One of the four most important Classic
lyric one line
metres (the others being the
asclepiad metres, the
glyconic metre and the
pherecratic metre). While the
dactylic poetry (
epic,
boucolic etc.) and the
iambic and
trochaic poetry (
dramatic etc.) use feet arranged by certain orders and quantities, the lyric metres pertain to complete lines. A stanza doesn't need to be constituted of a single metric element (except for the
Alcaic and the
Sapphic Stanzas), but could interchange them and even occasionally add "feet-metre" lines and couplets (particularly the '
Elegiac Couplet'). The normal
lyric stanza has four lines.
The hendecasyllabic metre was Catullus' favourite line. It consists (as the name suggests) of eleven syllable in this pattern:
- - - ^ ^ : - ^ - ^ - -
* - long or stressed syllable; ^ short or unstressed syllable; :
caesura
Either the first or the second syllable may be occasionally short, and the caesura sometimes may change its place.
Example (in Latin):
- - - ^^ - ^ : - ^ - -
vivamus, mea Lesbi(a), atqu(e) amemus
(Catullus 5, 1)