Dactylic hexameter (also known as "heroic hexameter") is a form of meter in poet

ry or a rhythmic scheme. It is traditionally associated with the quantitative me

ter of classical epic poetry in both Greek and Latin, and was consequently consi
dered to be the Grand Style of classical poetry. The premier examples of its use
are Homer's Iliad and Odyssey and Virgil's Aeneid.
Contents show
Structure
A dactyl is like a finger, having one long syllable followed by two short syllab
les.
The meter consists of lines made from six ("hex") feet. In strict dactylic hexam
eter, each of these feet would be a dactyl, but classical meter allows for the s
ubstitution of a spondee in place of a dactyl in most positions. Specifically, t
he first four feet can either be dactyls or spondees more or less freely. The fi
fth foot is frequently a dactyl (around 95% of the time in Homer).
Because of the anceps, the sixth foot can be filled by either a trochee or a spo
ndee. However, because of the strong pause at the end of the line (which prevent
s elision and correption between lines in the dactylic hexameter), it is traditi
onally regarded as a spondee. Thus the dactylic line most normally looks as foll
ows:
U | U | U | U | u u | X
(note that is a long syllable, u a short syllable and U either one long or two s
horts and X anceps syllable)
As in all classical verse forms, the phenomenon of brevis in longo is observed,
so the last syllable can actually be short or long.
Hexameters also have a primary caesura a break in sense, much like the function
of a comma in prose at one of several normal positions: After the first syllable
in the third foot (the "masculine" caesura); after the second syllable in the t
hird foot if the third foot is a dactyl (the "feminine" caesura); after the firs
t syllable of the fourth foot; or after the first syllable of the second foot (t
he latter two often occur together in a line, breaking it into three separate un
its). The first possible caesura that one encounters in a line is considered the
main caesura. A masculine caesura can offset a hiatus, causing lengthening of a
n otherwise light syllable.
In addition, hexameters have two bridges, places where there very rarely is a br
eak in a word-unit. The first, known as Meyer's Bridge, is in the second foot: i
f the second foot is a dactyl, the two short syllables generally will be part of
the same word-unit. The second, known as Hermann's Bridge, is the same rule in
the fourth foot: if the fourth foot is a dactyl, the two short syllables general
ly will be part of the same word-unit.
It must be stressed that Meyer's and Hermann's Bridge concern only Homeric verse
and are not observed in Latin dactylic hexameter. Even in Homer, these bridges
are not prescriptive. The first line of the Iliad violates Meyer's Bridge (?????
?e?de ?e? ??????de? ???????) since there is a word break between ?e?de and ?e?.
Hexameters are frequently enjambed, which helps to create the long, flowing narr
ative of epic. They are generally considered the most grandiose and formal meter
.
An English language example of the dactylic hexameter, in quantitative meter:
Down in a | deep dark | dell sat an | old cow| munching a | bean stalk
As the absurd meaning of this example demonstrates, quantitative meter is extrem
ely difficult to construct in English. Here is an example in normal stress meter
(the first line of Longfellow's "Evangeline"):
This is the | forest pri | meval. The | murmuring | pines and the | hemlocks
The "foot" is often compared to a musical measure and the long and short syllabl
es to half notes (minims) and quarter notes (crotchets), respectively.
Homers meter
The hexameter was first used by early Greek poets of the oral tradition, and the
most complete extant examples of their works are the Iliad and the Odyssey, whi
ch influenced the authors of all later classical epics that survive today. Early
epic poetry was also accompanied by music, and pitch changes associated with th
e accented Greek must have highlighted the melody, though the exact mechanism is
still a topic of discussion.1
The Homeric poems arrange words in the line so that there is an interplay betwee
n the metrical ictusthe first long syllable of each footand the natural, spoken ac
cent of words. If these two features of the language coincide too frequently, th
ey overemphasize each other and the hexameter becomes sing-songy. Nevertheless,
some reinforcement is desirable so that the poem has a natural rhythm. Balancing
these two considerations is what eventually leads to rules regarding the correc
t placement of the caesura and breaks between words; in general, word breaks occ
ur in the middle of metrical feet, while accent and ictus coincide only near the
end of the line.
The first line of Homers IliadSing, goddess, the anger of Peleus son Achillesprovides
an example:
???? ?e?de, ?e?, ??????de? ???????
Dividing the line into metrical units:
???? ? | e?de, ?e | ?, ?? | ???? | de? ??? | ???? dactyl, dactyl, spondee, dactyl
, dactyl, trochee.
Note how the word endings do not coincide with the end of a metrical foot; for t
he early part of the line this forces the natural accent of each word to lie in
the middle of a foot, playing against the natural rhythm of the ictus.
This line also includes a masculine caesura after ?e?, a natural break that sepa
rates the line into two logical parts. Unlike later writers, Homeric lines more
commonly employ the feminine caesura; an example occurs in Iliad I.5 ...and every
bird; thus the plan of Zeus came to fulfillment:
??????s? te p?s?, ???? d ?te?e?et? ????,
??? | ???s? te | p?s?, ?? | ?? d ?te | ?e?et? | ????,
Homers hexameters contain a far higher proportion of dactyls than later hexameter
poetry. They are also characterised by a laxer following of verse principles th
at the authors of later epics almost invariably adhered to. For example, Homer a
llows spondaic fifth feet (albeit not often), whereas many later authors virtual
ly never did. There are also exceptions to Meyers Bridge and Hermanns Bridge in Ho
mer (albeit rare), but such violations are exceedingly rare in a later author li
ke Callimachus.
Homer also altered the forms of words to allow them to fit the hexameter, typica
lly by using a dialectal form: ptolis is an epic form used instead of the Attic
polis wherever it is necessary for the meter. On occasion, the names of characte
rs themselves actually seem to have been altered: the spelling of the name of Ho
mers character Polydamas, Pouludamas, appears to be an alternative rendering of t
he metrically unviable Poludamas (subduer of many).
Finally, even after accepting the various alterations admitted by Homer, some li
nes remain impossible to scan as they stand now, e.g. Iliad I.108 not a good word
spoken nor brought to pass:
?s???? d ??t? t? p? e?pa? ?p?? ??t ?t??essa?
The first three feet of this line scan spondee-dactyl-spondee, but the fourth fo
ot of -pa? ?p?? has three consecutive short syllables. These metrical inconsiste
ncies (along with a knowledge of comparative linguistics) have led scholars to i
nfer the presence of a lost digamma consonant in an old form of that line. In th
is example, the word ?p?? was originally ??p?? in Ionian; this consonant lengthe
ns the last syllable of the preceding e?pa? and corrects the apparent defect in
the meter. This example demonstrates the oral tradition of the Homeric epics tha
t flourished long before they were written down sometime in the 7th century BC.
In spite of the occasional exceptions in early epic, most of the later rules of
hexameter composition have their origins in the methods and practices of Homer.
Latin hexameter
The hexameter came into Latin as an adaptation from Greek long after the practic
e of singing the epics had faded. Consequentially, the properties of the meter w
ere learned as specific "rules" rather than as a natural result of musical expre
ssion. Also, because the Latin language generally has a higher percentage of lon
g syllables than Greek, it is by nature more spondaic than Greek. These factors
caused the Latin hexameter to take on distinct Latin characteristics.
The earliest example of the use of hexameter in Latin poetry is that of the Anna
les of Ennius, which established the dactylic hexameter as the standard for late
r Latin epic. Later Republican writers, such as Lucretius, Catullus and even Cic
ero, wrote their own compositions in the meter and it was at this time that many
of the principles of Latin hexameter were firmly established, ones that would g
overn later writers such as Virgil, Ovid, Lucan, and Juvenal. Virgil's opening l
ine for the Aeneid is a classic example of Latin hexameter:
Arma virumque cano, Troiae qui primus ab oris (dactyl, dactyl, spondee, spondee,
dactyl, spondee)
As in Greek, lines were arranged such that the metrically long syllablesthose occ
urring at the beginning of a footavoided the natural stress of a word. In the fir
st few feet of the meter, meter and stress were expected to clash, while in the
final few feet they were expected to resolve and coincidean effect that gives eac
h line a natural "dum-ditty-dum-dum" ("shave and a haircut") rhythm to close. Su
ch an arrangement is a balance between an exaggerated emphasis on the metrewhich
would cause the verse to be sing-songyand the need to provide some repeated rhyth
mic guide for skilled recitation.
In the following example of Ennius's early Latin hexameter composition, metrical
weight ("ictus") falls on the first and last syllables of certabant; the ictus
is therefore opposed to the natural stress on the second syllable when the word
is pronounced. Similarly, the second syllable of the words urbem and Romam carry
the metrical ictus even though the first is naturally stressed in typical pronu
nciation. In the closing feet of the line, the natural stress that falls on the
third syllable of Remoramne and the second syllable of vocarent coincide with th
e metrical ictus and produce the characteristic "shave and a haircut" ending:
certabant urbem Romam Remoramne vocarent.
(Annales 1.86)
Like their Greek predecessors, classical Latin poets avoided a large number of w
ord breaks at the ends of foot divisions except between the fourth and fifth, wh
ere it was encouraged. In order to preserve the rhythmic close, Latin poets avoi
ded the placement of a single syllable or four-syllable word at the end of a lin
e. The caesura is also handled far more strictly, with Homer's feminine caesura
becoming exceedingly rare, and the second-foot caesura always paired with one in
the fourth.
One example of the evolution of the Latin verse form can be seen in a comparativ
e analysis of the use of spondees in Ennius' time vs. the Augustan age. The repe
ated use of the heavily spondaic line came to be frowned upon, as well as the us
e of a high proportion of spondees in both of the first two feet. The following
lines of Ennius would not have been felt admissible by later authors since they
both contain repeated spondees at the beginning of consecutive lines:
his verbis: "o gnata, tibi sunt ante ferendae
Aerumnae, post ex fluvio fortuna resistet."
(Annales 1.42f)
However, it is from Vergil that the following famous, heavily spondaic line come
s:
Monstr' horrend' inform' ingens, cui lumen ademptum.
(Aeneid III 658)
Virgil and the Augustan poets
By the age of Augustus, poets like Virgil closely followed the rules of the mete
r and approached it in a highly rhetorical way, looking for effects that can be
exploited in skilled recitation. For example, the following line from the Aeneid
(VIII.596) describes the movement of rushing horses and how "a hoof shakes the
crumbling field with a galloping sound":
quadrupedante putrem sonitu quatit ungula campum
This line is made up of five dactyls and a closing spondee, an unusual rhythmic
arrangement that imitates the described action. A similar effect is found in VII
I.452, where Virgil describes how the blacksmith sons of Vulcan "take up their a
rms with great strength one to another" in forging Aeneas' shield:
illi inter sese multa ui bracchia tollunt
The line consists of all spondees except for the usual dactyl in the fifth foot,
and is meant to mimic the pounding sound of the work. A third example that mixe
s the two effects comes from I.42, where Juno pouts that Athena was allowed to u
se Jove's thunderbolts to destroy Ajax ("she hurled Jove's quick fire from the c
louds"):
Ipsa Jovis rapidum jaculata e nubibus ignem
This line is nearly all dactyls except for the spondee at -lata e. This change i
n rhythm paired with the harsh elision is intended to emphasize the crash of Ath
ena's thunderbolt.
Virgil will occasionally deviate from the strict rules of the meter to produce a
special effect. One example from I.105 describing a ship at sea during a storm
has Virgil violating metrical standards to place a single-syllable word at the e
nd of the line:
...et undis
dat latus; insequitur cumulo praeruptus aquae mons.
The boat "gives its side to the waves; there comes next in a heap a steep mounta
in of water." By placing the monosyllable mons at the end of the line, Virgil in
terrupts the usual "shave and a haircut" pattern to produce a jarring rhythm, an
effect that echoes the crash of a large wave against the side of a ship.
One final, amusing example that comments on the importance Roman poets placed on
their verse rules comes from the Ars Poetica of Horace, line 263:
Non quivis videt inmodulata poemata iudex,
The line, which lacks a proper caesura, is translated "Not every critic sees an
inharmonious verse."
Silver Age and later heroic verse
The verse innovations of the Augustan writers were carefully imitated by their s
uccessors in the Silver Age of Latin Literature. The verse form itself then was
little changed, as the quality of a poet's hexameter was judged against the stan
dard set by Virgil and the other Augustan poets, a respect for literary preceden
t encompassed by the Latin word aemulatio.2 Deviations were generally regarded a
s idiosyncrasies or hallmarks of personal style, and were not imitated by later
poets. Juvenal, for example, was fond of occasionally creating verses that place
d a sense break between the fourth and fifth foot (instead of in the usual caesu
ra positions), but this techniqueknown as the bucolic diaeresisdid not catch on wi
th other poets.
In the late empire, writers experimented again by adding unusual restrictions to
the standard hexameter. The rhopalic verse of Ausonius is a good example; besid
es following the standard hexameter pattern, each word in the line is one syllab
le longer than the previous, e.g.:
Spes, deus, aeternae stationis conciliator,
si castis precibus veniales invigilamus,
his, pater, oratis placabilis adstipulare.
Also notable is the tendency among late grammarians to thoroughly dissect the he
xameters of Virgil and earlier poets. A treatise on poetry by Diomedes Grammatic
us is a good example, as this work (among other things) categorizes dactylic hex
ameter verses in ways that were later interpreted under the golden line rubric.
Independently, these two trends show the form becoming highly artificialmore like
a puzzle to solve than a medium for personal poetic expression.
By the Middle Ages, some writers adopted more relaxed versions of the meter. Ber
nard of Cluny, for example, employs it in his De Contemptu Mundi, but ignores cl
assical conventions in favor of accentual effects and predictable rhyme both wit
hin and between verses, e.g.:
Hora novissima, tempora pessima sunt vigilemus.
Ecce minaciter imminet arbiter ille supremus.
Imminet imminet ut mala terminet, qua coronet,
Recta remuneret, anxia liberet, thera donet.
(I.1-4: These are the last days, the worst of times: let us keep watch. Behold t
he menacing arrival of the supreme Judge. He is coming, he is coming to end evil
, crown the just, reward the right, set the worried free, and give the skies.)
Not all Medieval writers are so at odds with the Virgilian standard, and with th
e rediscovery of classical literature, later Medieval and Renaissance writers ar
e far more orthodox, but by then the form had become an academic exercise. Petra
rch, for example, devoted much time to his Africa, a dactylic hexameter epic on
Scipio Africanus, but this work was unappreciated in his time and remains little
read today. In contrast, Dante decided to write his epic, the Divine Comedy in
Italiana choice that defied the traditional epic choice of Latin dactylic hexamet
ersand produced a masterpiece beloved both then and now.citation needed
With the New Latin period, the language itself came to be regarded as a medium o
nly for "serious" and learned expression, a view that left little room for Latin
poetry. The emergence of Recent Latin in the 20th century restored classical or
thodoxy among Latinists and sparked a general (if still academic) interest in th
e beauty of Latin poetry. Today, the modern Latin poets who use the dactylic hex
ameter are generally as faithful to Virgil as Rome's Silver Age poets.
Notes