Old English Metrical History and the Composition of Widsið (original) (raw)
Related papers
A unified account of the Old English metrical line
A unified account of the Old English metrical line, 2017
Old English poems are all written in the same style and all share common features regarding alliteration and metrical prominence. However, within poems, lines differ from each other in length considerably, as do the positions of metrically prominent syllables. This thesis provides an analysis which allows all Old English verse lines to be described according to a single model which addresses all the variation in the sizes of lines and verse feet. This model is defended with statistical evidence from a large corpus of Old English verse, and based on an analysis consistent with contemporary phonological theory. To complement the main study, findings regarding the metrical status of compound numbers, derivational nouns and non-Germanic names are presented using a combination of phonological and philological methods. A statistical comparative study is added to show that this analysis applies to all Old English verse, but not to the closely related Old Norse or Old Saxon verse traditions.
On The Diachronic Analysis of Old English Metre
International Journal of Language & Linguistics, 2018
The article is devoted to the diachronic analysis of Old English metre, based on the study of changes in the metrical structure of lines, modification of laws governing the placement of a caesura and the sound structure of alliteration, as well as transformations of the phonetic organisation of verse (the loss of certain types of sound devices, the appearance and spreading of others). As is shown in the article, the most important criteria for the diachronic analysis of Old English metre appear to be deviations from the canons governing the quantitative structure of alliteration (alliteration including palatal [g'] and velar [g]; alliteration of voiceless consonants [hl-, hn-, hr-, hw-]; alliteration of consonant clusters [st, sp-, sl-, sn-, sw-]) as well as the use of double alliteration, studied with special reference to skaldic runhent. The main focus of the article is on the study of the sound organisation of half-and long lines. In nearly a third of the extant lines of Old English poetry, alliteration is enriched by additional sound devices, whose structure and function appear to be crucial for the diachronic study of Old English metre. In discussion of these in Old English verse not only full repetitions of vowels and consonants of root morphemes are considered, but also consonances, as these were canonised in other Germanic poetic traditions (i.e. Old Norse), preserving the skaldic system of internal rhyme (skothendingarconsonances used in odd lines, and aðalhendingarfull rhymes used in even lines). The distribution of full rhymes and consonances involving root morphemes is analysed in opposition to the sound repetitions of inflectional and suffixational morphemes. Inflectional rhymes resulting from rhythmic-syntactic parallelisms are taken into account, if they occur in isosyllabic units constituting rhythmic groups and in the same function as the rhymes of root morphemes. The function of consonances and full rhymes is studied not only in the units of poetic speech, such as compound words, lexical repetitions, repetitions of genetically related words and formulas, but also in the metrical units of verse. The change in the distribution of different types of full rhymes and consonances within half-lines and long lines can be accounted for by the changes taking place in the metrical organisation of alliterative verse.
Metrical positions and their linguistic realisations in Old Germanic metres: a typological overview
Studia Metrica et Poetica 1, 9–38, 2014
This paper provides a typological account of Old Germanic metre by investigating its parametric variations that largely determine the metrical identities of the Old English Beowulf, the Old Saxon Heliand, and Old Norse eddic poetry (composed in fornyrðislag, málaháttr, or ljóðaháttr). The primary parameters to be explored here are the principle of four metrical positions per verse and the differing ways in which these constituent positions are aligned to linguistic material. On the one hand, the four-position principle works with a maximal strictness in Beowulf, and to a slightly lesser extent in fornyrðislag, whereas it allows for a wider range of deviations in verse size in the Heliand and ljóðaháttr. In málaháttr, however, the principle in itself gives way to the five-position counterpart. On the other hand, the variation in the metricallinguistic alignment in the three close cognate metres may be generalised by positing the common scale, Heliand > Beowulf > fornyrðislag, for the decreasing likelihood of resolution, the increasing likelihood of suspending resolution, and the decreasing size of the drop.
The Medieval Review 11 June, 2021
Old English meter is a richly enigmatic research topic. There is a usual form, with four metrical positions per verse supporting a range of accentual contours, which are schematized as five "types" (G Typen) in the influential theory of Eduard Sievers. Then there are eccentricities whose raison d'être has not been adequately explained. Chief among these is so-called hypermetric verse (G Schwellvers), verses of five positions or more that tend to cluster in passages of
The Evolution of Verse Structure in Old and Middle English Poetry
The Evolution of Verse Structure in Old and Middle English Poetry
This chapter surveys predictable developments in alliterative meter after Beowulf, which was probably composed around ad 700. 1 The most important evidence for these developments comes from The Battle of Maldon, a late Old English poem about one-tenth the size of Beowulf. Our language-based theory makes many predictions and testing them systematically can compensate for a smaller body of evidence. Suppose, for example, that the theory predicts an increase in frequency for a variant with an extrametrical word. If Beowulf provides one instance of the variant, one instance in Maldon will represent a tenfold increase in frequency. Since Maldon provides only one instance, however, the frequency rise might be due to chance. This kind of prediction has limited weight on its own, like the prediction that a flipped coin will land heads-up. Predicting that a coin will land heads-up nineteen times out of twenty is quite a different matter. 2 Making the correct prediction for a variety of cases can validate a theory even if each prediction has limited weight. An array of predictions is questionable if the researcher has ignored an important false prediction or has failed to make a prediction explicit enough for proper testing (has failed, in technical idiom, to make the prediction falsifiable). From a statistical point of view, however, what matters is the probability of chance occurrence for the whole array of successful predictions. Poetic universals provide additional help in dealing with a small corpus. The principle of closure makes it possible to deduce the complexity of a verse pattern from its placement within the line. The universal principle of "interest" provides help of a different kind. 3 We would expect Old English poets to use complex types at appropriate frequencies for metrical variety, with frequent return to the norm for metrical coherence. As Ruth Lehmann pointed out, the Beowulf poet does exactly that, pairing the optimal type A1 with a more complex verse pattern in a typical line. 4 For Late Old English Meter to Middle English Meter
Before Beowulf: On the proto-history of Old Germanic verse
Journal of the Australian Early Medieval …, 2007
It has long been held that the alliterating long line common to the earliest traditions of medieval Germanic literature is of ancient pedigree. Essential similarities in Old English, Old Norse and early German poetry are typically held up as evidence for a common Germanic use of an alliterating 4/4 metrical line in the earliest vernacular poetry of England, Scandinavia and Germany. The evidence of early Germanic verse afforded by runic inscriptions from late antiquity and the early medieval period, however, suggest a rather different picture - few examples of runic verse are reconcilable with long and widely held assumptions concerning the early medieval alliterating Germanic long lines. This paper summarises the metrical and stylistic evidence from these eary epigraphic testimonies and suggests a more nuanced and linguistically plausible scheme for the history of native English, continental and Scandinavian verse in the late proto-historical period.
Three-Position Verses and the Metrical Pratice of the Beowulf Poet
This article assesses the authenticity of the three-position SS verse type in Beowulf on the basis of its unambiguous incidence both in Beowulf and in a larger corpus of Old English poetry. The first part of this essay examines the metrical configuration of thirteen verses from Beowulf that have recently been identified as instances of the SS pattern. In doing so, it demonstrates that nearly all of them furnish a standard four-position metrical structure. The second part discusses the empirical obstacles to accepting the formal legitimacy of the three-position SS pattern in Old English verse, thereby reaffirming the validity of the stricture of traditional Sieversian metrics against verses consisting of less than four metrical positions.
Ælfric's Rhythmical Prose and the Study of Old English Metre
A decade ago, Thomas A. Bredehoft designed a new theory of Old English metre that classified Ælfric of Eynsham's rhythmical-alliterative texts as verse. The present article submits Bredehoft's metrical theory to critical scrutiny by means of three case studies. The first deals with Bredehoft's case for simplicity in metrical argumentation; the second assesses the theoretical validity of Bredehoft's exclusively syllabic substitute for the traditional four-position principle; and the third focuses on Bredehoft's metrical system for late Old English metre and its application to Ælfric's rhythmical-alliterative texts. These three case studies demonstrate that Bredehoft's theory is empirically insufficient, since it is unable to account for significant distributional patterns that occur in the surviving manuscripts. Bredehoft's claim about Ælfric's rhythmical texts is therefore devoid of meaning, since it is predicated on the untenable principles of his metrical theory. The essay concludes by characterizing Ælfric's rhythmical-alliterative style as a particular manner of prose composition informed by the didactic temper that obtained during Æthelred's reign.