Prosody Glossary: Latin Grammar

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Prosody Glossary

A&G §642–640|6 rules|0 practice questions

When you start scanning Latin verse, you hit a wall of jargon — dactyl, spondee, caesura, elision, ictus, synizesis — and most of it is Greek shorthand for things Roman poets did automatically. This page is the lookup, not the lesson.

Use it as a reference while you read: the line Arma virumque canō, Trōiae quī prīmus ab ōrīs (Vergil, Aen. i. 1) is a hexameter of six feet, each a dactyl (— ⏑ ⏑) or a spondee (— —), with a caesura sitting somewhere in the middle of the third or fourth foot.

Every term in that sentence has a one-line entry below. Click through to the full Meter & Versification topics when you want the teaching.

Prosody & Meter Terms — Quick Reference

dactyl (— ⏑ ⏑)

arma vi- — heavy + light + light, the spine of epic

critical

spondee (— —)

Trōiae — two heavies, slows the line down

critical

trochee (— ⏑) and iamb (⏑ —)

falling (— ⏑) vs. rising (⏑ —) two-syllable feet

critical

hexameter

six feet of dactyls/spondees — the meter of the Aeneid

critical

pentameter

five-foot line; pairs with hexameter to form the elegiac couplet (Ovid)

important

caesura

word-end inside a foot — the natural pause mid-line

critical

diaeresis

word-end at a foot boundary — pause between feet

important

elision

monstr(um) horrendum — final vowel dropped before initial vowel

critical

ecthlipsis

the same as elision when the dropped syllable ends in -m

important

hiatus

two vowels meet across a word break and DON'T elide — rare, marked

common

ictus

the metrical beat — the stress that falls on the heavy syllable of each foot

critical

scansion

marking up a line as — ⏑ ⏑ | — — | — ‖ ⏑ ⏑ | — — | — ⏑ ⏑ | — —

critical

resolution / contraction

two shorts → one long, or one long → two shorts; lets poets substitute

important

synaeresis / synizesis

two adjacent vowels run together as one syllable — deinde scanned as 2 syllables

common

anacrusis

an unstressed syllable or two before the regular meter starts

common

arsis / thesis

the unaccented vs. accented part of a foot — the 'lift' and the 'down'

common

See It In Action

Arma virumque canō, Trōiae quī prīmus ab ōrīs

Arms and the man I sing, who first from the shores of Troy

— Verg. Aen. i. 1

Six feet, mostly dactyls and spondees — the canonical hexameter pattern. The pause after quī is the caesura; the line ends, as every hexameter must, with — ⏑ ⏑ — — (dactyl + spondee).

monstrum horrendum, informe, ingens

a monster horrible, shapeless, vast

— Verg. Aen. iii. 658

Three elisions in one half-line — read aloud, you barely hear horrend(um), inform(e), just the next vowel taking over. Ecthlipsis is the same thing when the dropped final ends in -m.

Caesura vs. Diaeresis

Both name a word-break inside a line of verse, but they sit in different places relative to the foot.

Caesura

word-end INSIDE a foot

arma virumque ‖ canō

pause cuts the third foot

Diaeresis

word-end matches a foot boundary

...|...|...|‖|...|...

pause sits between feet

Tip: Ask: does the word end IN THE MIDDLE of a foot (caesura) or AT THE EDGE of a foot (diaeresis)?

Quick Check

In the line Arma virumque canō, Trōiae quī prīmus ab ōrīs, the phrase quī prīmus sits where one word ends inside the third foot. What is that pause called?

Study Tips

•Start with the four foot shapes — dactyl (— ⏑ ⏑), spondee (— —), trochee (— ⏑), iamb (⏑ —). Almost every meter you'll meet in AP Latin is built from these.
•When a line of Vergil sounds short by a syllable, look for elision — a final vowel (or vowel + m) gets eaten by the next word's opening vowel.
•Don't memorize this whole list. Bookmark it and look terms up the first three or four times you see them — they stick fast once you've scanned a dozen lines.

See It In Action

Arma virumque canō, Trōiae quī prīmus ab ōrīs

Arms and the man I sing, who first from the shores of Troy

— Verg. Aen. i. 1

monstrum horrendum, informe, ingens

a monster horrible, shapeless, vast

— Verg. Aen. iii. 658

Three elisions in one half-line — read aloud, you barely hear horrend(um), inform(e), just the next vowel taking over. Ecthlipsis is the same thing when the dropped final ends in -m.

Study Tips

•Start with the four foot shapes — dactyl (— ⏑ ⏑), spondee (— —), trochee (— ⏑), iamb (⏑ —). Almost every meter you'll meet in AP Latin is built from these.

•When a line of Vergil sounds short by a syllable, look for elision — a final vowel (or vowel + m) gets eaten by the next word's opening vowel.

•Don't memorize this whole list. Bookmark it and look terms up the first three or four times you see them — they stick fast once you've scanned a dozen lines.