Dactylic Hexameter

Dactyl: long syllable, two short syllables vertice

Hexameter Six measures In this case, six feet For instance:

Spondees! Despite the name, any dactyl can be replaced by a spondee

Endings The last foot is never a dactyl The fifth foot is rarely a spondee So almost all lines end like this: Tum tiddy tum tum!

Anceps / Brevis in Longo We give the name Anceps to any position in a line of verse that can have a long or short syllable The last syllable of the hexameter is Anceps – it can be short or long It's often marked like this: Note: when short, this syllable is also called brevis in longo – a short in place of a long. The theory is that the end of the line acts like a final consonant and lengthens the syllable by position...

Notation We can diagram the full range of possibilities for the hexameter like this:

Practice Without further ado, lets practice a few lines: mille domos adiere locum requiemque petentes

mille domos adiere locum requiemque petentes

First syllable is long (has to be in dactylic hexameter – you can rely on this!!! Next two are short – dactyl complete! mille domos adiere locum requiemque petentes

2nd declension plural accusative ending -os is long And the first syllable of the foot has to be long anyway Looks like another dactyl to me... mille domos adiere locum requiemque petentes

That first e in adiere is long because it's the alternate form of the 3rd person plural perfect, adierunt mille domos adiere locum requiemque petentes

-cum is long because it's followed by two consonants Note that qu- in requiem acts like a single consonant mille domos adiere locum requiemque petentes

-em in requiemque is long by position, since it's followed by -mq- mille domos adiere locum requiemque petentes

So it's all dactyls apart from the last, which can't be a dactyl. mille domos adiere locum requiemque petentes

Another one: illa sunt annis iuncti iuvenalibus, illa

illa sunt annis iuncti iuvenalibus, illa

illa sunt annis iuncti iuvenalibus, illa Ablative singular, 1st declension ends with long ā illa sunt annis iuncti iuvenalibus, illa

An important tip illa sunt ... Let's say we aren't sure that illa is meant to be ablative – maybe it's nominative In that case, it would be short a. But that would leave us with this pattern: That pattern (it's called a cretic) never occurs in dactylic hexameter So if the syllables on either side are long, this one must be too! And so it must be ablative – by reading for meter, we just figured out the grammar. illa sunt ...

illa sunt annis iuncti iuvenalibus, illa Both long by position (vowels followed by more than one consonant) illa sunt annis iuncti iuvenalibus, illa

illa sunt annis iuncti iuvenalibus, illa Ablative plural first and second declension end with long īs The u in iuncti is long by position illa sunt annis iuncti iuvenalibus, illa

illa sunt annis iuncti iuvenalibus, illa The I that starts iuvenalibus is a consonant here illa sunt annis iuncti iuvenalibus, illa

illa sunt annis iuncti iuvenalibus, illa If you didn't know before that the a in iuvenalibus is long, you'd know now, since you need it to start your foot! illa sunt annis iuncti iuvenalibus, illa

illa sunt annis iuncti iuvenalibus, illa So, more spondees in this one illa sunt annis iuncti iuvenalibus, illa

Caesura One final thing to learn In most latin meters, the lines are put together from two half-lines Some people call those part-lines cola Where the parts join, there's usually a natural break in sense At the very least, it's a break between words We call that the caesura, and we mark it like so:

Note: for some, the caesura marks a point in the line where someone reading the poem out loud would pause for breath This doesn't seem to make much sense when we find poets eliding syllables before the caesura So just think of it as the point where the line has been glued together from its components

Position In dactylic hexameter, the caesura most often occurs after the first syllable of the third foot It's quite common after the first syllable of the fourth foot Occasionally it occurs between the two short syllables of a dactyl in those feet (sometimes called a “weak” caesura). That's really rare in the fourth foot.

Updated Notation

Our first example We don't want to break up “locum requiemque” since that's a pair So the caesura makes most sense after adiere – a so-called weak caesura mille domos adiere locum requiemque petentes mille domos adiere locum requiemque petentes mille domos adiere locum requiemque petentes

illa sunt annis iuncti iuvenalibus, illa This one's debatable (the position of the caesura often is) It would work well in the middle of the fourth foot too illa sunt annis iuncti iuvenalibus, illa