A
lyric metre named after the
Greek poet
Asclepiades. It was not as common as the free use of the two
Asclepiad one line metres, but was still used regularly by
Horace and other
Roman and
Hellenistic poets.
The metre is made up of two pairs of intermittant Glyconic verse and short Asclepiad verses in the following scheme:
---^^-^-
---^^-//-^^-^-
---^^-^-
---^^-//-^^-^-
(Each of the last syllables can be replaced by short ones)
Example (in Latin):
- - - ^ ^ - ^ -
sed cur heu, Ligurine, cur
- - - ^ ^- // - ^ ^ - ^ -
manat rara meas // lacrima per genas?
- - - ^ ^ - ^ -
cur facunda parum decor(o)
- - - ^ ^ - // - ^ ^ - ^-
inter verba cadit // lingua silentio?
(Hor. Od. IV, I, 33-36)
* - long or stressed syllable; ^ short or unstressed syllable; // diaeresis.