The octosyllable or octosyllabic verse is a
line of verse with eight
syllable
A syllable is a basic unit of organization within a sequence of speech sounds, such as within a word, typically defined by linguists as a ''nucleus'' (most often a vowel) with optional sounds before or after that nucleus (''margins'', which are ...
s. It is equivalent to
tetrameter verse in
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 ...
s in languages with a
stress accent. Its first occurrence is in a 10th-century Old French saint's legend, the ''
Vie de Saint Leger'';
another early use is in the early 12th-century Anglo-Norman ''
Voyage de saint Brendan''.
It is often used in
French,
Italian,
Spanish and
Portuguese poetry. While commonly used in
couplets, typical
stanzas using octosyllables are:
décima, some
quatrains,
redondilla.
In Spanish verse, an octosyllable is a line that has its seventh syllable stressed, on the principle that this would normally be the penultimate syllable of a word (''Lengua Castellana y Literatura'', ed. Grazalema Santillana. El Verso y su Medida, p. 46). If the final word of a line does not fit this pattern, the line could have eight or seven or nine syllables (as normally counted), thus –
:1 / 2 / 3 / 4 / 5 / Gra/NA/da
:1 / 2 / 3 / 4 / 5 / Ma/DRID
:1 / 2 / 3 / 4 / 5 / 6 / MA/(la)/ga
In
Medieval French literature
In the history of Europe, the Middle Ages or medieval period lasted approximately from the 5th to the late 15th centuries, similarly to the post-classical period of World history (field), global history. It began with the fall of the West ...
, the octosyllable
rhyme
A rhyme is a repetition of similar sounds (usually the exact same phonemes) in the final Stress (linguistics), stressed syllables and any following syllables of two or more words. Most often, this kind of rhyming (''perfect rhyming'') is consciou ...
d
couplet was the most common verse form used in verse
chronicle
A chronicle (, from Greek ''chroniká'', from , ''chrónos'' – "time") is a historical account of events arranged in chronological order, as in a timeline. Typically, equal weight is given for historically important events and local events ...
s,
romances (the ''romans''), ''
lais'' and ''dits''. The meter reached Spain in the 14th century, although commonly with a more varied rhyme scheme than the couplet. The Anglo-Norman poets from the 12th-13th centuries brought the French octosyllablic verse to England and influenced the 4 stress tetrameter verse used in narration (as in
Chaucer).
See also
*
meter (poetry)
In poetry, metre ( Commonwealth spelling) or meter ( American spelling; see spelling differences) is the basic rhythmic structure of a verse or lines in verse. Many traditional verse forms prescribe a specific verse metre, or a certain set ...
*
hexasyllable – 6 syllable line
*
decasyllable – 10 syllable line
*
hendecasyllable – 11 syllable line
*
dodecasyllable – 12 syllable line
References
Types of verses
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