Old English metre is the conventional name given to the poetic metre in which English language poetry was composed in the Anglo-Saxon period. The best-known example of poetry composed in this verse form is Beowulf, but the vast majority of Old English poetry belongs to the same tradition. The most salient feature of Old English poetry is its heavy use of alliteration.
The most widely used system for classifying Old English prosodic patterns is based on that developed by Eduard Sievers and extended by Alan Joseph Bliss.[1][2][3] The discussion which follows is mostly based on that system, with modifications from the more recent literature. Another popular system is that of Geoffrey Russom, which is predicated on a theory of meter involving two metrical feet per verse.[4][5][6] Another is that of Thomas Cable, based on the idea that each verse contains four syllables, with specific rules for the addition of extra unstressed syllables.[7][8][9]
^Sammlung kurzer Grammatiken germanischer Dialekte. Reihe B: Ergänzungsreihe. Berlin, New York: DE GRUYTER.
^Griffith, Mark (2022-09-30), "Appendix 2.", Tradition and Innovation in Old English Metre, Arc Humanities Press, pp. 251–256, ISBN 978-1-80270-025-1, retrieved 2023-11-30
^Terasawa, Jun (2011). Old English metre: an introduction. Toronto Anglo-Saxon series. Toronto: University of Toronto Press. ISBN 978-1-4426-4238-6.
^Russom, Geoffrey (1987). Old English Meter and Linguistic Theory. Cambridge University Press.
^Russom, Geoffrey (1998). Beowulf and Old Germanic Metre. Cambridge Studies in Anglo-Saxon England, 23. Cambridge University Press.
^Bredehoft, Thomas A. (2005). Early English Metre. University of Toronto Press.
^Cable, Thomas (1991). The English Alliterative Tradition. University of Pennsylvania Press. ISBN 978-1-5128-0385-3.
^Hall, Alaric. "A beginner's guide (hopefully) to Old English metre (version 1.5, September 26th 2016" (PDF).
^Cornelius, Ian; Weiskott, Eric (2021). "The intricacies of counting to four in Old English poetry". Language and Literature: International Journal of Stylistics. 30 (3): 249–275. doi:10.1177/09639470211012297. ISSN 0963-9470.
OldEnglishmetre is the conventional name given to the poetic metre in which English language poetry was composed in the Anglo-Saxon period. The best-known...
of another world, an "unrecapturable magic". The essay describes OldEnglishmetre, with each line in two opposed halves. The stressed syllables in each...
OldEnglishMetre: An Introduction. Toronto: University of Toronto Press. ISBN 978-1442611290. Bostock, J. K. (1976). "Appendix on Old Saxon and Old High...
The metre (or meter in US spelling; symbol: m) is the base unit of length in the International System of Units (SI). Since 2019, the metre has been defined...
Terasawa, Jun (2011). OldEnglishMetre: An Introduction, p.45. University of Toronto. ISBN 9781442642386. McCully, C. B. (1996). English Historical Metrics...
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manuscripts of the OldEnglish translation renders the poems as OldEnglish alliterative verse: these verse translations are known as the Metres of Boethius...
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customary unit of distance; both are based on the olderEnglish unit of length equal to 5,280 English feet, or 1,760 yards. The statute mile was standardised...
features of OldEnglish phonology; see Phonological history of OldEnglish § Palatalization and Germanic umlaut § I-mutation in OldEnglish for more information...
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instead of K, and this influence carried over into OldEnglish. The letter usually represents /k/ in English. It is silent when it comes before ⟨n⟩ at the...
usually pronounced the same in speech). metre or meter: in British English there is a distinction between metre as a unit of length (which is also the...
The history of the metre starts with the Scientific Revolution that is considered to have begun with Nicolaus Copernicus's publication of De revolutionibus...
particular metrical forms are common in English, why certain variations interrupt the metre and others do not, or why metre functions so powerfully as a literary...