the poulterer, as Gascoigne tells us, giveth twelve for one dozen and fourteen for another’.
[149] These poems are also printed in Böddeker, Altengl. Dichtungen, Geistl. Lieder, xviii, Weltl. Lieder, xiv.
[150] Chaucer’s Sprache und Verskunst, § 305, note.
[151] The verses he calls five-foot lines have, on the other hand, decidedly not this structure, but are four-foot lines with unaccented rhymes; for a final word in the line, such us wrécfúl, as is assumed by Ten Brink, with the omission of an unaccented syllable between the last two accents, would be utterly inconsistent with the whole character of this metre.
[152] According to Ten Brink, Chaucer’s Sprache und Verskunst, § 305, the shifting character of Chaucer’s caesura was chiefly caused by his acquaintance with the Italian endecasillabo. This influence may have come in later, but even in Chaucer’s early Compleynt to Pitee (according to Ten Brink, Geschichte der englischen Literatur, ii. p. 49, his first poem written under the influence of the French decasyllabic verse) the caesura is here moveable, though not to the same extent as in the later poems. The liability of the caesura to shift its position was certainly considerably increased by the accentual character of English rhythm. On the untenableness of his assertion, that in Chaucer’s five-accent verse the epic caesura is unknown, cf. p. 145 (footnote), Metrik, ii. 101–3 note, and Schipper in Paul’s Grundriss, ed. 2, II. ii, pp. 217–21.
[153] For the accentuation of the word cf. inter alia rhymes such as mérie: Cáunterbúry, Prol. 801–2, and Schipper, l.c., pp. 217–18.
[154] This definition is also given by Milton in his introductory note on ‘The Verse’ prefixed in 1668 to Paradise Lost.
[155] Cf. Metrik, ii. §§ 132–5.
[156] Cf. Metrik, ii. §§ 136–46.
[157] Cf. on this subject the essays and treatises by T. Mommsen, Abbott, Furnivall, Ingram, Hertzberg, Fleay, A.J. Ellis (On Early English Pronunciation, iii), &c. (quoted Metrik, ii, p. 259); besides G. König, Der Vers in Shakspere’s Dramen, Strassburg, Trübner, 1888, 8^o (Quellen und Forschungen, 61); Der Couplet-Reim in Shakspere’s Dramen (Dissertation), von J. Heuser, Marburg, 1893, 8; H. Krumm, Die Verwendung des Reims in dem Blankverse des englischen Dramas zur Zeit Shaksperes, Kiel, 1889; H. Conrad, Metrische Untersuchungen zur Feststellung der Abfassungszeit von Shakspere’s Dramen (Shakespeare-Jahrbuch, xxx. 318–353); William Shakespeare, Prosody and Text, by B. A. P. van Dam and C. Stoffel, Leyden, 1900, 8^o; Chapters on English Printing Prosody, and Pronunciation (1550–1700), by B.A.P. van Dam and C. Stoffel, Heidelberg, 1902 (Anglistische Forschungen, ix).
[158] I. 1587–1592; II. 1593–1600; III. 1600–1606; IV. 1606–1613; according to Dowden.
[159] Cf. Furnivall, p. xxviii.
[160] Cf. Mayor, Chapters on English Metre, pp. 174–7.
[161] Cf. Metrik, ii, § 154.
[162] Cf. Metrik, ii, § 161.
[163] Cf. N. Delius, Die Prosa in Shakespeares Dramen (Jahrbuch d. deutschen Shakespeare-Gesellschaft, v. 227–73).
[164] Cf. the Halle dissertations by Hannemann (on Ford, Oxford, 1889); Penner (on Peele, Braunschweig, 1890); Knaut (on Greene, 1890); Schulz (on Middleton, 1892); Elste (on Chapman, 1892); Kupka (on Th. Dekker, 1893); Meiners (on Webster, 1893); Clages (on Thomson and Young, 1892); and the criticism of some of them by Boyle, Engl. Studien, xix. 274–9.
[165] IV. i, p. 66, cf. Engl. Studien, v, p. 76.
[166] Engl. Studien, iv-vii.
[167] On the many combinations of the three kinds of caesura in the different places of the verse, cf. Metrik, ii, pp. 28–31.
[168] Cf. Metrik, ii, §§ 179–185.
[169] See Englische Metrik, ii, §§ 188–90.
[170] Cf. Metrik, ii, §§ 195–201.
[171] Cf. Metrik, ii, §§ 202–6.
[172] For examples see Metrik, ii, § 218.
[173] A Century of Roundels, p. 30.
[174] Cf. Metrik, ii, § 232.
[175] Prince Henry and Elsie, pp. 249–51.
[176] Cf. Metrik, ii, § 238.
[177] Cf. Metrik, ii, § 239.
[178] Book of Nonsense, London, Routledge, 1843.
[179] Specimens of earlier hexameter verse with detailed bibliographical information may be found in our Metrik, ii, §§ 249–50; and especially in C. Elze’s thorough treatise on the subject, Der englische Hexameter. Programm des Gymnasiums zu Danzig, 1867. (Cf. F. E. Schelling, Mod. Lang. Notes, 1890, vii. 423–7.)
[180] The word stanza is explained by Skeat, Conc. Etym. Dict., as follows:
‘STANZA. Ital. stanza, O.Ital. stantia, “a lodging, chamber, dwelling, also stance or staffe of verses;” Florio. So called from the stop or pause at the end of it.—Low Lat. stantia, an abode.—Lat. stant-, stem of pres. pt. of stare.’
[182] Cf. §§ 60–2 and the author’s ‘Metrische Randglossen, II.’, Engl. Stud., x, pp. 196–200.
[183] Cf. Sir Thomas Wyatt, von R. Alscher, Wien, 1886 pp. 119–23.
[184] By the German metrists it is called Binnenreim, or Innenreim.
[185] So called from a poet Leo of the Middle Ages (c. 1150) who wrote in hexameters rhyming in the middle and at the end. Similar verses, however, had been used occasionally in classic Latin poetry, as e.g. Quot caelum stellas, tot habet tua Roma puellas, Ovid, Ars Amat. i. 59.
[186] See The Oxford Dante, pp. 379–400, or Opere minori di Dante Alighieri, ed. Pietro Fraticelli, vol. ii, p. 146, Florence, 1858, and Böhmer’s essay, Über Dante’s Schrift de vulgari eloquentia, Halle, 1868.
[187] See B. ten Brink, The Language and Metre of Chaucer, translated by M. Bentinck Smith. London, Macmillan & Co., 1901, 8º, § 350.
[188] Stanzas of six and twelve lines formed on the same principle (a a a b b b and a a b b c c d d e e f f) are very rare. For specimens see Metrik, ii, § 363.
[189] Cf. O. Wilda, Über die örtli che Verbreitung der zwölfzeiligen Schweifreimstrophe in England, Breslau Dissertation, Breslau, 1887.
[190] This is a stanza of four iambic lines alternately of four and three feet with masculine endings, usually rhyming a b a b.
[191] Chaucerian and other Pieces, &c., ed. Skeat, Oxford, 1897, p. 347.
[192] This form of stanza is of great importance in the anisometrical ‘lays’, which cannot be discussed in this place (cf. Metrik, i, § 168). In these poems the strophic arrangement is not strictly followed throughout, but only in certain parts; a general conformity only is observed in these cases.
[193] As to this form cf. Huchown’s Pistel of Swete Susan, herausgeg. von Dr. H. Köster, Strassburg, 1895 (Quellen und Forschungen, 76), pp. 15–36.
[194] Cf. R. Brotanek, Alexander Montgomerie, Vienna, 1896.
[195] It is worth noticing that there are also tripartite stanzas in Middle English, either allied to the bob-wheel stanza or belonging to it, both in lyric and dramatic poetry; e.g. the ten-lined stanza of a poem in Wright’s Songs and Carols (Percy Soc., 1847), p. 15, on the scheme A B A B C C C4 d1 D D4 (quoted in Metrik, i, p. 406); one of eleven lines according to the formula A A A4 B3 C C C4 B3 d1 B D3 in the Towneley Mysteries, p. 224 (quoted in Metrik, i, p. 407), and one of thirteen lines, used in a dialogue, corresponding to the scheme A B A B A A B A A B3 c1 B3 C2, ibid., pp. 135–9 (quoted in Metrik, i, p. 408).
[196] Cf. Karl Bartsch, ‘Der Strophenbau in der deutschen Lyrik’ (Germania, ii, p. 290).
[197] For titles of books and essays on the sonnet see Englische Metrik, ii, pp. 836–7 note; cf. also L. Bladene, ‘Morfologia del Sonetto nei secoli XIII e XIV’ (Studi di Filologia Romanza, fasc. 10).
[198] Cf. Étude sur Joachim du Bellay et son rôle dans la réforme de Ronsard, par G. Plötz. Berlin, Herbig, 1874, p. 24.
[199] The Sonnet: Its Origin, Structure and Place in Poetry, London, 1874, 8º, p. 4.
[200] For certain other varieties occasionally used by these poets see Metrik, §§ 536 and 544–5.
[201] Cf. Studien über A. M., von Oscar Hoffmann (Breslau Dissertation), Altenburg, 1894, p. 32; Engl. Studien, xx. 49 ff.; and Rud. Brotanek, Wiener Beiträge, vol. iii, pp. 122–3.
[202] Cf. Wordsworth, Prose Works, ed. Grosart, 1876, vol. iii, p. 323, where he praises Milton for this peculiarity, showing thereby that he was influenced in his sonnet-writing by Milton.
[203] On Wordsworth’s Sonnets see the Note on the Wordsworthian Sonnet by Mr. T. Hutchinson, in his edition of Poems in two volumes by William Wordsworth (1807), London, 1897, vol. i, p. 208.
[204] See Chaucer’s Works, edited by W. W. Skeat, Minor Poems, pp. 75–6, 310–11.
[205] Cf. the essay by Gosse in The Cornhill Magazine, No. 211, July, 1877, pp. 53–71.
[206] Französische Verslehre, Berlin, 1879, p. 388.
[207] Ritson’s Ancient Songs, i. 128, written, it is true, in five-foot verses; the repetition of the two refrain-verses in the proper place, however, is not indicated in the edition, and a slight emendation of the text is also required by the sense, viz. hath sprung instead of that sprang in the last line.
[208] London, Chatto & Windus, 1833.
[209] The Works of John Gower, ed. G. C. Macaulay, Oxford, 1899, vol. i, pp. 335 ff.