An adonic (
Latin
Latin ( or ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally spoken by the Latins (Italic tribe), Latins in Latium (now known as Lazio), the lower Tiber area aroun ...
: ''adoneus'') is a unit of
Aeolic verse
Aeolic verse is a classification of Greek lyric, Ancient Greek lyric poetry referring to the distinct verse forms characteristic of the two great poets of Archaic Greece, Archaic Lesbos, Sappho and Alcaeus of Mytilene, Alcaeus, who composed in the ...
, a five-syllable
metrical foot
The foot is the basic repeating rhythmic unit that forms part of a line of verse in most Indo-European traditions of poetry, including English accentual-syllabic verse and the quantitative meter of classical ancient Greek and Latin poetry. ...
consisting of a
dactyl followed by a
trochee
In poetic metre, a trochee ( ) is a metrical foot consisting of a stressed syllable followed by an unstressed syllable, unstressed one, in qualitative meter, as found in English, and in modern linguistics; or in quantitative meter, as found in ...
.
[
] The last line of a
Sapphic stanza
The Sapphic stanza, named after the Ancient Greek poet Sappho, is an Aeolic verse form of Quatrain, four lines. Originally composed in quantitative verse and unrhymed, imitations of the form since the Middle Ages typically feature rhyme and accen ...
is an adonic. The pattern (where "-" stands for a long and "u" for a short syllable) is: "- u u - -" when the pattern ends with a
spondee
A spondee (Latin: ) is a metrical foot consisting of two long syllables, as determined by syllable weight in classical meters, or two stressed syllables in modern meters. The word comes from the Greek , , 'libation'.
Spondees in Ancient Gree ...
(i.e. --) or " -uu -u " if a trochee is intended.
Hexameter lines often end in an adonic.
References
External links
Say Something Wonderful: Spot the Adonic
Types of verses
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