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FROM   THE   LIBRARY  OF 

REV.   LOUIS    FITZGERALD    BENSON,  D.  D. 

BEQUEATHED   BY  HIM   TO 

THE   LIBRARY  OF 

PRINCETON  THEOLOGICAL  SEMINARY 


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STUDIES  IN  CLASSICAL  PHILOLOGY 


THE   STRESS   ACCENT  IN 
LATIN   POETRY 


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/ 


THE    STRESS    ACC 
IN    LATIN    POETF 


BY 


yy 


ELIZABETH   HICKMAN   DU   BOIS 


THE  COLUMBIA  UNIVERSITY   PRESS 

THE  MACMILLAN  COMPANY,  Agents 

LONDON:    MACMILLAN  &  CO.,  Ltd. 

1906 

All  rights  reserved 


Copyright,  1906, 
By  THE  MACMILLAN  COMPANY. 


Set  up  and  electrotyped.    Published  August,  1906. 


Norfoooti  ^rcss 

J.  S.  Cushing  &  Co.  —  Berwick  &  Smith  Co. 

Norwood,  Mass.,  U.S.A. 


PREFATORY  NOTE 

This  monograph  contains  a  condensed  and  care- 
ful summing  up  of  the  most  authoritative  evidence 
with  regard  to  a  stress  accent  in  Latin.  On  the 
basis  of  the  doctrine  here  set  forth,  Miss  du  Bois 
has  formulated  an  ingenious  and  very  plausible 
theory  of  the  Saturnian  Verse,  and  has  sought  to 
establish  an  explanation  of  the  purely  quantitative 
Latin  poetry  which  shall  reconcile  the  opposing 
views  as  to  an  apparent  clash  between  word  accent 
and  verse  accent.  I  regard  her  discussion  as  a 
valuable  contribution  to  the  literature  of  this 
highly  controversial  subject. 

HARRY   THURSTON   PECK. 

Columbia  University, 
July  i,  1906. 


THE   STRESS   ACCENT   IN 
LATIN    POETRY 


WORD   ACCENT 

Accent  is  the  prominence  of  one  syllable  of  a 
word  over  the  other  syllables.  It  is  the  essential 
part  of  a  word,1  its  cachet.  Because  the  Romance 
languages  have  preserved  the  accentuation  of  the 
Latin,  they  are,  as  Gaston  Paris  says,  "deslangues 
filles"  and  "des  langues  sceurs,"  while,  though 
many  French  words  have  been  borrowed  by  Eng- 
lish and  German,  because  the  Teutonic  accent 
has  been  substituted  for  the  Latin,  the  whole 
physiognomy  of  the  word  is  changed.2  This 
predominance  of  one  syllable  of  a  word  over  the 
others  is  accomplished  by  pronouncing  it  at  a 
higher  pitch  and  with  increased  stress  of  the  voice, 
the  two  factors  varying  in  importance  both,  abso- 
lutely, from  one  language  to  another  (often  be- 
tween different   dialects   of   the   same   language) 

1  anima  vocis,  Diomed.  p.  430,  29  K  ;   Pompeius,  p.  126,  27  K. 

2  Gaston  Paris,  £tude  stir  le  Role  de  r Accent  latin  dans  la 
Langue  francaise,  Paris  and  Leipzig,  1862,  p.  9  ss. 

B  I 


2  THE  STRESS  ACCENT  IN  LATIN  POETRY 

and,  relatively,  between  different  modes  of  utter- 
ance.1 So  the  musical  accent  of  ancient  Greek 
and  of  ancient  Sanskrit  is  essentially  one  of  pitch, 
differences  of  stress  playing  a  subordinate  and  all 
but  negligible  part.  English  and  German,  on  the 
other  hand,  have  a  stress  accent,  though  differ- 
ences in  pitch  are  still  important.  In  English,  the 
word  really,  for  example,  by  variations  in  pitch 
may  be  made  to  express  a  wide  range  of  feeling 
from  mild  interest  to  profound  contempt. 

There  is  another  factor  in  Greek  and  Latin 
which  helps  to  make  the  accented  syllable  promi- 
nent, though  it  is  not  in  itself  sufficient  to  consti- 
tute such  prominence ;  and  that  is  quantity. 
Professor  C.  E.  Bennett2  maintains  that  Latin,  in 
the  Classical  Period,  at  least,  was  "  absolutely 
unstressed."  He  writes:  "May  not  a  syllable  be 
primarily  prominent  by  virtue  of  its  quantity? 
That  is,  in  a  word  like  amavit,  for  example,  may 
not  the  rule  of  the  grammarians,  that  such  a  word 
was  accented  on  the  penult,  simply  mean  that  they 
felt  the  quantity  of  the  long  penult  as  making  that 
syllable  prominent,  without  any  stress  on  the  one 
hand  or  any  elevation  of  pitch  on  the  other  ?  And 
in  words  like  latuit  homines  y  etc.,  may  not  the 
rule  that  these  words  were  accented  on  the  ante- 
penult simply  mean  that,  in  consequence  of  the 
short   penult,  that   syllable   did   not  possess   any 

1  Cf.  Eduard  Sievers  in  Paul's  Grundriss,  1897,  1  Bd»  2  Lief- 
p.  304  ss.  2  A,  J,  F,  vol,  xix.  p.  362  et  ss. 


WORD  ACCENT  3 

prominence,  and  hence  after  the  establishment  in 
Latin  of  the  three-syllable  law,  the  syllable  next 
preceding  became  the  conspicuous  one  ? "  Take 
the  word  amavit ;  the  penult  is  an  "  open  "  syllable 
(to  quote  his  own  terminology  2)  with  a  long  vowel ; 
it  is,  therefore,  a  long  syllable.  The  ultima  is  a 
"closed"  syllable,  "and  a  closed  syllable  is  pho- 
netically long."2  There  is  therefore  no  difference 
in  quantity  between  the  penult  and  the  ultima,  so 
that  it  is  difficult  to  see  how  the  former  could  be 
"quantitatively  prominent."  Further,  in  the  word 
homines,  because  of  the  short  penult,  "  the  sylla- 
ble next  preceding  becomes  the  conspicuous  one." 
How  ?  Both  penult  and  antepenult  are  short. 
The  only  long  syllable  in  the  word  —  the  only  one, 
therefore,  which  can  be  said  to  possess  "  quantita- 
tive prominence" — is  the  ultima;  so  that,  follow- 
ing his  own  rule,  the  word  should  be  accented  on 
the  ultima.  Latin  possesses  a  very  large  number 
of  long,  i.e.  "  quantitatively  prominent,"  syllables, 
so  much  so  that  Plautus  and  Terence  were  obliged 
to  shorten  many  such  syllables  by  the  law  of 
Brevis  Brevians,  and  Ennius  and  his  successors 
still  more.  In  an  iambic  word  like  mbdo,  for 
example,  what  influence  was  at  work  to  cause  the 

^Appendix  to  Bennett's  Latin  Gra?Jimar,  Boston,  1895,  p.  32. 
But  cf.  Pompeius,  p.  112,  26  K. 

2  The  only  exception  would  be  where,  with  no  break  in  the  sense, 
the  following  word  began  with  a  vowel.  Before  a  pause  and,  as  he 
expressly  states,  at  the  end  of  a  line,  such  final  syllables  are  long. — 
Op.  cit.  p.  375  note. 


4  THE  STRESS  ACCENT  IN  LATIN  POETRY 

shortening  of  the  final  d  ?  If  quantity  alone  was 
responsible,  why  did  not  a  short  unaccented  syl- 
lable produce  the  same  result?  But  iurigo  (in 
Plautus)  becomes,  later,  not  iurigo,  but  iurgo.  Nor 
is  this  syncope  of  the  unaccented  syllable,  which 
can  be  due  only  to  stress,  confined  to  ante-classical 
times,  when,  according  to  Professor  Bennett,  the 
language  may  not  have  been  "  absolutely  un- 
stressed." Augustus  stigmatized  calidus  for  cal- 
dus  as  a  piece  of  affectation,  "  non  quia  id  non  sit 
latinum,  sed  quia  sit  odiosum," 1  while  It.  caldo 
shows  that  caldus  was  the  form  in  late  Latin.  It 
is,  in  fact,  precisely  the  "  quantitatively  monoto- 
nous "  character  of  Latin  that  makes  some  other 
principle  of  accentuation  imperatively  necessary. 
But  such  a  thesis  as  that  of  Professor  Bennett 
cannot  be  seriously  maintained  for  any  age  or  any 
language. 

Behind  the  lyric  and  epic  in  Greece,  as  every- 
where else,  there  must  have  been  rhythmical  songs 
of  the  people,  but  so  imperceptibly  does  this  Volks- 
poesie  shade  off  into  the  Volksthiimliche  Poesie  of 
later  and  more  cultivated  times,  so  industriously  is 
every  motif  made  a  subject  of  art,  and,  withal,  so 
national  and  democratic  is  the  whole  body  of  Greek 
poetry,  that  the  first  rude  songs  of  daily  life  and 
of  worship  —  at  least  in  their  original  form  —  stood 
small  chance  of  being  preserved.2    It  is  a  tempta- 

1  Quint,  i.  6,  19. 

2  Smyth,  Greek  Melic  Poets,  London,  1900,  p.  488  et  ss. 


WORD  ACCEXT  5 

tion,  however,  with  Christ1  and  others,  to  see  the 
influence  of  stress  in  the  Lesbian  Mill-Song,  quoted 
by  Plutarch:2— 

aAei,  fxv\a,   aAei 

KCLL    IIlTTaKOS    jap    aXcL 

[xeyd\a<s   MvriAavas   /3acriAeva>v, 

where  the  last  line,  at  least,  seems  to  match  the 
rhythmical  movement  of  the  hand  as  it  turns  the 
mill.  Keller3  adds  the  saying  of  the  children  of 
Attica  when  they  first  saw  the  birds  in  spring. 
It  is  from  the  Scholiast  on  Aristophanes'  Birds, 

1.54:- 

86s  to  ctkcAos  rrj  7rcToa  kclI  TreaovvTaL  to.  opvea. 

He  reads :  — 

805  TO  (TKcAoS  TT]  7T€Tpa 
KOL   7T€oWvTCU  TLOpVtd. 

He  also  quotes  the  Tortoise-Game  from  Pollux,  ix. 
125,  where  he  sees  in  the  long  i  of  rt  (w.  1  and  3) 

the  influence  of  stress  :  — 

\€Xl^€Xo)V7}   Tl  TTOLCLS  €V  TO)  fxicTU)  ', 

Zpux  fj.apvop.aL  Kal  KpoKtfv  ^ItXrjcriav. 
6  8'  tKyovos  crov  tl  ttolojv  oAcoActo  ; 
XevKwv  a<fi   lttttcov  eis  ^aAacrcrav  aAaro. 

The  lengthening  of  a  short  vowel  in  an  accented 
syllable  and  the  shortening  of  a  long  unaccented 

1  Metrik  der  Griechen  und  Romer,  Leipzig,  1879,  p.  374. 

2  Sept.  Sap.  Conv.  14  (157  E). 

3  Der  Satumische   Vers  ah  rhythmisch  erwiesen,  Prague,  1883, 
p.  81  et  s. 


6  THE  STRESS  ACCENT  IN  LATIN  POETRY 

vowel  is  a  sure  sign  of  the  growing  power  of  stress, 
which,  like  every  strong  influence  in  the  history  of 
humanity,  works  its  way  up  from  below.  Setting 
aside  the  fishmonger's  rdpcov  /3o\cov  and  /ctco  /3o\a)v 
for  rerrdpcov  6f3o\a>v  and  oktco  6/3o\cov  in  Amphis' 
comedy,  IlXaVo?  and  the  occasional  suppression  of 
a  short  vowel  on  Attic  vases,  e.g.  iTrotTjcrv  'AOrjvrjcrv, 
—  instances  which  may  seem  to  be  entirely  sporadic 
only  through  the  losses  of  centuries,  —  there  is  con- 
siderable evidence  for  the  confusion  of  long  and 
short  vowels  as  early  as  the  second  and  first  cen- 
turies before  Christ. 

Kretschmer,  in  an  excellent  article,1  which  by 
the  way  is  entirely  misrepresented  by  Vendryes,2 
has  collected,  from  papyri  and  inscriptions,  a 
number  of  instances  of  this  confusion.  In  con- 
clusion he  writes  :  "  Die  oben  zusammengestell- 
ten  belege  aus  papyri  und  inschriften  zeigen 
noch  kein  durchgehendes  abhangigkeitsverhaltniss 
zwischen  vocalquantitat  und  betonung.  Es  finden 
sich  schreibungen  wie  yiyoirco,  fcarcoxjj,  oopoicos, 
coparcu,  7r/3a)e<7Tft)TO?,  €%&)*>  st.  e%ov,  fxei&v  st.  fiei^ov 
und  veorepov,  irapaTV^pv  st.  -Tv%d)v.  Aber  in  der 
mehrzahl  der  falle  sind  betonte  kiirzen  als  lang 
oder  unbetonte  langen  als  kurz  bezeichnet :  man 
vergleiche  Ma/eeSo^o?,  &Wo?,  TrpaHceincu,  <w7Tft)?, 
/3oa>?,  fieyaXcoSo^ov,  wvoixa,  iBcodrj,  BcaBco^a),  irpoare- 

1  Kuhrts  Zeit.  xxx.  p.  591  et  ss. 

2  Recherches  sur  VHistoire  et  les  Effets  de  VIntensite  initiate  en 
Latin,  Paris,  1902,  p.  34. 


WORD  ACCENT  7 

Ta%a)T(ov,  ^o?,  reOrjafjiat,  ivvr)a,  avSpet,  andererseits 
TrpoaoTTOV)  eSo/ca,  evtyovov,  eyvov,  fiaprvpov,  ixeOoiropt- 
z>o'?,  aireWdyrjV^  KaTaarpovvve^  <J>tXoz^o?,  'Apiaro- 
vlhas,  faXocfrpovos  st.  -(£/doW>?,  etc.  Thatsache  ist  also, 
dass  die  vulgare  aussprache  bereits  im  2.  jahrh. 
v.  Chr.  lange  und  kiirze  zusammenfallen  Hess. 
Mit  der  aufhebung  der  quantitatsunterschiede  fiel 
aber  eine  der  wichtigsten  voraussetzungen  fur  die 
urspriingliche  musikalische  betonung  fort;  denn 
der  unterschied  von  acut  und  circumflex  sowie  das 
ganze  sogen.  dreisilbengesetz  sind  durch  die  ver- 
schiedenheit  der  quantitaten  bedingt.  Hieraus 
folgt,  dass  die  betonung  der  griechischen  volks- 
sprache  schon  in  vorchristlicher  zeit  eine  nicht 
unwesentlicheveranderung  erfahren  haben  muss." 
Finally,  Westphal 2  shows  that  in  the  later  Greek 
times  there  arose  a  kind  of  didactic  poetry  whose 
appeal  was  directly  to  the  people,  through  fables 
told  in  choliambic  verse.  It  is,  however,  of  the 
utmost  importance  to  note  that,  while  the  ancient 
verses  of  Hipponax  and  Aeschrion  were  based 
solely  on  quantity,  this  new  verse  required  that 
in  the  last  foot,  word-  and  verse-ictus  should  al- 
ways coincide.  Unfortunately  we  do  not  know 
the  date  of  Babrius,  who  first  used  this  verse.  It 
has  been  variously  given  all  the  way  from  the 
third  century  before  Christ  to  the  third  century 
after  Christ.     Crusius,2  after  giving  the  arguments 

1  Allgemeine  Metrik,  Berlin,  1892,  p.  242  et  ss. 

2  De  Babrii  Aetate  (Leipzig,  1879). 


8  THE  STRESS  ACCENT  IN  LATIN  POETRY 

(which  often  rest  upon  very  slight  grounds)  both 
for  an  early  and  for  a  late  date,  decides  in  favour 
of  the  time  of  Alexander  Severus.  In  the  Byzan- 
tine Period,  the  choliamb  of  Babrius  had  lost  all 
trace  of  prosody  and  had  become  a  verse  of  twelve 
syllables  in  which  it  was  only  required  that  the 
last  ictus  coincide  with  the  accent  of  the  word  — 

Ancient  choliamb  w_w__w_w__^ ^» 

Choliamb  of  Babrius  w_^_w_w_w_Z.vy- 
Byzantine  choliamb  vywwwvywwwww^w- 

Many  of  the  so-called  Political  Verses  {cttlxoi 
ttoXltlkoi)  of  the  Byzantine  writers  employ  this 
measure  of  twelve  syllables,  as,  for  instance,  the 
following  lines  of  Tzetzes  :  — 

TrpoXoyos   eort  ^XPL  X°P0^  euro  Sou* 
e7re«roSiov  icrriv,   ws   /cat  7rpoe<j>r)Vf 
A.oyos  fxera^v  7r\r)V  fxeXwv  xppuv  8vo. 

It  would  seem,  therefore,  that  the  history  of 
Greek  poetry  shows  the  same  successive  phases  as 
that  of  Latin.  Rhythmical  at  first,  in  all  probabil- 
ity, though  the  finer  poetical  sense  of  the  Greeks 
may  not  have  allowed  the  suppression  of  the 
thesis,  so  frequent  in  Teutonic  popular  poetry,1  it 
had  become  quantitative  long  before  the  period  of 
the  Homeric  epic,  and  for  more  than  a  thousand 
years  had  so  remained.  Then,  through  the  influ- 
ence of  the  people,  its  musical  accent  became  less 
nuance',  the  fine  distinctions  of  pitch  gave  way  to 

1  Usener,  Altgriechischer  Versbau,  Bonn,  1887,  p.  78  et  ss. 


WORD  ACCENT  9 

the  heavier,  more  palpable  differences  of  stress, 
and  along  with  stress  as  a  dominant  principle 
came  in  a  poetry  which  ignored  quantity  altogether 
and  only  required  that  in  the  last  foot  of  each 
line  (in  the  longer  lines,  of  each  hemistich),  word- 
and  verse-accent  should  coincide. 

Just  as  all  the  dialects  of  Greek  have  a  common 
system  of  accentuation,  and  all  the  dialects  of  Ger- 
man, so,  Corssen1  thinks,  have  all  the  old  Italic 
dialects.  For  Oscan  and  Umbrian,  at  least,  it 
seems  clear  that  the  accent  {i.e.  stress)  fell  at 
one  time  on  the  initial  syllable  of  the  word.  This 
is  proved  by  the  same  phenomena  as  in  Latin, 
namely:  i.  Syncope  of  the  vowel,  which  under 
the  later  Penultimate  Law  would  bear  the  accent 

(a)  in  the  antepenult;  as,  Osc.  Anagtiai  from 
Anketidi  or  *Angetiai  (Lat.  Angitiai);  Osc.-Umb. 
nessimo-  perhaps  from  *nezdismmo-  or  *nedhism- 
mo- ;  Vo.  atahus  perhaps  from  *  ad-tetahnst  (like 
Lat.  attigi  from  *ad-tetigi,  reccidi  from  *rececidi)\ 

(b)  in  a  long  penult,  the  Oscan  proper  name  Opsci, 
from  *Opisei,  Osc.  minstrels  (mistreis)  from  *mini- 
streis  (Lat.  minister).  Syncope  in  these  positions 
is  more  widespread  in  Oscan  and  Umbrian  than  in 
Latin.  2.  Weakening  of  the  vowel  in  the  same 
positions,  which  is  rare  and  doubtful ;  for  example, 
Umb.  pre  hub  ia  y  Lat.  praehibeat. 

Whether   this   initial   accent  was  preserved   in 

1  Uber  Auss.  Vok.  u.  Beton.  der  lat.  Sprache,  Leipzig,  1870,  ii. 
p.  907  ss. 


10        THE  STRESS  ACCENT  IN  LATIN  POETRY 

Oscan-Umbrian  or  replaced  by  the  three-syllable 
law,  as  in  Latin,  cannot  be  determined  with  cer- 
tainty. Brugmann,1  on  account  of  the  widespread 
loss  of  the  vowel  in  final  syllables,  is  in  favour  of 
the  former  view;  Corssen,  with  whom  von  Planta 
is  inclined  to  agree,  prefers  the  latter.  Von  Planta 
writes,2  "  Wenn  auch  nicht  alle  angef  iihrten  Argu- 
mente  von  gleichem  Werth  sind,  so  scheinen  sie 
doch  ausreichend  um  es  entschieden  wahrschein- 
lich  zu  machen,  dass  im  Osk.-Umbrischen  in  his- 
torischer  Zeit  die  jiingere  lateinische  Betonung 
herrschte.  Uber  der  Zeitpunct  der  Aenderung 
lasst  sich  nur  so  viel  sagen  dass  er  spater  fiel  als 
die  Syncope  in  osk.  A?iagtias,  Vezkei,  umbr. 
mersto-,  etc.,  und  als  die  Schwachung  in  umbr.  /r^- 
hubia  (osk.  Mamerttiais  ?).  Dass  die  Aenderung 
uritalisch  gewesen  sei,  ist  aus  verschiedenen  Griin- 
den  unwahrscheinlich." 

As  to  the  nature  of  the  free  shifting  accent, 
claimed  by  many  to  have  preceded  the  stress 
accent  on  the  initial  syllable  in  Latin,  we  are 
ignorant.  Vendryes3  claims  that  it  was  a  pitch 
accent  like  that  of  the  parent  Indo-European,  but 
he  adds,  "  Ce  ton  n'a  eu  aucune  influence  sur  la 
constitution  et  le  developpement  de  la  phonetique 
latine."  Conway,  Wharton,  Collitz,  and  others  think 
it  was  a  stress  accent,  and  see  in  certain  vowel 

1  Grundriss,  i.  p.  553. 

2  Gram,  der  Oskisch-umbrischen  Dialekte,  Strassburg,  1892, 
p.  596.  3  Op.  cit.  p.  99. 


WORD  ACCENT  II 

changes,  for  example  the  a  in  quatuor {Gr.  rerrape^) 
and  in  magnus(ln&.-¥.u.r.  *meg-nos,  Gr.  /xeya?),  traces 
of  its  influence.  This  earliest  accent  was,  however, 
replaced,  as  Corssen  proved,  by  a  stress  accent 
resting  on  the  first  syllable  of  each  word.  In- 
stances of  Syncope  under  the  Initial  Accent  Law 
are,  ancidus  for  ambi-quolus  (Gr.  a/jL<j)L-7ro\o<;), 
naufragus  for  ndvif vagus,  selibva  for  *semilibva, 
undecim  for  *oinidecem  ;  vettuli  for  ve-tetuli,  veppevi 
for  ve-pepevi,  veccidi  for  ve-cecidi;  of  Vowel  Weaken- 
ing, infvingo  from  in  and  fvango  ;  concldo  from  cum 
and  caedo  ;  tviennium  from  tvi-  (tves)  and  annus. 

Sometime  before  the  dawn  of  the  Literary  Era 
(Stolz  conjectures  the  fifth  century  of  the  city1) 
the  Initial  Accent  in  Latin  yielded  to  the  law  of 
the  Last  Three  Syllables.  Vendryes,  who  holds 
that  the  former  was  a  stress  accent  and  the  latter 
a  pitch  accent  pure  and  simple,  makes  no  attempt 
to  explain  the  manner  of  the  change.  Lindsay,2 
who  regards  both  as  essentially  stress  accents, 
thinks  that  the  change  began  in  long  words  like 
sapientia,  tempestatibus,  which,  in  order  to  be  pro- 
nounced at  all,  must  have  had  a  secondary  as  well 
as  a  main  accent,  and  that  the  change  from  the 
older  accentuation  to  the  Penultimate  Law  of  the 
Historic  Period,  consisted  merely  in  substituting 
the  main  accent  for  the  secondary,  and  the  secon- 
dary for  the  main ;  sdpihitia  becoming  sapie'ntia, 

1  Lateinische  Grammatik  in  Iwan  Miiller's  Handbuch,  II.  s.  321. 

2  The  Latin  Language >  Oxford,  1894,  p.  158  ss. 


12        THE  STRESS  ACCENT  IN  LATIN  POETRY 

te'mpestatibzis,  thnpestdtibus,  etc.  In  one  particu- 
lar this  change  appears  to  have  been  still  incom- 
plete at  the  time  of  the  Early  Drama,  words  like 
facilius,  balineum  {y  w  \j  ^)  having  the  metrical 
ictus  on  the  first,  not  on  the  second  syllable,  in  the 
plays  of  Plautus  and  Terence.  So  also  (I  think) 
capitibus  in  Naevius'  line:  — 

Noctu  Troiad{e)  exibant  capitibus  opertis. 

The  very  fact  that  the  place  of  the  Latin  accent 
was  so  circumscribed  points  to  an  essential  differ- 
ence between  it  and  the  pitch  accent  of  ancient 
Greek.  Except  in  a  few  words  which  have 
dropped  or  contracted  their  last  syllable  like  acids, 
ilhic,  tanton  (tantonc)  the  accent  never  falls  on  the 
ultima,  but  is  determined  rigorously  by  the  quan- 
tity of  the  penult,  even  Greek  loan  words  like 
Epirus,  tyrdnnus,  submitting  to  its  heavy,  hand. 
On  the  contrary,  all  the  pitch  accents  that  we 
know  have  a  far  wider  scope.  In  ancient  Sanskrit 
the  accent  may  fall  on  the  seventh  syllable  from 
the  end.  Greek  has  a  recessive  accent,  which 
is  only  provisionally  established  for  Latin  in  con- 
ventional word  groups.1  In  Chinese,  the  only 
pitch  language  of  modern  times,  the  tones,  of 
which  there  are  five  (some  say  four  or  seven),  seem 
to  play  all  about  a  word  combination  like  veritable 

1  Radford  in  A.  J.  P.  vol.  xxv.  "  On  the  Recession  of  the  Latin 
Accent  in  Connection  with  Monosyllabic  Words  and  the  Traditional 
Word-Order."     (Three  articles,  pp.  147,  256,  406.) 


WORD  ACCENT  1 3 

will-o'-the-wisps,  often  changing  the  entire  mean- 
ing of  a  sentence.1 

Further,  in  Late  and  Vulgar  Latin,  even  a  short 
penult  attracted  the  accent,  as  is  abundantly 
proved  by  the  evidence  of  the  Romance  lan- 
guages.2 (i)  In  a  syllable  not  initial  the  second 
of  two  vowels  in  hiatus  attracts  the  accent;  thus 
the  accentuation  mulierem  in  Vulgar  Latin  is  at- 
tested, not  only  by  the  Romance  forms,  Eng- 
mulcr,  Old  Fr.  moulier,  Prov.  mother,  Roum.  muli- 
ere.  Span,  mujer,  It.  mogliera  ;  but  by  the  precept 
of  a  late  grammarian,3  "mulierem  in  antepaenul- 
timo  nemo  debet  acuere,  sed  in  paenultimo  potius," 
and  by  the  usage  of  Christian  poets  of  the  third 
and  fourth  centuries.  (2)  A  mute  followed  by  r 
at  the  beginning  of  the  last  syllable  attracted  the 
accent  to  the  penult,  the  result,  in  all  probability, 
of  the  practice  among  Latin  poets  of  allowing  a 
mute  and  a  liquid  to  "make  position."4  Lat.  tent- 
brae  is  attested  by  Span,  tinieblas ;  colobra,  by 
Fr.  coulenvre,  Span,  ctilebra,  etc.  (3)  In  com- 
pound verbs  the  accent  shifted  to  the  stem-vowel 
of  the  verb.  Lat.  recipit  is  shown  by  It.  riceve, 
Fr.  recoit,  Span,  recebe ;  demorat,  by  It.  dimora, 
Old  Fr.  demtiere,  Fr.  demeure,  Prov.  demorat  etc. 
(4)  The  evidence  from  the  Romance  numerals,  it 
is  true,  seems  to  point  in  the  opposite  direction, 

1  Kleczkowski,  Cours  de  Chinois,  Paris,  1876,  i.  p.  29  ss. 

2  Meyer-Liibke,  Gram.  Rom.  Sprach.,  Leipzig,  1890,  i.  p.  489  ss. 

3  Anecdot.  Helv.  ciii.  i  But  cf.  Serv.  ad  Aen.  i.  384. 


14       THE  STRESS  ACCENT  IN  LATIN  POETRY 

namely  to  a  Vulgar  Latin  viginti,  triginta,  quadrd- 
ginta,  etc.  Triginta,  according  to  Consentius1 
(fifth  century),  is  one  of  the  barbarisms,  "  quae  in 
usu  cotidie  loquentium  animadvertere  possumus." 
But  while,  according  to  Meyer-Liibke,  it  is  pos- 
sible to  derive  It.  venti  from  viginti,  and  even 
veinte,  treinta  from  viginti,  triginta  on  the  sup- 
position that  the  i  was  close  (though  not  possibly 
quarante  from  quadraginta),  it  seems  to  me  more 
likely  that  there  was  a  still  later  change  in  Vulgar 
Latin,  so  that  while  the  earlier  Romance  forms  are 
derived  from  viginti,  triginta,  etc.,  the  Italian  are 
derived  from  shortened  forms  which  were  accented 
on  the  penult.  There  is  some  evidence  for  this 
view  in  late  inscriptions,  for  example,  on  a  fifth- 
century  inscription  2  quarranta  is  written  for  quad- 
raginta (It.  quardnto),  and  an  epitaph  in  hexameters 
has  vinti,  for  viginti  (It.  venti).3 

The  phenomena  of  syncope  and  vowel  reduction, 
characteristic  of  all  periods  of  the  language,  are 
the  main  support  of  the  stress  theory.  These  have 
been  very  ably  treated  by  Lindsay  in  his  chapter 
on  Accentuation4  and  need  only  be  briefly  sum- 
marized here. 

A.  Syncope  (i)  Pretonic :  artena  (Gr.  apv- 
Taiva),  perstromah   (Gr.   Trepia-rpcopia);    enclitic    or 

1  p.  391  K.  2  A.  L.  L.  v.  106. 

3  Wilm.  569,  cf.  C.  I.  L.  viii.  8573  :  {Et  menses  septem  diebus  cum 
vinti  duobus).  4  Op.  cit.  p.  148  et  ss. 

5  Lucil.  (i.  41  M.  and  Lowe,  Prodr.  p.  347). 


WORD  ACCENT  1 5 

subordinate  words  which  drop  final  e  before  an 
initial  consonant,  e.g.  nempe,  proinde,  deinde,  atque, 
neque  becoming  *nemp  (so  scanned  by  Plautus  and 
Terence),  prom,  dein,  ae,  nee;  benficiiwi,  malftcium, 
(calefacere,  ealefacere,  then)  calfacere,  olfacere,  mins- 
tcrium  or  tnisterium ;  aet  for  aevit  in  aetemus, 
aetatem,  etc.,  then  in  aetas ;  frigdarius1  beside 
frigidus,  caldarms  beside  calidus,  portorium  beside 
portitor,  postridie  beside  posteri,  altrinsecus  be- 
side altcri ;  si  audes  (Plaut.)  in  the  Class.  Period, 
sodes.  (2)  Post-tonic :  barca,  lamna 2  (in  Vul. 
Lat.  lamia),  lardum,  iurgo  (still  inrigo  in  Plautus), 
usurpo  for  *tt,suripo  ;  nouns  and  adjectives  in  -atis, 
denoting  the  country  of  one's  birth,  as  nostras, 
Arpinds,  etc. ;  u,  i,  in  hiatus,  larna,  a  trisyllable 
in  Plautus,  is  later  a  dissyllable,  so  gratiis  later 
gratis ;  occasionally,  ardus 3  for  aridns,  aspris  for 
asperis  ;4  soldus?  possum  for  pote-sum  of  earlier 
writers.  In  Vulgar  Latin  wave  after  wave  of  syn- 
cope, as  is  shown  by  the  Romance  derivatives, 
changed  the  whole  appearance  of  the  language ; 
e.g.  slave  names  like  Marpor^  for  Marcipor,  etc. ; 
mattns 7  for  madidus,  virdis,  fridam  for  frigidam 

1  Lucil.  (viii.  12  M.). 

2  Hor.  Od.  ii.  2,  2  (inimice  lamnae). 

3  Plaut.  Aid.  297;   Pers.  266. 

4  Verg.  Aen.  ii.  379.    Cf.  aspritudo,  aspretiun,  aspredo,  It.  aspro. 

5  Lex  Mzinicipalis  of  Julius  Caesar  (C  I.  Z.  i.  206,  114,  115); 
Hor.  Sat.  ii.  5,  65  and  i.  2,  113. 

6  C.  I.  L.  i.  1076. 

7  Petron.  §  41. 


1 6       THE  STRESS  ACCENT  IN  LATIN  POETRY 

(on  an  inscription  of  Pompeii) ; 1  calda  is  read  in 
Cato2  and  the  proper  name  Cald(iis)  is  found  on 
coins  as  early  as  109  B.C.;3  domnus  for  dominus, 
and  also  the  proper  names  Domnus,  Domna, 
Gr.  Aofjuvos 4 ;  so  saeculum  was  restored  to  its  orig- 
inal form  saeclum,  etc.,  veclus  took  the  place  of 
vetulus,  anglus  of  angulus,  stablum  of  stabulum, 
vaplo  (Ms.  baplo)  of  vapulo?  etc. 

B.  Weakening  of  unaccented  vowels :  Under 
the  Early  Accent  law,  unaccented  short  vowels 
were  changed  to  e,  before  a  labial  or  /  to  0 ;  so  the 
Mss.  of  Plautus  preserve  traces  of  subegit  (from  sub 
and  ago,  cf.  Gr.  awaya))  for  snbigit?  exsolatum  for 
exulaturn?  and  the  Lex  Repetundarum  of  121  B.C. 
has  forms  like  detolerit,  oppedeis  side  by  side  with 
detirierit,  ediderit,  etc. ;  e  is  retained  before  r,  e.g. 
peperit  from  pario,  before  a  consonant  group  retnex, 
but  remigis,  and  after  z,  ebrietas,  parietem,  etc.,  and 
6  when  not  before  a  labial  is  retained,  eg.  invoco, 
advoco,  and  even  before  a  labial  when  i  precedes, 
filiolus.  In  the  final  syllable  it  is  invariably  re- 
duced, vicus,  older  vlcos  (Gr.  ol/cos),  filios  on  the 
First   Scipio-Inscription,    etc.      Even   diphthongs 


1  C.  I.  z.  iv.  1291. 

2  ^.  R.  vi.  1  and  75,  also  Varro,  R.  R.  i.  13,  etc. 

3  C.  I.  I.  i.  328. 

4  C.  I.  G.  i.  6505,  end  of  second  century  A.D. 

5  Prodi  App.  197,  20-22  K. 

6  Capt.  814. 

7  Merc.  593  (B);  Most.  597  (,4),  etc. 


WORD  ACCENT  1 7 

were  changed,  their  first  element  being  affected) 
ai  becoming  l  (through  *ei),  au  becoming  u 
(through  *eu).  In  final  syllables,  ei,  Class.  iy  repre- 
sents Ind.-Eur.  ai,  e.g.  tetudl  (older  ei),  just  as  oi 
was  weakened  to  ei  then  to  I,  foideratei  (S.  C. 
Bacch.),  Class,  foederatl.  In  the  late  Republican 
and  Imperial  times,  possibly  on  account  of  the 
grammatical  studies  imported  from  Greece,  com- 
pounds were  often  restored  to  their  unweakened 
form  ('  Recomposition '),  and  at  all  periods  of  the 
language  the  analogy  of  similar  forms  operated 
now  in  favour  of  and  now  against  vowel  re- 
duction. 

C.  Shortening  of  unaccented  vowels :  By  the 
law  of  Brevis  Brevians  the  final  syllable  of  a  dis- 
syllabic word  was  shortened  if  the  preceding  syl- 
lable was  short,  so  in  Plautus  viodo,  ago,  Jiabcs, 
amor,  cub  at,  and  even  potest.  Later  the  shortening 
was  applied  to  Cretic  words.  Horace,  for  example, 
admits  Pollio,  mentio,  dixero,  and  the  fourth  century 
grammarians  speak  of  the  final  o  of  nouns  (nom. 
sing.),  verbs  (ist  pers.  sing.  pres.  ind.),  adverbs,  and 
conjunctions,  as  universally  shortened  in  the  pro- 
nunciation of  their  time,  except  in  monosyllables 
and  foreign  words.1  So  also  final  syllables  ending 
in  -m,  -r,  -t,  -s,  and  even,  occasionally,  those  long  by 
position  are  shortened,  a  result  due  partly  to  the 
inherent  weakness  of  every  final  syllable,  partly,  in 

1  Charis.  p.  16,  5  K  ;   Diomed.  p.  435,  22  K  ;   Prob.  de  ult.  syll. 
p.  220,  15  K  ;   Mar.  Vict.  p.  28,  23  K  ;   Priscian,  i.  p.  409,  16  H. 
c 


1 8        THE  STRESS  A  CCENT  IN  LA  TIN  FOE  TR  Y 

the  case  of  words  ending  in  a  vowel,  to  the  practice 
of  shortening  a  long  vowel  in  hiatus. 

The  view  that  the  Latin  was  essentially  a  stress 
accent  is  supported  by  the  united  testimony  of  the 
Romance  languages.  French  must,  at  one  time, 
have  had  a  very  strong  stress  accent,  as  is  shown 
by  the  preponderance  of  "heavy"  syllables  (soup- 
con,  maison,  amour,  planter,  attention,  commande- 
ment),  and  in  parts  of  France  stress  differences  are 
still  strongly  marked,  as  in  the  north,  in  Piedmont, 
and  in  French  Switzerland.  Meyer-Liibke  sug- 
gests1 that  at  a  certain  epoch  a  musical  element 
was  added  to  the  stress  accent,  so  that  (represent- 
ing the  musical  accent  by  A  )  a  word  like  soupgon, 
for  instance,  would  show  the  series  supson,  supson, 
stipson.  While  the  French  makes  more  account  of 
differences  in  pitch  than  any  other  of  the  Romance 
languages,  the  musical  element  is  noticeable  in 
Spanish  and  Italian,  though  the  whole  develop- 
ment of  these  languages  shows  the  influence  of 
stress.  The  same  is  true  a  fortiori  of  Roumanian, 
in  which  the  syncope  of  Latin  words  is  carried  to 
a  very  great  extent ;  for  example,  dmeng  for  Lat. 
domimca,  Sunday,  and  cal  for  Lat.  caballus,  a 
horse,  etc. 

The  one  stumbling-block  is  the  adverse  testi- 
mony of  Latin  writers  on  accent,  from  Varro,  with 
a  few  exceptions,  down  to  Priscian.  Of  greatest 
importance  are  Varro,  Cicero,  and  Q'uintilian,  for 

1  Op.  cit.  p.  500. 


WORD  ACCENT  1 9 

the  later  grammarians,  as  a  rule,  continue  to  re- 
peat mechanically  the  formulas  of  their  predeces- 
sors, even  down  to  a  period  when,  as  is  universally 
acknowledged,  stress  must  have  been  the  dominant 
principle.  This  weakens  the  whole  mass  of  evi- 
dence from  the  grammarians.  As  M.  Vendryes 
rather  neatly  illustrates,  they  are  like  the  French 
schoolmasters  who  are  still  teaching  the  difference 
between  aspirate  h  and  mute  //,  though  the  two 
are  precisely  alike  and  have  been  for  more  than  a 
century. 

All  that  is  said  by  Varro,  Cicero,  and  Ouintilian, 
on  the  subject  of  accent,  interpreting  the  words  in 
their  most  obvious  sense,  refers  to  differences  in 
pitch  and  quantity.  But,  on  the  other  hand,  they 
are  frankly  applying  the  terms  learned  from  their 
Greek  teachers  to  the  nearest  equivalents  in  Latin, 
just  as  the  names  of  the  Greek  gods  were  fitted, 
more  or  less  aptly,  to  the  already  existing  Roman 
deities.  That,  in  the  matter  of  accent,  the  new 
terminology  was  faulty,  is  shown  by  the  confusion 
in  regard  to  the  circumflex  accent  among  Roman 
writers  ;  Vitruvius  placing  it  on  monosyllables  like 
sol,  1/tXyJlos,  vox ;  Quintilian  on  the  penult  of  tri- 
syllabic words  whose  vowel  was  long  by  nature, 
Cethegus,  but  Camillas ;  Priscian,  Martianus  Ca- 
pella,  and  other  late  grammarians,  placing  it  on  the 
penult  of  Rojtia,  for  example,  but  not  of  Romac, 
where  the  ultima  was  long.  It  is  worth  while  to 
note  in  passing,  that  this  last  theory,  taken  over 


20        THE  STRESS  ACCENT  IN  LATIN  POETRY 

bodily  from  the  Greek,  is  not  found  in  Servius  or 
Pompeius,  who  recognize  the  stress  character  of 
the  Latin  accent.1  The  Latin  writers  do,  indeed, 
speak  of  the  more  obvious  difference  between  the 
Greek  accent  and  their  own.  Quintilian,  for  ex- 
ample,2 complains  of  the  monotony  produced  by 
the  accent  falling  always  on  one  of  two  syllables. 
"  Itaque  tanto  est  sermo  Graecus  Latino  iucundior, 
ut  nostri  poetae,  quotiens  dulce  carmen  voluerunt, 
illorum  id  nominibus  exornent."  But  the  subtler 
distinction  between  pitch  and  stress — a  distinction 
which  has  only  recently  been  mastered  by  phoneti- 
cians, as  Hendrickson  points  out  in  his,  to  my 
mind,  conclusive  reply3  to  Bennett's  "What  was 
Ictus  in  Latin  Prosody?"  —  they  may  well  have 
missed.  Especially  does  this  seem  to  be  the  case 
when  we  reflect  that  the  language  of  the  cultivated 
classes,  in  the  Classical  Period  at  least,  shows  far 
less  tendency  to  syncope  than  the  popular  speech. 
It  is  not  claimed  that  the  Latin  accent  was  so 
heavily  stressed  as  English  or  German,  for  instance, 
but,  just  as  in  French  the  phenomena  of  syncope 
and  vowel  reduction  abundantly  prove  the  stress 
character  of  the  accent  (although  a  musical  accent 
seems  to  have  been  added  later),  so  in  Latin,  the 
same  phenomena  prove  that  the  essential  differ- 
ence between  the  accented  and  unaccented  syl- 
lables  of  a  word  was  a  stress   and  not  a  pitch 

1  Vendryes,  op.  cit.  p.  31.  2  Instit.  Or  at.  xii.  10,  33. 

3  A.  J.  P.  vol.  xx.  p.  207. 


WORD  ACCENT        '  21 

difference.  This  stress  difference  may  have  been 
almost  unnoticeable  under  ordinary  circumstances, 
when  one  was  speaking  remissione  et  moderatione 
vocis}  —  even  in  English,  in  quiet  conversation  the 
voice  rises  and  falls  as  much  at  least  as  it  strength- 
ens and  weakens,  —  but  when  the  voice  was  raised 
for  any  reason,2  it  did  become  apparent,  as  it  un- 
questionably does  in  French  to-day.  It  would, 
frankly,  be  impossible  to  imagine  a  pitch  accent 
entirely  without  differences  of  stress,  or  a  stress 
accent  unaccompanied  by  a  rise  and  fall  of  the 
voice,  because  in  the  effort  to  produce  a  higher 
tone  we  unconsciously  use  more  energy,  and  vice 
versa.  Now  if,  as  we  have  seen  reason  to  believe, 
Greek  in  the  time  of  Varro  and  Cicero  had  already 
begun  to  show  traces  of  the  change  that  has  made 
modern  Greek  a  stressed  language,  the  difference 
between  a  pitch  accent  with  a  growing  tendency 
toward  stress,  and  a  stress  accent  accompanied  — 
as  in  the  Romance  languages  —  by  a  musical  tone, 
may,  not  unreasonably,  have  escaped  the  notice  of 
men  eager  only  to  find  resemblances. 

In  conclusion,  I  quote  three  of  the  later  gram- 
marians, because,  while  their  contemporaries  and 
successors  were  still  repeating  by  rote  the  worn-out 
precepts  borrowed  from  the  Greek,  their  remarks 
show   a   quite  modern   spirit  of  experimentation. 

1  Cic.  Brut.  xci.  314. 

2  Cf.  Servius's  suggestion  for  determining  the  accented  syllable 
of  a  word,  quoted  below. 


22        THE  STRESS  ACCENT  IN  LATIN  POETRY 

Servius 1  (fourth  century) :  "  Accentus  in  ea  syllaba 
est,  quae  plus  sonat.  Quam  rem  deprehendimus, 
si  fingimus  nos  (ad)  aliquem  longe  positum  cla- 
mare.  Invenimus  enim  naturali  ratione  illam 
syllabam  plus  sonare,  quae  retinet  accentum  atque 
usque  eodem  nisum  vocis  ascendere."  Pompeius  2 
(fifth  century)  takes  Servius's  hint  and  enlarges 
upon  it.  "  Et  quo  modo  invenimus  ipsum  accen- 
tum ?  et  hoc  traditum  est.  Sunt  plerique  qui 
naturaliter  non  habent  acutas  aures  ad  capiendos 
hos  accentus  et  inducitur  hac  arte.  Finge  tibi 
quasi  vocem  clamantis  ad  longe  aliquem  positum. 
Ut  puta  finge  tibi  aliquem  illo  loco  contra  stare  et 
clama  ad  ipsum ;  cum  coeperis  clamare,  naturalis 
ratio  exigit,  ut  unam  syllabam  plus  dicas  a  reliquis 
illius  verbi ;  et  quam  videris  plus  sonare  a  ceteris, 
ipsa  habet  accentum.  Ut  puta  si  dicas  orator,  quae 
plus  sonat  ?  -ra  ipsa  habet  accentum.  optimus,  quae 
plus  sonat?  ilia  quae  prior  est.  Numquid  sic 
sonat  -ti  et  -tnus,  quemadmodum  op  f  Ergo  necesse 
est,  ut  ilia  syllaba  habeat  accentum,  quae  plus  sonat 
a  reliquis,  quando  clamorem  fingimus."  In  an- 
other place  Pomponius  writes  : 3  "  Et  quid  est  ipse 
accentus  ?  ita  definitus  est :  accentus  est  quasi 
anima  vocis,  id  est  accentus  est  anima  verborum  et 
anima  vocis  uniuscuiusque.  Quemadmodum  cor- 
pus nostrum  non  potest  esse  sine  anima,  sic  nee 

1  Comment,  in  Donat.  p.  426,  16  K. 

2  p.  127,  1  K. 
8  p.  126,  27  K. 


WORD  ACCENT  23 

ullum  verbum  nee  ullus  sermo  sine  accentu  potest 
esse.  Et  quemadmodum  anima  nostra  in  toto 
corpore  ipsa  plus  potest,  sic  etiam  ilia  syllaba  plus 
sonat  in  toto  verbo,  quae  accentum  habet.  Ergo 
ilia  syllaba,  quae  accentum  habet  plus  sonat,  qua- 
si ipsa  habet  maiorum  potestatem."  Diomedes  : 
(fourth  century)  writes:  "  Accentus  est  acutus  vel 
gravis  vel  inflexa  elatio  orationis  vocisve,  intentio 
vel  inclinatio  acuto  aut  inflexo  sono  regens  verba. 
Nam  ut  nulla  vox  sine  vocali  est,  ita  sine  accentu 
nulla  est;  et  est  accentus,  ut  quidam  recte  puta- 
verunt,  velut  anima  vocis."  This  remark,  it  seems 
to  me,  shows  very  careful  observation.  Looked  at 
from  one  point  of  view  the  accent  was  elatio,  from 
another,  it  was  intentio.  To  see  that  it  was  really 
both,  would  have  been  too  much  to  expect  so  long 
before  the  days  of  Experimental  Psychology. 

1 1.  430,  29  K. 


II 

NUMERI   ITALICI    ET   SATURNII 

The  first  utterances  of  every  people  are  in  verse, 
not  verse  in  the  sense  of  a  definite  arrangement  of 
syllables  that  inevitably  strikes  the  ear  as  different 
from  the  prose  arrangement,  but  words  forced  into 
a  rude  kind  of  rhythm  by  being  chanted  again  and 
again  in  worship  of  some  god  or  over  the  daily 
tasks  that  are  shared  in  common.1  Now  whatever 
view  may  be  held  of  the  nature  of  ictus  in  quanti- 
tative poetry,  there  can  be  no  two  opinions  of  the 
nature  of  the  beat  in  music.  In  the  most  primitive 
and  the  most  sophisticated  music  alike,  the  down 
beat  is  the  stressed  beat  —  the  placing  of  the  foot 
on  the  first  syllable  of  the  measure.  We  are  all 
perfectly  familiar  with  the  transformation  of  prose 
into  rhythm  by  being  chanted  :  — 

Our  Father  which  art  in  Heaven 
Hallowed  be  thy  name, 

or  Du  fond  de  l'abime  je  crie  vers  toi 

O,  mon  Dieu. 

1  Bowditch,  Mission  to  Ashantee ;  Westphal,  Einleitung,  Allge- 
meine  Metrik ;  du  Meril,  Introd.  Poesies  Populaires  latines  au 
doiizihne  siecle,  Paris,  1843. 

24 


NUMERI  I  TALI  CI  ET  SATURNII  2$ 

Moreover,  if,  after  centuries  of  quantitative  poetry, 
the  Christian  hymns  became  purely  accentual  by 
being  chanted  in  the  service  of  the  Church,  —  the 
singing  was  at  first  congregational  and  only  grad- 
ually restricted  to  the  priests,  —  much  more  would 
the  first  primitive  chants  base  their  rhythm  on  the 
accent  of  the  words.  As  we  have  seen,  this  accent, 
in  the  Italic  dialects  as  well  as  Latin,  was  one  of 
stress,  nor  is  it  thinkable  that  the  stress  of  the 
chant  and  the  natural  stress  of  the  words  should 
not  coincide.  This  stress  was  helped  out  by  allit- 
eration of  the  accented  syllable,  and  by  the  endless 
repetition  both  of  final  syllables  and  of  entire 
words.  So  the  chant  to  Mars  on  the  Iguvine 
Tablets  is  rhythmical :  — 

Serfe  Martie 
Prestota  Cerfier  |  Cerfier  Martier 
Tursa  Cerfier  |  (Jerfer  Martier 
Totam  Tarsinatem  |  trifom  Tarsinatem 
Tuscer  Naharcer  |  Jabuscer  nomner 
)^  nerf  cihitu  |  ancihitu 

jovie  hostata  |  anhostatu 
tursitu  tremitu  |  sonitu  savitu 
ninctu  nepitu  |  hondu  holtu 
preplohatu  |  previclatu. 

Very  similar  is  the  Old  Latin  chant  to  Mars, 
quoted  by  Cato  : 2  — 

1  De  Re  Rustic  a,  141. 


26        THE  STRESS  ACCENT  IN  LATIN  POETRY 

/  r  r  / 

Mars  pater  te  precor 

quaesoque  uti  sies  |  volens  propitius 

mihi  domo  |  familiaeque  nostrae. 

quoius  rei  ergo 

agrum  terram  |  fundumque  meum 

suovetaurilibus  [  circumagi  iussi, 

uti  tu  morbos  |  visos  invisosque 

viduertatem  |  vastitudinemque 

calamitates  |  intemperiasque 

proibessis,  defendas  averuncesque ; 

/  f  f  r  \  / 

ut  fruges  frumenta  |  vineta  virgultaque 
grandire  dueneque  |  ev\nire  siris,   \L 
pastores  pecuaque  |  salva  servassis 
duisque  dubnam  salutem  |  valetudinemque 
mihi,  domo  |  familiaeque  nostrae : 
j      harumce  rerum  ergo 
L  j        fundi  serrae  |  agrique  mei 

lustrandi  lustrique  |  faciendi  ergo, 
sic  uti  dixi : 

(Mars  pater)  macte  hisce  lactentibus 
suovetaurilibus  |  immolandis  esto. 

Alliteration,  as  Westphal  has  pointed  out,1  is  not 
the  underlying  principle  of  the  verse,  though  it  is 
of  frequent  occurrence.  Repetition,  indeed,  both 
of  sounds  and  of  entire  words,  is  the  invariable 
characteristic  of  a  poetry  based  on  stress.  Still 
frequent  in  the  verses  of  Plautus  and  Terence, 
there  is  a  visible  falling  off  both  of  alliteration  and 

1  Op.  cit.  p.  220. 


NUMERI  ITALIC/  ET  SATURNII  27 

of  the  various  forms  of  Reimart,  during  the  Classi- 
cal Period,  when  stress  was  subordinated  to  quan- 
tity. Yet  even  here  there  is  a  difference.  In  the 
smooth  hexameters  of  Ovid,  which  show  sixty-five 
per  cent  of  accords  between  quantity  and  word 
accent,  repetition  both  of  words  and  sounds  is 
especially  frequent,  as  it  is  in  the  more  familiar 
Eclogues  of  Vergil,  —  the  eighth,  for  example.  In 
the  popular  and  semi-popular  poetry  of  the  first 
three  centuries  of  the  Christian  era,  when  quantity 
and  word  accent  tend  more  and  more  to  coincide, 
assonance,  repetition  of  words  and  phrases,  and 
even  rhyme  are  increasingly  frequent,  until  in  the 
Christian  hymns,  stress  and  rhyme  are  the  two 
almost  equally  important  principles  of  the  verse. 

For  the  remaining  fragments  of  Latin  verse, 
prior  to  the  Saturnians,  I  shall  content  myself  with 
those  the  text  of  which  is  reasonably  complete. 
It  would  be  idle  to  quote  the  Carmen  Sa/zare,  for 
example,  which  was  unintelligible  to  the  Romans 
themselves  in  the  time  of  Horace,  and  which  has 
been  emended  by  Baehrens 2  and  by  Zander,2  to 
give  only  two  authors,  in  the  most  widely  different 
manner. 

Carmen  Fratrum  Arvalizim2,  (inscribed  on  a 
marble  tablet,  discovered  in  1778  and  now  in  the 
Vatican) :  — 

1  Poetae  Latini  Minores,  vol.  vi.  p.  29. 

2  Versus  Italici  Antiqui,  Lund,  1 890,  p.  29. 

3  Zander,  op.  cit.  p.  25. 


28        THE  STRESS  ACCENT  IN  LATIN  POETRY 


Neve  luem  ruem  Marmar,    . 

1   three  times 


Enos  Lases  iuvate.  —  three  times 

sms  mcurrere  in  pleores.    J 
Satur  fu  fere  Ma(vo)rs 
U      limen  sali  sta  berber 


\  three  times 


\  three  times 


Semunis  alternei 

\  r  * 

advocapit  cunctos 

r  r  / 

Enos  Marmor  iuvato  —  three  times 

'  '  ' 

Triumpe,  triumpe,  triumpe 

triumpe,  triumpe  (triumpe). 

The    prayer    to    Jupiter    Dapalis,    quoted    by 
Cato:1  — 

Jupiter  Dapalis 

f  /  r 

quod  tibi  fieri 

oportet  in-domo 

familia  mea 

calignam  vini  dapi 

eius  rei  ergo 

macte  illace  dape 

\        /        / 
pollucenda  esto. 

The  Drinking-song  from  Varro.2    Zander  unnec- 
essarily changes  the  order  of  the  words. 

r  f  r  / 

Novum  vetus  vinum  bibo, 

•  /  r  / 

Novo  veteri  morbo  medeor. 

A  charm  against   foot-ache,  quoted  by  Varro.3 
The  person  using  this  charm  was  to  sing  it  over 

1  De  R.  R.  c.  132.        2  De  L.  L.  vi.  21.         s  De  R.  R.  i.  12,  27. 


NUMERI  I  TALI  CI  ET  SATURNII  29 

twenty-seven  times,  to  touch  the  ground,  and  to 
spit. 

Terra  pestem  teneto 

Salus  hie  maneto. 

A  charm  against  sprains,  quoted  by  Cato:1  — 

/         /  / 

Huat,  hanat,  huat 

/  r  * 

ista,  pista,  sista. 

/  r         * 

dannabo  danna  ustra. 

A  charm  against  tumours  and  inflammations 
quoted  by  Pliny.2  The  person  was  to  say  it  over 
three  times  and  spit  on  the  ground  three  times. 

Reseda,  morbis,  reseda 
scin,  scin  quis  hic-pullus 
egerit  radices 
nee  caput  nee  pedes  habeant. 

An  old  saw  quoted  by  Festus,  p.  93 :  — 

Hiberno  pulvere  verno  luto 
Grandia  farra,  camille  metes. 

The  words  of  the  goal-post,  which  marks  the 
end  of  the  race,  to  the  defeated  runner,  quoted  by 
Porphyrio  on  Horace:3  — 

Quisquis  ad  me  novissimus 
venerit,  habeat,  scabiem. 

Lucien  M tiller  rewrites,  Habeat  scabiem   quisquis 

1  De  R.  R.  c.  160.  2  Hist.  Nat.  xxvii.  131. 

3  Ars  Poetica,  1.  417. 


30        THE  STRESS  ACCENT  IN  LATIN  POETRY 

ad  me  venerit  novissimus,  destroying  both  the 
rhythm  and  the  spirit,  for  the  three  dactylic  beats 
at  the  end  represent  the  last  desperate  sprint  of 
the  runner  and  the  sneer  of  the  goal-post  at  his 
lack  of  success. 

All  the  foregoing  quotations,  with  the  possible 
exception  of  the  last  two,  are  in  the  nature  of 
chants,  repeated  over  and  over  again,  as  children 
repeat  in  their  play.  There  are  three  or  four 
measures  in  the  musical  phrase,  the  down  beat 
falling  on  the  primary  or  secondary  accent  of  the 
word.  This  accented  syllable  is  usually  (though 
not  always)  a  long  syllable,  for  quantity  is  an 
inherent  principle  in  Latin  derived  from  the  Indo- 
European  parent  speech.  Further,  the  movement 
of  the  voice  is  from  the  accented  to  the  unaccented 
syllable  —  the  most  natural  cadence  in  Latin  — 
with  an  occasional  anacrusis,  common  to  both 
music  and  poetry,  and  made  perfectly  familiar  to 
us  by  its  use  in  the  Christian  hymns.  It  is  inter- 
esting to  note  that  the  phrase  consisting  of  three 
measures  —  by  far  the  more  usual  —  Enos,  Lases 
iuvate  I  J  |  J  J~l  I  J  J  II  or  lupiter  Dapalis 
J  J  |  J  J  |  J  J  ||  for  example,  shows  the  type  of  the 
first  and  second  half-verses  in  the  Saturnians 
where  the  strong  caesura  in  the  middle  of  the  line 
points  to  a  composite  nature. 

Closely  analogous  to  the  primitive  chant  are  the 
Sentential  or  maxims  of  everyday  life.1    They,  too, 

1  Zander,  op.  cit.  pp.  1-19. 


NUMERI  I  TALI  CI  ET  SAT  URN II  3 1 

have  the  unmistakable  ear-marks  of  a  popular 
origin  ;  namely,  a  strong  stress  rhythm,  alliteration, 
and  the  frequent  repetition  of  words;  since,  by 
reason  of  these  three  elements,  such  maxims  are 
easy  to  remember,  give  greater  pleasure  in  repeat- 
ing, and  seem  to  carry  more  authority.  Our  own 
proverbs  are  precisely  similar  in  nature  :  — 

Many  men,  many  minds. 
Nothing  succeeds  like  success. 
Money  makes  the  mare  go. 
Be  sure  your  sins  will  find  you  out. 

Latin  writers  are  fond  of  quoting  these  bits  of 
popular  wisdom.  Cicero  has  a  large  number,  gen- 
erally accompanied  by  some  such  expression  as 
in  proverbii  consuetudinem  venit,  or  tit  est  in  vetere 
proverbio  :  — 

Quot  homines  tot  sententiae.1 
Largitio  fundum  non  habet.2 
Fortes  fortuna  adiuvant.3 
Summum  ius  summa  iniuria. 
Minima  de  malis.5 

The  talk  of  Petronius'  petits  bourgeois  is  full  of 
proverbs,  especially  is  this  the  case  in  the  Cena 

TrimalcJiionis :  — 

1  De  Fin.  i.  15.  2  De  Off.  ii.  55. 

3  Tusc.  ii.  1 1 .     Cf.  the  similar  Di  facientes  ddiuvant,  Varro,  R.  R. 
i.  1,  4. 

4  De  Off.  i.  33.  5  De  Off.  iii.  102,  105. 


32        THE  STRESS  ACCENT  IN  LATIN  POETRY 

/  *  r  f 

Post  asellum  diaria  non  sumo 1 

Sociorum  olle  male  fervet.2 

Qui  asinum  non  potest,  stratum  caedit.3 

Colubra  restem  non  parit.4 

Quod  hodie  non  est  eras  erit. 

In-alio  peduclum  in-te  ricinum  non  vides. 

Semper  in  hac-re,  qui  vincitur  vincit.7 

Assem  habeas,  assem  valeas.8 

Varro,  Pliny,  Gellius,  the  Grammarians,  contain 
many  more.  Sometimes  a  proverb  is  quoted  by 
different  writers  with  a  slight  change  of  form,  or 
with  the  verb  omitted,  as  often  in  Cicero,  or  with 
only  the  characteristic  words  quoted.  For  ex- 
ample, Nonius  has  LSnge  fugit  qui  suos  fugit? 
and  Petronius,  LSnge  fugit  quisquis  suos  fiigit.10 
This  latter  I  agree  with  Zander  in  considering  a 
corrupt  form.  Multis  eget  qui  miilta  hdbet11  in 
Gellius,  while  Seneca  expresses  the  same  idea, 
Qui  miiltum  hdbet  phis  ciipit.^2,  Non  semper 
Saturnalia  erunt}z  in  Seneca;  Semper  Saturna- 
lia1^ (agunt)  and  Dii  pedes  landtos  habent}^  in 
Petronius ;  while  Macrobius 16  writes,  "  atque  inde 
prov erbium  ducttim  deos  laneos  pedes  habere"  and 
Porphyrio  on  Horace's  words  deseruit  pede  Poena 

1  Petron.  24.  7  Petron.  59.  13  Sen.  Apocol.  12. 

2  Petron.  38.  8  Petron.  77.  14  Petron.  44. 

3  Petron.  45.  9  Nonius  204.  22.  15  Petron.  44. 

4  Petron.  45.  10  Petron.  43.  16  Mac.  i.  8,  5. 

5  Petron.  45.  u  Gell.  ix.  8.  I. 

6  Petron.  57.  12  Sen.  Ep.  119.  6. 


NUMERI  I  TALI  CI  ET  SATURNII  33 

claudo}  "hoc  proximum  est  Mi  quod  dicitur  deos 
iratos  pedes  lanatos  habere." 

Far  more  important  than  the  Numeri  Italici  just 
considered,  are  the  Numeri  Saturnii,  over  which  a 
long  and  bitter  struggle  has  raged  between  those 
who  advocate  a  quantitative  and  those  who  advo- 
cate an  accentual  basis  of  versification.  In  favour 
of  the  Quantitative  Theory  it  may  be  urged  that 
it  is  the  view  of  all  the  Latin  writers  who  treat  of 
the  measure  from  Caesius  Bassus  down,  and  against 
it,  that  it  requires  the  arbitrary  lengthening  of 
a  very  large  number  of  naturally  short  syllables. 
The  Accentual  Theory  is  in  harmony  with  all  we 
know  of  popular  Latin  verse,  but,  on  the  other 
hand,  it  requires  a  secondary  accent  on  words  of 
four  syllables,  like  Cornelius,  for  example,  and, 
unless  we  accept  Thurneysen's  (and  Lindsay's) 
theory  of  but  two  accents  in  the  second  half -verse, 
a  binary  accent  on  words  of  three  syllables  accented 
on  the  antepenult,  as  maximas.  Zander2  lessens 
the  number  of  syllables  arbitrarily  lengthened,  by 
suggesting  an  alternation  of  rhythm  between  the 
first  and  second  half -verses  ;  the  first,  though  regu- 
larly iambic,  may  become  trochaic,  and  the  second 
may  become  iambic.  This  view  he  supports  by 
ancient  verses,  like  — 

/  f  f     u  / 

Hiberno  pulvere  luto  verno 

/  f  r  r 

Grandia  farra,  camille,  metes. 

1  Porph.  ad  Od.  iii.  2,  32.  2  Op.  cit.  p.  ii. 

D 


34        THE  STRESS  ACCENT  IN  LATIN  POETRY 

But  such  an  alternation  of  rhythm  seems  utterly 
out  of  place  in  an  unaffected  primitive  verse.  As 
du  Meril  well  says,  "  La  nature  des  langues  exerce 
done  une  influence  preponderante  sur  la  premiere 
forme  du  vers ;  on  utilise  les  elements  d'harmonie 
qu'elles  possedent,  sans  songer  a  augmenter  les 
difncultes  de  sa  tache  par  des  innovations  sans 
raison  et  sans  but.  Dans  presque  toutes,  la  desi- 
nence des  mots  n'a  qu'une  valeur  grammaticale  ou 
meme  purement  euphonique,  la  syllable  radicale, 
celle  dont  l'accentuation  domine  la  prononciation 
des  autres,  est  la  premiere,  et  le  mouvement  natu- 
rel  de  la  voix  va  du  temps  fort  au  temps  faible."1 
The  difficulty  of  Zander's  theory  is  increased  by 
the  fact  that  the  alternation  of  rhythm  may  take 
place  not  only  between  the  two  halves  of  a  line, 
as  in, — 

Grandia  farra,  camille  metes, 
but  between  successive  feet,  — 

Hiberno  pulvere  luto  verno. 
To  Zander's  bibliography 2  need  only  be  added 
the  quantitative  treatment  of  Klotz3  and  of  Rei- 
chardt4  (scarcely  more  than  a  restatement);  and 
the  accentual  treatment  of  Westphal  in  his  chap- 
ter "  Die  accentuirenden  Verse  der  alten  Italiker,"  5 

1  Op.  cit.  p.  50  et  s. 

2  Op.  cit.  p.  xix  et  ss. 

8  Grundzilge  altromischer  Metrik,  Leipzig,  1890,  p.  97  ss. 
*  Jahrbucher  fur  Klassische  Philologie  (Suppl.),  xix.  p.  207. 
5  Allgemeine  Metrik,  Berlin,  1892.  p.  220  ss. 


NUMERI  I  TALI  CI  ET  SATURNII  35 

of  Lindsay,1  who  follows  Thurneysen 2  in  making 
the  verse  one  of  five  accents,  and  of  Gleditsch,3 
who  makes  it  one  of  eight,  like  the  Old  German 
Lang ze  He. 

Caesius  Bassus,4  the  most  ancient  authority  on 
the  Saturnian  metre,  makes  it  a  purely  quantita- 
tive verse.  His  scheme  for  the  first  half  is  iam- 
bic, w  _  w  _  v_/  _  f  and  for  the  second  trochaic, 
—  w  _  \j  _  w,  though  he  acknowledges  that  many 
of  the  verses  are  either  too  long  or  too  short  to  fit 
the  scheme.  "  Nostri  autem  antiqui,  ut  vere  dicam 
quod  apparet,  usi  sunt  eo  {i.e.  Saturnio  versu)  non 
observata  lege  nee  uno  genere  custodito,  (ut)  inter 
se  consentiant  versus,  sed  praeterquam  quod  duris- 
simos  fecerunt,  etiam  alios  breviores,  alios  longiores 
inseruerunt,  ut  vix  invenerim  apud  Naevius,  quos  pro 
exemplo  ponerem."  As  a  matter  of  fact,  none  of 
the  extant  Saturnians  fits  Caesius  Bassus's  scheme 
perfectly,  the  quantities  of  the  "  model "  verse, 
Dabunt  malum  Metelli  \  Nacvio  poetae  are  ^  —  ^  — 

^ |_w_^ ,  so  that  it  would  almost  seem 

to  be  the  one  thing  which  the  Saturnians  are  not. 

The  arguments  against  the  Quantitative  Theory, 
stated  briefly,  are  as  follows  :  — 

A.   The  clash  between  word  accent  and  quantity 

1  A.  J.  P.  vol.  xiv.  pp.  139  ss.  303  ss. 

2  Der  Saturnier,  Halle,  1885. 

3  Rhetorick  und  Metrik  der  Griechen  und  Rower,  in  I.  Miil- 
ler's  Handbtich,  2  Bd.  p.  820  ss.    Miinchen,  1901. 

4  Keil,  vi.  1.  p.  265  et  s. 


36        THE  STRESS  ACCENT  IN  LATIN  POETRY 

is  exceedingly  harsh  in  a  majority  of  the  lines;  for 
instance,  — 

f  r  * 

Subigit  omne  Loucanam 

/  /  / 

Runcus  atque  Porpureus 

Ne  quaeratis  honore, 

so  harsh  and  so  frequent  indeed,  as  to  make  it 
thoroughly  unnatural  in  a  popular  verse.  Espe- 
cially does  this  seem  to  be  the  case  when  the 
Saturnians  are  compared  in  this  respect,  with  the 
earlier  popular  verses,  with  the  popular  poetry  of 
the  Classical  Period  itself,  like  the  Mille-song  of 
Aurelian's  legions,  in  which  there  is  little  or  no 
clash  between  word  accent  and  quantity,  with  the 
semi-popular  poetry  of  the  early  centuries  of  the 
Christian  era,  and  with  the  Christian  hymns. 

B.  Aside  from  final  syllables,  it  must  be  con- 
fessed that  the  number  of  short  syllables  arbitra- 
rily lengthened  is  not  great.  Lucius ;  however, 
with  long  i  is  contradicted,  not  only  by  every  ex- 
ample of  the  word  in  early  Latin  poetry,  but  by 
the  evidence  of  Oscan  Luvkis  (nom.  sing,  of  stem 
Loucio)]1  and  the  argument  for  long  i  in  early 
Latin  from  modern  Italian  Lucio  has  even  less 
weight  than  for  long  e  in  the  penult  of  mulierem, 
for  the  same  period.  There  is,  moreover,  no 
authority  for  long  u  in  puer,  parisuma,  nor  long  i 
in  viro  (Ind.-Eur.  *wzro,  but  vir  in  Latin).  The 
treatment  of  this  word   (viro,   1.  2    in    the  first 

1  Lindsay,  op.  cit.  p.  158. 


NUMERI  I  TALI  CI  ET  SATURNII  37 

Scipio  Inscription  virum,  1.  32  in  the  epitaph  of 
Atilius  Calatinus)  by  the  adherents  of  the  Quan- 
titative Theory  is  interesting.     Weil  and  Benloew 2 

scan  — 

.»         /        /         /        / 

Bonorum  optimum  fujisse  virum 

Populi  primarium  fu.isse  virum 

with  the  remark,  "  Virum  a  la  place  d'un  trochee 
est  tres-choquant,  nous  l'avouons  ;  mais  les  liquides 
se  redoublent  facilement,  surtout  apres  une  voyelle 
aigue :  l'auteur  aura  fait  violence  a  la  langue  en 
pronongant  virrotn.  C'est  done  la  un  effet  d'accent, 
mais  un  effet  tout  exceptionnel.  .  .  .  N'oublions 
pas  que  nous  avons  affaire  a  une  versification  nais- 
sante,  qui  tantot  force  la  prononciation  au  profit  du 
vers,  tantot  sacrifice  le  mouvement  du  vers  aux 
obstacles  qu'y  oppose  une  langue  encore  rude  et 
peu  fa^onnee  au  tour  poetique."  Bartsch  2  (with 
others)  adds  the  genitive  plural.     He  reads  :  — 

Duonoro  optimo  fujise  viro  (viroro). 

Havet,3  whose  exhaustive  treatise  leaves  no  line,  or 
fragment  of  a  line,  unconsidered,  reads  :  — 

Duo[noro  |  opti|mo  (     )  fu  ise  vi|ro  (     )  | 

Popu  li  pri|mari|um  (     )  fuijse  vir]um  (    ). 

1  Theorie  Generate  de  V Accentuation  Latine,  Paris  and  Berlin, 
1855,  p.  97- 

2  Der  Saturnische  Vers  und  Die  Altdeutsche  Langzeile,  Leipzig, 
1867. 

3  De  Saturnio  Latinorum  Versu,  Paris,  1880,  p.  223. 


38        THE  STRESS  ACCENT  IN  LATIN  POETRY 

These  he  calls  Saturnia  disticha  and  thinks  they 
may  have  been  of  the  nature  of  formulae.  In  the 
two  lines  of  Naevius,  however,  where  the  word 
occurs  in  the  same  position  (11.  58,  84),  he  ex- 
pressly states  that  the  i  is  long,  adding,  "  Sane 
mirum  est  vlri  latine  correptum  esse.  Sed  simili 
modo  perierare  pro  periurare  habemus,  quod  adhuc 
explicatione  caret;  neque  magis  scimus  cur  dica- 
tur  humanus  et  homo,  publicus  et  populo"  1 

Klotz,2  who  allows  but  four  feet  to  the  measure, 
reads : — 

'         '  '    ' 

Bonorum  optimum  |  fuise  virum. 

Zander3  has  recourse  to  his  theory  of  alternation 
of  rhythm  in  all  four  lines,  and  reads :  — 

Duonoro  optimo  |  fuise  viro 
Populi  primarium  |  fuise  virum,  etc. 

Reichardt 4  follows  Zander's  marking,  but  sug- 
gests that  the  suppression  of  the  last  thesis  was  a 
liberty  of  which  the  writers  of  the  Saturnians,  on 
occasion,  availed  themselves,  not  only  in  epitaphs, 
fui\se  vi\ro  (  )  |  where  Havet  finds  it,  but  in  Epic 
poetry  as  well. 

C.  The  strongest  argument,  however,  is  the 
very  large  number  of  final  syllables  arbitrarily 
lengthened  under  the  arsis  (Klotz  does  not  fail  to 
see   that   this  strengthens  the  argument   for   the 

1  De  Saturnio  Latinorum  Versu,  p.  85.  2  Op.  cit.  p.  99. 

3  Op.  cit.  pp.  60  and  58.  4  Op.  cit.  p.  224. 


NUMERI  ITALICI  ET  SATURNII  39 

accentual  nature  of  the  verse).  The  syllables  thus 
lengthened  include,  not  only  those,  like  the  a  of 
the  nom.  sing,  in  the  1st.  decl.  and  of  the  nom. 
pi.  neut,  which  though  originally  long,  had  been 
shortened  before  the  time  of  the  oldest  Latin 
poetry,1  but  also  those  that  were  never  long  at 
any  period  of  the  language,  like  -bits 2  in  the  dat. 
and  abl.  pi.  and  -que,  atque,  etc.  I  quote  Havet's3 
classes  of  lengthened  final  syllables  :  — 

"  i.  Nominativus  primae  declinationis,  ut  terra,  mea, 
sancta,  tua,  forma,  fama,  vita,  divina,  hasta,  ea,  cura, 
parisuma,  ferocia,  filia,  Proserpina  ; 

ii.  Nominativus  secundae  declinationis,  ut  Runcus,  in- 
feros,  inclitus,  Putins,  fortasse,  faber  ; 

iii.   Vocativus,  ut  summe,  Laertie ; 

iv.    Neutrum  plurali  numero,  ut  exta,  patria,  occisa  ; 

v.    Nominativus  tertiae  declinationis,  ut  mare,  acer ; 

vi.    Genitivus,  ut  regis  ; 

vii.  Dativus  vel  ablativus  plurali  numero,  ut  Te?npesta- 
tebus,  piscibus,  capitibus. 

viii.  Neutrum  plurali  numero,  ut  omnia,  pec  tor  a, 
atrocia,  sagmina  ; 

ix.    Numerale,  ut  fortasse,  quinque  ; 

x.  Verbum,  ut  obliviscere,  insece  ;  subigit,facit;  quaira- 
tis  ;  cante  ;  pellere,  fuisse  ; 

xi.  Adverbium,  ut  facile ;  comiter ;  hice ;  quamde, 
deinde ;  semul ;  -que,  atque,  itaque ;  fortasse  cume." 

1  Lindsay,  Lat.  Lang.  p.  371. 

2  Lindsay,  Lat.  Lang.  p.  403,  from  an  original  -bhos. 

3  Havet,  op.  cit.  p.  57  ss. 


40        THE  STRESS  ACCENT  IN  LATIN  POETRY 

The  ablative  singular  of  the  third  declension  he 
considers  a  doubtful  case  of  lengthening  for  two 
reasons :  (i)  because  of  the  two  endings  -e  and  -I, 
corresponding  to  the  two  endings  of  the  accusative 
-em  and  -im  and  the  two  endings  of  the  genitive 
plural  -urn  and  turn;  and  (2)  because  instead  of  -e, 
-ed  might  have  been  written  at  this  period,  for  ex- 
ample, patred,  loved,  ordined,  rumored,  pulvered. 
But  there  are  only  a  few  instances  of  I  in  the 
ablative  singular  of  consonant  stems,1  and  the  ex- 
tension of  the  ablatival  d,  especially  to  such  a 
word  as  love,  is  very  doubtful.  It  is  persistently 
written  in  the  S.  C.  de  Bacchanalibus  of  186  B.C., 
but  as  persistently  omitted  in  a  nearly  contempo- 
rary inscription,2  nor  is  there  any  trace  of  d  in  the 
ablative  of  nouns  in  Plautus  and  the  earliest 
Dramatic  literature.3  It  may  be  remarked  in  pass- 
ing, that  inasmuch  as  the  ablative  suffix  in  d  ap- 
pears to  be  confined  in  Ind.-Eur  to  O-stems,  the 
same  argument  that  caused  Havet  to  lengthen 
Latin  vlr  (from  Ind.-Eur.  *wlro)  should  have  pre- 
vented his  extension  of  the  ablatival  d  beyond 
O-stems  in  Latin. 

Thurneysen,4  and  Lindsay  in  his  two  suggestive 
articles,5  allow  but  two  accents  to  the  second  half- 
verse.  Against  this,  the  following  considerations 
may  be  urged :  — 

1  Neue,  i.2  p.  212  et  ss.         2  C.  I.  L.  ii.  5041,  Spain,  of  189  B.C. 
3  Lindsay,  op.  cit.  p.  391.      4  Op.  cit.  p.  13  ss.     5  Op.  cit.  p.  303  ss. 


NUMERI  I  TALI  CI  ET  SATURNII  4 1 

A.  It  is,  to  say  the  least,  very  difficult  to  find 
a  primitive  verse  with  just  five  accents.  Bartsch 
postulates  an  original  common  Epic  verse  for  all 
Indo-Germanic  poetry,  consisting  of  eight  feet, 
with  a  caesura  after  the  fourth  foot.  From  this 
root  form  he  derives  the  Greek  hexameter  and  the 
Saturnians,  as  well  as  the  Indian  sloka  and  the  Old 
German  Langzeile}  A  verse  with  eight  accents 
(the  trochaic  septenarian)  is  the  favourite  metre  of 
the  soldiers'  songs  in  the  time  of  the  Caesars,  and 
recurs  in  the  Spanish  Epic ;  a  verse  of  eight  feet 
is  much  used  in  the  Byzantine  poetry  (though  that 
of  six  is  also  common)  and  in  the  poems  of  the 
Troubadours,  and,  divided  into  two  verses  of  four 
feet  each,  with  end  rhyme,  such  verse  is  familiar  to 
us  from  the  Christian  hymns.  So  verses  of  four, 
six,  or  eight  feet,  seem  to  be  the  primitive,  spon- 
taneous form,  while  those  of  five  —  English  blank 
verse,  for  example  —  are  artificial  and  modern. 

B.  If  there  were  but  two  accents  in  the  second 
half-verse,  we  ought  to  find  Saturnians  in  which 
the  second  half  is  made  up  of  four  (or  even  three) 
syllables,  for  they,  according  to  the  rest  of  the 
scheme,  could  bear  two  accents,  and  this,  as  a  mat- 
ter of  fact,  we  do  not  find. 

C.  It  certainly  is  "strange,"  to  use  Lindsay's 
own  word,  that  consentiunt,  Calypsonem,  Aleriaque, 
etc.,  in  the  second  half-verse  should  receive  but  one 
accent,  while  words  of  four  syllables  in  the  first 

1  Cf.  Westphal,  op.  cit.  p.  56  et  s. 


42        THE  STRESS  ACCENT  IN  LATIN  POETRY 

half-verse  always  receive  two  accents,  and  even 
aetate  (1.  21),  with  three  syllables,  receives  two  — 
Aetate  quam  parva -1 

D.  A  half-verse  like  gloria  atque  ingenium  in 
the  third  Scipio  Inscription,  since  it  occurs  in  the 
last  half  of  the  line,  is  allowed  to  have  but  two 
accents,  although  it  consists  of  seven  syllables, 
and  if  it  stood  before  the  caesura  would  un- 
doubtedly receive  three.  Why  should  the  fact 
that  it  stands  after  the  caesura  deprive  the  syl- 
lables of  their  full  value  ?  The  same  may  be  asked 
with  regard  to 

Hone  vino  ploirume  consentiont  Ripmai) 

(the  inscription  of  Atilius  Calatinus  twice  quoted 
by  Cicero  and  ending  consentiunt  gentesy  makes 
the  two-syllabled  Romai  a  more  probable  conjec- 
ture than  Romanai)  and  also 

Hie  cepit  Corsica  Aleriaque  urbe. 

In  both  lines,2  the  number  of  syllables  before  and 
after  the  caesura  is  the  same,  but  the  six  syllables 
before  the  caesura  receive  three  accents,  while  the 
six  following  the  caesura  are  put  off  with  two. 

E.  The  second  half  of  the  line  is  the  more  im- 
portant, because  upon  it  the  attention  rests  during 
the  moment  of  adjustment  before  the  next  line  is 
begun ;  but  this  accentuation  makes  the  caesura  a 
precipice  over  which  the  verse  rushes,  to  end  with 

1  Lindsay,  op.  cit.  p.  314.  2  First  Scipio  Inscription. 


NUMERI  ITALICI  ET  SATURNII  43 

an  ignominious  splash  on  the  rocks  below.  In  the 
second  half-verse  fortis  vir  sapiensque}  Thurney- 
sen2  contents  himself  with  marking  the  syllable 
-ens,  in  sapiens que ;  Lindsay  goes  further  and  marks 
the  two  accents  fortis  vir  sapiensque,  thus  put- 
ting five  syllables  under  one  metrical  stress 
{fortis  vir  sapi-).  This  seems  like  a  theory  for  the 
theory's  sake,  inasmuch  as  the  poetry  has  wholly 
disappeared. 

F.  Caesius  Bassus,  Marius  Victorinus,  Terenti- 
anus  Maurus,  and  others3  — "  Unde  apud  omnes 
grammaticos  super  hoc  adhuc  non  parva  lis  est " 
—  agree  in  making  the  Saturnian  a  verse  of  six 
feet,  especially  are  they  sure  about  the  three 
trochees  in  the  last  half.  Now  the  later  quantita- 
tive treatment  of  Latin  verse  would  undoubtedly 
influence  their  view  of  the  character  and  disposi- 
tion of  the  syllables  in  the  feet;  but  the  strik- 
ing, the  fundamental,  part  of  a  verse,  the  part 
which  no  metrician  could  miss,  is  the  number  of 
feet.  Besides,  the  tendency  of  the  later  Satur- 
nians  is  to  become  longer,4  which  makes  Thurney- 
sen's  suggestion  5  at  least  a  possible  one,  that  when 
the  Saturnian  disappeared  from  literature, 
Sic  horridus  ille 
Defluxit  numerus  Saturnius,6 

1  Second  Scipio  Inscription.  2  Op.  cit.  p.  13. 

3  They  are  quoted  in  full  by  Havet,  op.  cit.  pp.  310-327. 

4  Cf.  the  quantitative  Saturnians  of  Terentianus  Maurus. 

5  Op.  cit.  p.  56.  6  Hor.  Ep.  ii.  1,  158,  9. 


44        THE  STRESS  ACCENT  IN  LATIN  POETRY 

it  continued  to  exist  among  the  common  people 
and  gradually  went  over  into  the  trochaic  septe- 
narian,  the  poor  man's  poetry,  a  few  examples  of 
which  are  preserved  by  Suetonius  and  others. 
But,  a  thing  which  he  does  not  appear  to  see,  the 
number  of  feet  in  each  half-verse  is  still  equal 
(four  instead  of  three),  and  the  second  half-verse, 
while  it  has  four  accents,  is  catalectic,  pointing  to 
the  smaller  number  of  syllables,  not  feet,  charac- 
teristic of  the  second  half-verse  of  the  Saturnians. 
Keller,1  whose  discussion  is,  on  the  whole,  the 
most  satisfactory  that  I  have  seen,  divides  the  ex- 
tant verses  into  "  strong  "  or  "  classical  "  Satur- 
nians, which,  incidentally,  fall  in  with  his  scheme, 
and  "older"  or  "cruder,"  which  do  not.  But 
there  is  not  a  shred  of  evidence  for  such  a  divi- 
sion. Why  should  we  suppose  that  the  floruit  of 
the  Saturnian  metre  was  reached  in  the  time  of 
Naevius  ?  Is  it  not  at  least  as  probable  that  the 
two  oldest  Scipio  Inscriptions  represent  the  purer 
native  tradition,  and  that  the  increased  number  of 
unaccented  syllables  in  the  third  Scipio  Inscription 
shows  a  more  pronounced  borrowing  from  the 
Greek  ?  Keller  enumerates  sixteen  rules  for  the 
"  strong  "  Saturnians,  certain  of  which2  apply  also 
to  the  others.      The  points  he  really  holds  to  are 

1  Otto  Keller,  Der  Saturnische  Vers  als  rhythmisch  erwiesen, 
Prague,  1883  ;  Keller,  Der  Saturnische  Vers,  2  Abhandl. 
Prague,  1886. 

2  Namely,  Rules  1,  3,  4,  6b,  9,  10,  na,  12,  14,  15,  16. 


NUMERI  ITALICI  ET  SATURNII  45 

three;1  namely,  the  strong  pause  in  the  middle  of 
the  line,  the  impossibility  of  two  accented  syllables 
following  each  other,  and  the  equal  impossibility 
of  either  half-verse  ending  in  an  accented 
syllable. 

Now  the  strong  pause  in  the  middle  of  the  line, 
naturally  at  the  end  of  a  word  —  for  Ritschl  has 
not  been  followed  by  the  more  modern  editors  in 
such  readings  as 

Hone  vino  ploirume  con  .  .  .  sentiont  R(oma?iai)  — 

is  the  least  disputed  characteristic  of  the  Satur- 
nians.  It  is,  moreover,  of  the  highest  importance, 
bringing  them  into  harmony  both  with  the  earlier 
Numeri  Italici  by  pointing  to  a  composite  nature, 
and,  through  the  Law  of  the  Last  Half,  with  the 
hexameter.  There  is  also  practical  unanimity 
among  the  adherents  of  the  Accentual  Theory,  in 
regard  to  the  accent  falling  on  the  penultimate 
syllable  of  each  half-verse.  For  toward  the  end, 
Thurneysen  seems  half  inclined  to  yield  his  ac- 
centuation of  apud-vos,  remarking  in  a  foot-note,2 
"  Auch  diese  Falle  schwinden,  wenn  man  mit 
Keller  apud-zws,  inter-se  betont.  Dann  ist  der  letzte 
Vers  accent  ebenso  fest  wie  der  erste."  But  Kel- 
ler's rule  that  two  accented  syllables  may  not  fol- 
low each  other  not  only  reduces  him  to  the  necessity 
of  declassing  the  oldest  and  best-authenticated 
Saturnians,  but  it  is  contradicted  by  the  general 

1  p.  39.  2  Op.  cit.  p.  49. 


46        THE  STRESS  ACCENT  IN  LATIN  POETRY 

usage  of  primitive  poetry.     To  mention  only  a  few- 
instances,  the  prayer  to  Mars,  above  cited,  — 

Mars  pater,  te  precor ; 

the  old  German  of  Otfrid's  Evangelienharmonie} — 

habt  er  in  war  min,2 
\        /         /  \ 
ist  sedat  sinaz,3 
\        /       /  \ 
iir  kind  ellu  ; 4 

the  old  English  poem  of  Beowulf,5  — 

falcom  gefraege 
lange  hvvile 

r        r  \  r 

ne  leof  ne  lad"; 
the  Cuckoo-song  of  the  French  peasantry,  — 

Jeunes  gens  qui  etes  a  marier 

Oh  !  ne  vous  mariez  pas  dans  le  moi  de  Mai ; 

J'ai  vu  le  coucou  ! !  !     Me,  Me, 

J'a  vu  le  coucou  !  !  !     Me,  Me ; 

and  the  familiar  child's  rhyme,  — 

Rain,  Rain,  go  away  ! 
Come  again  another  day  ! 

This  is   the  well-known  theory  of   a   "supressed 
thesis."     Otfried  Mueller  was  the  first  to  suggest 

1  Quoted  by  Westphal,  op.  cit.  p.  67  et  s. 

2  O.  iii.  2?.  3  O.  i.  547.  4  O.  iv.  2633. 

5  Quoted  by  Kaluza,  Der  Altenglische  Vers.,  Berlin,  1894  ;   part 
ii.  p.  7  ss. 


NUMERI  ITALICI  ET  SATURNII  47 

it,  though  in  applying  it  to  the  Saturnians  he  con- 
fined it  to  the  second  and  fifth  feet.  But  it  is  no 
invention  of  the  theorists,  it  is  rather  das  ewig 
kindliche  of  poetry. 

[L]  CORNELIO    L   F.  SCIPIO1 

[A]    IDILES.  COSOL  CESOR 

1.  Hone  oino  ploirume  consentiont  R(omai) 

2.  Duonoro  optimo  fuise  viro 

3.  Luciom  Scipione  filios  Barbati 

4.  (Co)nsol  censor  aidiles  hie  fuet  (apud-vos) 

5.  Hec  cepit  Corsica  Aleriaque  urbe 

6.  Dedet  Tempestatebus  Aidem  mereto  (votam) 
[LCORNELIO.jC  N.   F.  SCIPIO2 


7.  Cornelius  Lucius  Scipio  Barbatus 

8.  Gnaivod  patre  prognatus  fortis  vir  sapiensque 

9.  Quoius  forma  virtutei     f  parisuma  fuit 

10.  Consol  censor  aidilis       quei  fuit  apud-vos 

11.  Taurasia  Cisauna  Samnio  cepit 

(^12.   Subigit  omne  Loucanam  opsidesque  abdouxsit 

Wolfrlin3  thinks  the  prose  heading  of  (1-6)  is 
much  older  than  the  Saturnians  which  follow,  on 
account  of  the  ruder  form  of  the  letters,  on  account 

1  C.  I.  L.  i.  32.     Consul  259  B.C. 

2  C.  I.  L.  i.  30.     Consul  298  B.C. 

3  Revue  de  Philologie>  vol.  xiv.  p.  113  ss. 


48        THE  STRESS  ACCENT  IN  LATIN  POETRY 

of  the  more  ancient  spellings,  Cornelio  (n.  case) 
over  against  filios  (1.  3),  cosol,  cesor,  over  against 
consoly  censor  (1.  4)  and  because  the  simple  order  of 
offices  is  changed  in  line  4,  metri  gratia.  He 
agrees  with  Ritschl,  Desau,  and  others,  in  placing  it 
before  (7-12),  though  he  considers  240  B.C.  (the 
date  generally  given)  too  early,  and  suggests  200 
B.C.  I  cannot  agree  with  him,  however,  in  finding 
in  the  expression  Duonoro  Optimo,  a  trace  of  Greek 
influence,  for  it  is  an  idiom  common  to  the  popu- 
lar speech  of  many  languages  (Cf.  the  Hebrew, 
Holy  of  Holies).  The  fact  that  the  second  half- 
line  is  not  so  regularly  shorter  than  the  first,  seems 
to  me  an  argument  for  giving  the  priority  in  time 
to  (1-6).  In  line  1,  the  first  half -line  consists  of 
six  syllables,  and  the  second  of  six,  if  we  emend 
Romai,  of  seven,  if  Romanai;  line  5  has  six  syl- 
lables in  the  first  half  and  six  (or  seven)  in  the 
second;  and  in  line  6,  the  sense  seems  to  require 
some  such  participle  as  votam,  although  the  stone 
is  broken  so  close  to  the  preceding  word  that  we 
cannot  be  sure  (quite  different  from  line  2,  where 
the  space  proves  viro  to  be  the  last  word).  Further, 
the  only  monosyllables  occupying  a  whole  foot 
(Jionc,  /lie,  hec)  refer  to  Scipio  himself,  making  it 
possible  that  the  additional  emphasis  of  the  slow 
tempo  (one  full  beat)  is  not  accidental,  character- 
istic, as  it  is,  of  all  primitive  poetry,  as  Mars  pater, 
te  pre  cor.  It  may  be,  however,  that  we  have  here 
only   an  instance  of   the  Schva  Indogermanicum, 


NUMERI  ITALICI  ET  SATURNII  49 

hice,  being  pronounced,  although  it  was  not 
written. 

Line  4  is  emended  with  certainty  from  the  similar 
line  (10)  in  the  second  inscription,  where  quei  is 
read  instead  of  hie,  as  also  in  (9)  the  relative  pro- 
noun has  taken  the  place  of  the  demonstrative. 
Thurneysen  1  is  certainly  wrong  in  accenting  apud- 
vos,  on  the  analogy  of  tecum,  mecum,  "  wo  deutlich 
der  Ton  auf  den  Pronomen  runt,"  for  the  latter 
follow  the  usual  accentuation  of  a  dissyllabic  word, 
cum,  as  Priscian  says,2  being  merely  an  enclitic, 
while  in  apiid-vos  (like  the  English  among-you)  the 
unemphatic  pronoun  is  treated  as  an  enclitic  and 
the  accent  falls,  as  before,  on  the  penult.  This 
accentuation  is  supported  by  the  versification  of 
Plautus  and  Terence,  for  example,  Trin.  421,  abs. 
te  accepi,  619  erga-te,  733  penes  me;  Merc.  585 
apud-me.3 

In  accenting,  fortis-vir  sapiensque,  Lindsay  re- 
marks, "fortis-vir,  a  word  like  our  gentleman ; " 
and  so  it  is,  but  if  we  were  writing  the  words  in 
English,  we  would  say,  "gentleman  and  scholar," 
with  the  primary  accent  on  the  first  syllable,  but  a 
secondary  accent  on  "  man "  for  the  sake  of  the 
rhythm.  So  Kipling  writes,  "  On  the  road  to 
Mandalay,"  "  'Er  petticoat  was  yaller,"  "Elephints 
a-pilin'  teak,"  and  so  on  ;  of  the  thirteen  trisyllabic 

1  Op.  cit.  p.  24.  2  xiv.  6,  p.  27,  H. 

3  Lindsay,  "Latin  Accentuation"  (second  paper)  Classical  Re- 
view, vol.  v.  p.  403. 


50        THE  STRESS  ACCENT  IN  LATIN  POETRY 

words  in  the  poem,  six  are  accented  on  the  first 
syllable  or  on  the  last;  and  so  have  a  secondary- 
accent  on  the  other,  as  also  the  proper  name 
of  four  syllables,  "  Supiyawlat."  Now  English 
poetry  is  based  solely  upon  accent;  there  are  no 
distinctions  of  long  and  short  syllables ;  and  yet  all 
of  these  syllables,  with  a  secondary  accent,  are 
what  may  be  termed  heavy  syllables.  In  Latin 
poetry  on  the  other  hand,  the  distinction  could 
never  have  been  unknown.  Their  alphabet  was 
borrowed  from  Greek  colonists  in  Italy,  so  that 
their  intercourse  with  Greeks,  though  perhaps 
slight,  was  long  continued.  It  is  not,  therefore, 
surprising,  if,  even  before  the  great  waves  of  Greek 
influence  in  the  time  of  Ennius  and  his  successors, 
the  writers  of  the  Saturnians  modified  their  native 
accentual  metre  by  the  recognition  of  quantity. 
The  influence  of  quantity  was  unquestionably  first 
felt  in  the  second  half-verse  of  the  Saturnians.1 
Half -verses  like  mdximas  legiones  (1.  33),  lacrimis 
cum  multis  (1.  88),  "read  themselves,"  with  a 
primary  accent  on  the  first  syllable  of  maximas, 
filiam,  and  a  binary  accent  on  the  last,  as  in  the 
popular  verse  chanted  by  the  soldiers  on  the  oc- 
casion of  Caesar's  triumph  over  Gaul :  — 

Ecce  Caesar  nunc  triumphat  qui  subegit  Gallias,  etc. 

1  Scholl,  De  Accentu  Latino,  Leipzig,  1876,  p.  32,  in  a  note, 
"  Verbo  moneo  etiam  in  Saturnius  posteriorem  versus  partem 
maiorem  fere  concentum  praebere,  quam  prior  em" 


NUMERI  I  TALI  CI  ET  SATURNII  5 1 

It  seems  to  me  that  one  may  go  a  step  further 
and  say  that  the  influence  of  quantity  was  more 
strongly  felt  in  the  fourth  and  fifth  feet  of  the 
Saturnians  than  in  the  sixth,  a  view  which  is  con- 
firmed by  the  usage  of  the  later  hexameter,  where 
the  clash  between  quantity  and  word  accent  is 
considerably  more  frequent  for  the  sixth  foot  than 
for  the  fifth  (a  little  less  than  2  to  i). 

Third  Scipio  Inscription1 

13.  Quei  apice  insigne  dial(is)  (fl)aminis  gesisti 

14.  Mors  perfe(cit)tua  ut  essent    f  omnia  brevia 

15.  Honos  fama  virtusque  gloria  atque  ingenium 

16.  Quibus  sei  in  longa  licu[i]set  tibe  utier  vita 

17.  Facile  facteifs]  superases  gloriam  maiorum 

18.  Qua-re  lubens  te  in  gremiu  Scipio  recip(i)t 

19.  Terra  Publi  prognatum  Publio  Corneli. 

The  tone  of  this  inscription  is  at  once  more 
personal  and  more  modern.  As.  Boissier  2  remarks, 
"  II  semble  qu'ici  le  vieux  saturnien  s'attendrisse 
et  qu'il  veuille  s'accommoder  a  des  temps  nou- 
veaux."  The  most  noteworthy  point  in  the  versifi- 
cation is  the  greatly  increased  length  of  the  first 
half-line  in  comparison  with  the  second.  In  this 
it  resembles  the  latest  of  the  well-authenticated 
Saturnians.3 

1  C.  I.  L.  I.  33,  Consul  180  B.C. 

2  Journal  des  Savants  (1881),  p.  167. 

3  The  epitaph  of  M.  Caecilius,  C.  I.  L.  I.  1006,  130-100  B.C. 


52        THE  STRESS  ACCENT  IN  LATIN  POETRY 

Hoc  est  factum  monumentum  Maarco  Caicilio 

Hospes  gratum  est  quom  apud-meas     restitistei  seedes 
Bene  rem  geras  et  valeas  dormias  sine  qura. 

As  has  been  already  remarked,  this  is  more  than 
halfway  to  the  popular  trochaic  septenarian,  for 
example :  — 

•  /  r  r  /  /  /■ 

Postquam  Crassus  carbo  factust  Carbo  crassus  factus- 
est. 

Fourth  Scipio  Inscription1 

20.  Magna  sapientia  multasque  virtutes 

21.  Aetate  quom-parva  posidet  hoc-saxsum 

22.  Quoiei  vita  defecit  non  honos  honore 

23.  Is  hie  situs  quei  numquam  victus  est  virtutei  ;  — - 

24.  Annos  gnatos  viginti  is(div)eis  (man)datus 

25.  Ne  quairatis  honore  quei  minus  sit  mand(at)u(s). 

Multasque  (1.  20)  is  like  aetate  (1.  21);  in  each 
half-line  the  thesis  of  the  first  foot  is  suppressed. 
In  the  second  half  of  24  there  remains  only  an 
upright  stroke  on  the  stone  for  the  first  letter  of  the 
second  word.  Havet  prefers  the  emendation  (loc) 
which  suits  his  metre  as  (dtv)  suits  mine.  The  read- 
ing of  the  half-line  is  very  doubtful. 

Sorana  Inscription2 

26.  Quod  re-sua  d[if]eidens        asper(e)afleicta 

27.  Parens  timens  heic  vovit       voto  hoc  solut(o) 

1  C.  I.  L.  I.  34.    130  b.c. 

2  C.  I.  L.  I.  1 1 75.     150-135  B.C.  according  to  Ritschl. 


NUMERI  ITALICI  ET  SATURNII  53 

28.  [De]  cuma  facta  poloucta    leibereis  lube(n)tes 

29.  Dono  danunt  Hercolei  maxume  mereto 

30.  Semol  te  orant  se(u)oti  crebro  condemnes. 

Havet  reads  Herclei,  with  the  remark,1  "  Pro 
Hercolei  quod  metro  repugnat  aut  Herclei,  pro- 
nuntiandum  est  syllabis  duabus  aut  quattuor 
fortasse  Herecolei ;  scilicet  primum  ex  'HpatcXfjs 
fieri  debuit  *Heracoles,  deinde  *Herecolesf  postremo 
Hercoles  (sic  *balancum,  balineum  y  balneutri)."  This 
I  cite  as  illustrative  of  his  method.  When  balineum 
is  written  with  four  syllables  —  in  Plautus,  for 
example  —  it  represents  6  v  w — ,  not  6  w — .  Why, 
then,  should  Hercolei  be  supposed  to  have  a  dif- 
ferent number  of  syllables  than  are  written,  except, 
of  course,  quod  metro  repugnat  ? 

These  oldest  inscriptions,  and,  above  all,  the  first 
and  second  Scipio  Inscriptions,  are  of  the  utmost 
importance  in  determining  the  norm  for  the  Satur- 
nian  metre,  because  we  may  be  reasonably  sure 
that  we  have  them  in  the  form  in  which  the  Ro- 
mans had  them,  while  in  the  case  of  verses  resting 
on  Ms.  authority,  both  accidental  and  intentional 
changes  may  have  been  made  by  generations  of 
copyists. 

An  examination  of  these  thirty  lines;  then,  give 
the  following  rules  for  the  Saturnian  metre  :  — 

I.     Every    Saturnian  is   divided   by  a   caesura 

1  Op.  cit.  p.  233. 


54 


THE  STRESS  ACCENT  IN  LATIN  POETRY 


into  two  parts,  equal  in  time  but  not  in  the  number 
of  syllables. 

II.  Each  half -verse  is  made  up  of  three  trochaic 
beats,  with  an  occasional  anacrusis. 

III.  The  third  and  sixth  beats,  which  are  the 
strongest,  must  coincide  with  the  primary  accent 
of  the  word ;  the  first,  second,  fourth,  and  fifth 
beats  may  fall  on  a  less  strongly  accented  syllable. 

IV.  The  thesis  may  be  suppressed  in  the  first, 
second,  fourth,  fifth  feet,  though  never  in  two  suc- 
cessive feet,  nor  in  the  third  or  sixth  foot. 

The  scheme,  therefore,  for  the  first  half-verse 
would  be :  — 


'  A 


II. 


'  A 

S     \J    \J  KJ 


III. 
S     \J 


i.e.  any  combination  of  these  feet,  making  not  less 
than  six  nor  more  than  eight  syllables  (average 
seven). 

And  for  the  second  half -verse :  — 


IV. 

S      \J 

'   A 
/  \j  \j 


V. 


'   A 


VI. 


i.e.  any  combination  of  these  feet,  making  not  less 
than  five  nor  more  than  seven  syllables  (average 
six). 

There  are  usually  three  words  in  the  first  half- 


NUMERI  I  TALI  CI  ET  SAT  URN II  55 

verse  and  two  in  the  second.  Elision  does  not 
take  place  between  the  half -verses  ;  in  other  places 
it  may  or  may  not  take  place,  according  to  the 
necessity  of  the  versification.  A  long  vowel  is 
sometimes  shortened  before  an  initial  vowel  or  h 
(not  elided),  as  it  is  occasionally  in  Accius,  Ennius, 
and  even  in  later  poets. 

Two  second  half-verses,  parisuma  fuit  (1.  9)  and 
omnia  brevia  (1.  14),  seem  to  have  but  two  accents, 
unless  with  Havet  and  others  we  read  omnia 
brevia,  for  which,  as  has  been  said,  there  is  no 
warrant  in  the  early  poetry.  Keller  explains  them 
as  belonging  to  the  alios  breviores  mentioned  by 
Caesius  Bassus.  They  both  contain,  however,  the 
average  number  of  syllables  (six)  and  seem  rather 
formulaic  in  character,  so  perhaps  the  poet  fitted 
them  into  the  scheme  as  best  he  could  and  let  it 
go  at  that.  The  Saturnians  are  not  more  irregular 
than  other  primitive  poetry.  In  the  first  thousand 
lines  of  Beowulf,  for  example,  Kaluza1  finds  ninety 
variants  on  Sievers's  "  five  types  "  for  the  old  Ger- 
man kurzzeile  or  halbzeile,  which  corresponds  in 
certain  respects  to  the  half-verse  of  the  Saturnians, 
though  perhaps  the  comparison  has  been  pushed 
too  far.2  It  would,  indeed,  be  just  as  absurd  to 
expect  regularity  and  perfection  in  primitive  verse 
as  in  primitive  sculpture.  But  just  as  the  latter, 
in  spite  of  its  conventional  misrepresentations,  and 

1  Kaluza,  op.  cit.  part  i,  p.  32  ss. 

2  Cf.  Bartsch,  op.  cit. 


56        THE  STRESS  ACCENT  IN  LATIN  POETRY 

all  the  hardness  and  stiffness  of  unsubdued  mate- 
rial, shows  some  of  the  beauty  of  the  human  form, 
so  through  the  limping  measures  of  the  former 
we  can  trace  the  beginnings  of  inspiration.  It  is 
poetry,  that  is  the  essential  thing  about  it,  and  any 
theory  which  destroys  the  poetry,  no  matter  how 
well  it  reads,  is  worthless. 

There  are  five  verses  quoted  by  different  writers 
from  inscriptions  : 1  — 

a.  Uno  cum  plurimae  consentiunt  gentes. 

31.  •       \         >>  \      f  f/ 

b.  Unicum  plurimae  consentiunt  gentes. 

32.  Populi  primarium  fuisse  virum. 

These  lines  are  from  the  epitaph  of  Atilius  Cala- 
tinus  (which  Wolfflin 2  thinks  served  as  the  model 
for  the  first  Scipio-Inscription)  quoted  by  Cicero.3 
Havet  emends,  unum  complurimae;  Reichardt,  Hunc 
unimi plurimae ;  Lindsay,  uno  complurimae,  with  the 
remark,  "  I  give  a  double  accentuation  to  (allitera- 
tive) co7nplurimae  and  primarium,  but  not  to  con- 
sentiunt. The  reading  complurimae  is  favoured 
both  by  the  alliteration  and  by  the  '  echo '  of  the 
other  line  of  the  distich."  The  important  point,  it 
seems  to  me,  is  that  the  two  readings  uno  cum  and 
unicum  must  have  sounded  the  same ;  the  second 

1  The  information  in  regard  to  the  sources  of  the  following 
verses  is  taken  from  Havet,  Zander,  Baehrens,  and  Lindsay  (all 
cited  above). 

2  Op.  cit.  p.  116  et  s. 

3  (a)  De  Fin.  ii.  35,  116;   (d)  De  Sen.  17,  61. 


NUMERI  I  TALI  CI  ET  SATURXII  $? 

syllable  cannot,  therefore,  have  been  accented, 
while  the  first  syllable  and  the  <:^;;z-syllable  were 
accented.  Complurimae  is  certainly  right  (though 
with  Zander  x  I  would  restore  the  ancient  spelling, 

Oino  comploiriMnae  consentiont  gentes), 

but  then  the  question  arises,  why  should  "  allitera- 
tive complurimae "  receive  a  double  accentuation 
and  consentiunt,  with  the  same  number  of  syllables 
and  beginning  with  the  same  letter  (presumably, 
therefore,  alliterative),  not,  except,  to  quote  Havet's 
illuminating  phrase,  quod  metro  repttgnat  ? 

33.  Fundi  t,  fugat,  prosternit  maximas  legiones. 

From  the  epitaph  of  Acilius  Glabrio,  181  b.c. 
(circ.)  quoted  by  Caesius  Bassus  de  Metris.2 

34.  Magnum  numerum  triumphat    hostibus  devictis 

Quoted,  apparently  from  an  inscription,  by 
Censorinus.3 

35.  Duello  magno  diremendo  regibus  siibigendis. 

From  the  inscription  of  M.  Aemilius  Lepidus, 
in  honour  of  his  father,  L.  Aemilius  Regillus,  179 
b.c,  quoted  by  Caesius  Bassus.4 

It  would  be  a  mere  jeu  d  'esprit  to  put  back  into 

1  Op.  cit.  p.  58. 

2  vi.  265  K.  Utrum  exemplem  suspicor  esse  a  Caesio  aut  aliquo 
grammatico  fictwn,  Zander,  op.  cit.  p.  57.  3  vi.  615  K. 

4  vi.  265  K.  Utrum  exemplem  suspicor  esse  a  Caesio  aut  aliquo 
grammatico  Jiclum,  Zander,  op.  cit.,  p.  57. 


58        THE  STRESS  ACCENT  IN  LATIN  POETRY 

Saturnians  the  lines  given  in  prose  by  Livy1  or 
in  hexameters  by  Priscian.2  Equally  unimportant 
would  be  the  attempt  to  fill  out,  or  to  place  in  one 
part  or  another  of  the  verse,  the  stray  words  and 
phrases  quoted,  in  some  instances,  by  the  gram- 
marians. For  the  Odyssia  of  Livius  Andronicus 
and  the  Bellum  Punicum  of  Naevius,  therefore,  I 
give  only  complete  lines,  requiring  no  emendation, 
or  the  very  slightest. 

From  the  Odyssia  of  Livius  Andronicus  (Ob.  204  B.C.). 

36.  Verum  mihi  Camena  insece  versutum. 
Quoted  by  Gellius,  xviii.  9,  5,  for  insece.     It  is  the 
opening  line  of  the  Odyssia. 

37.  Neque^enim  te  oblitus-sum      Laertie  noster. 

Quoted  by  Priscian  3  for  voc.  sing,  in  -ie.  Mss.  neque 
enirn,  neque  tamen,  Laertiae,  Lertie,  O  Laertiae, 
and  Laertie.  Tarn  is  Korsch's  suggestion.  Zander, 
with  Reichardt  following  (as  usual),  reads 

Neque  tarn  ted  oblitus      sum  Laertie  noster. 
.38.   Argenteo  polybro  aureo  eclutro. 

ap.  Non.  544  M.,  s.v.polybrum;  eclutro  is  Baehrens's 
suggestion.     Cf.  eicXovrpov.     Mss.  et  glutro. 

1  For  example,  i.   35,  5-14 ;   de  Anco  Marcio,  v.  16,  8  ss.  ;  vi. 
29,  5  ss.,  etc. 
.  2  For  example, 

Inferus  au  superus  tibi  fert  deus  funera,  Ulixes  (i.  p.  96), 
Cum  socios  nostros  mandisset  impius  Cyclops  (i.  p.  419), 
At  celer  hasta  volens  perrumpit  pectora  ferro  (i.  p.  335). 
3  i.  p.  301  H. 


NUMERI  ITALICI  ET  SAT  URN II  59 


\     tt 


39.  Tuque  mihi  narrato  omnia  disertim. 
ap.  Non.  509  M.,  s.v.  disertim.  Three  Mss.  have 
tu  quae  and  one  tuque.  I  prefer  tuque  because  it 
gives  the  usual  number  of  words  in  the  first  half- 
line. 

40.  Quando  dies  adveniet      quern  profata  Morta~est. 
Quoted   by  Gellius  hi.    16,   11  for  Morta,  as  the 

name  of  one  of  the  three  Fates. 

*  f  tt  ?     t  ft 

41.  (Aut)  in  PylunTadvenie(n)s     aut  ibrommentans. 

Quoted    by   Festus1   for    ommentans.     Mss.     ad- 

venies.  Corr.    Scaliger.     Aut  is  Baehrens's  almost 

certain  emendation. 

*  t    tt  f  \    tt 

42.  Ibi]demque  vir  summus        adprimus  Patroclus. 

Ap.  Gell.  vi.  7,  11.  After  a  discussion  to  prove 
that  adverbs  compounded  with  ad  should  be  ac- 
cented on  the  first  syllable,  this  verse  is  quoted 
with  the  remark,  adprimum  autem  longe  primum 
Livius  in  Odyssia  dicit. 

t  f  t'  t  \  tt  -*y 

43.  Partim  errant  nequinont      Graeciam  redire. 

Festus,2  nevuinont pro  nequeuntt  ut  solinunt  ferinunt 

pro  solent  feriunt  diccbant  antiqui. 

t  /  tt  t  \  *, 

44.  Apud  nympham  Atlantis        filiam  Calypsonem. 

Quoted  by  Caesellius  Vindex3  for  Calypsonem,  ace. 
sing. 

t  r  ^^  tt  t  \      tt  X 

45.  Utrum  genua  amploctens      virginem  oraret.   ) 

1  Thewrewk  de  Ponor,  p.  218, 14.     2  Thewrewk  de  Ponor,  p.  162, 24. 
8  Ap.  Pris.  i.  p.  210  H. 


V 


60        THE  STRESS  ACCENT  IN  LATIN  POETRY 

Diomedes,1  vulgo  dicimus  "  amp  lector"  veteres 
immutaverunt  "  amploctor"  crebo  dictitantes.  One 
Ms.  has  orraret? 

46.  Ibi  manens  sedeto  donicum  videbis.  | 

47.  Me  carpento  vehentem         domum  venisse. 

Chairsius,3  donicum  pro  donee.  The  (single)  Ms. 
has  vehementem.  Havet 4  reads  vehente  int  Thur- 
neysen,5  vehentem,  Bucheler6  and  Zander,7  endo  do- 
mum. If  I  were  emending  the  second  half-line  I 
should  write,  domum  venisse  patris,  from  Homer's 
line,8  — 

aoruSe  iXOoifxev  ml  iKco//,e#a  Sahara  7rar/)Os. 

48.  Simul-ac  dacrimas  de~ore         noegeo  detersit. 

Festus,  IVoegeum,  amiculi  genus?  Noegeum  can- 
didumP  Dacrimas  should  probably  be  written  for 
Livius.11     Ms.  lacrimas. 

49.  Merjcurius  cumque  eo  filius  Latonas. 

Quoted  by  Priscian  ^  for  Latonas,  gen.  sing. 
Havet13  and  Baehrens,14  following  Bartsch,  supply 
venit,  at  the  beginning  of  the  verse,  but  without 
probability,  for  the  resemblance  to  Homer's  line  15 
is  not  striking. 

1  384,  7  K.  2  Paris.  7493. 

3  197,  15  K.  4  Op.  cit.  p.  352.  5  Op.  cit.  p.  14. 

6  Neue  Jahrbucher  fur  Phil,  lxxxvii.  p.  332.  7  Op.  cit.  p.  88. 

8  f  296.         9  186,  32  Th.  de  P.  10  187  Pauli  Excerpta. 

11  Th.  de  P.  p.  48.  I2  I.  p.  198.  13  Op.  cit.  p.  372. 

14  Op.  cit.  p.  40.  15  6  322. 


NUMERI  ITALIC!  ET  SATURNII  6 1 

50.  Nam  divina  Monetas  filia  im  docuit. 
Quoted  by  Priscian1  for  Monetas,  gen.  sing. 
The  Irish  Mss.  divina,  the  others  (the  larger 
number)  diva.  All  Mss.  filiam.  Filia  must  be 
nominative,  and  since  an  accusative  may  very  well 
have  been  added,2  I  have  followed  Fleckeisen  (and 
Zander)  in  reading  im,  not  me  (Lindsay)  for  the 
passage  in  Homer  is  third  person. 

51.  Topper  facit  homines  ut  prius  fuerunt. 
Quoted  by  Festus3  for  topper.     Mss.  utrius  fuerint. 
tit  prius  is  Duntzer's  suggestion,4  fuerunt,  Biiche- 
ler's.5     Zander6  (and  Reichardt)  homoncs. 

■    52.   Topper  citi  ad-aedis  venimus  Circai. 

53.  Simul  duona  eorum  portant  ad-naves. 

V    54.    Millia  alia  deinde  isdem  inserinuntur. 

These  three  lines  are  quoted  together  by  Festus,7 
immediately  after  1.  51,  from  Livius,  in  Odyssia 
vetere.  From  their  subject  they  can  scarcely  be- 
long to  the  story  of  Circe,  and  Lindsay  follows 
Thurneysen  in  attributing  them  to  Naevius.  The 
Mss.  read  Circae  and  the  third  line,  millia  alia  in 
isdem  inserinuntur,  in  all  three,  therefore,  the  sec- 
ond half-line  has  five  syllables.  Lindsay  suggests 
Circai  as  a  "  perfectly  justifiable  alteration,"  though 
he  reads   Circae.     Baehrens  and    Zander  frankly 

1  I.  p.  198.  2  0  480  et  ss.  3  532  Th.  de  P. 

4  De  Versu  que??i  vocant  Satarnio,  p.  45. 

5  1.  1.  6  Op.  cit.  p.  91.  7  1.  1. 


62        THE  STRESS  ACCENT  IN  LATIN  POETRY 

rewrite  lines  53  and  54.  The  latter  is  very  suspi- 
cious for  the  reason  that  it  is  the  only  one  of  the 
extant  Saturnians  in  which  a  single  word  occupies 
the  whole  of  the  second  half-verse.  I  have,  there- 
fore, written  deinde,  which  might  easily  have 
dropped  out,  and  followed  Baehrens  in  placing 
isdem  in  the  second  half. 

55.   Sancta  puer  Saturni  filia  regina. 

Quoted  by  Priscian 1  as  an  instance  of  puer  for 
puella.  Baehrens  suggests  maxima  regina,  Zander, 
omnium  regina,  "vel  aliquid,  infinitaconiectura."  2 
He  marks  it  dcsperatus. 

From  the  Bellum  Punicum  of  Naevius  (ob.  198 
B.C.):  — 

/     56.  Eorum  sectam  sequuntur  multi  mortales. 

57-  Ubi  foras  cum-auro  illic  exibant. 

V      58.   Multi  aliPe  Troia  strenui  viri. 

Servius  Danielis  ad  Verg.  Aen.  ii.  797.  There 
is  no  need  of  any  change. 

59.  Iamqu(e)  eius  mentem  fortuna     fecerat  quietem. 

Priscian,3  etiam  simplex  (quies)  in  usu  invenitur 
trium  generum. 

60.  Inerant  sign(a)  expressa       quo-modo  Titani. 

Jj  61.   Bicorpores  Gigantes  magniqu(e)  Atlantes. 

62.   Runcus  atque  Purpureus        filii  Terras. 

1 1.  232,  5  H.  2  Op.  cit.  p.  87.  3  I.  242,  20  H. 


NUMERI  I  TALI  CI  ET  SAT  UR  Nil  63 

Quoted  by  Priscian,1  for  Terras,  gen.  sing,  and 
again2  (1.  60  and  61  only)  for  Titani,  nom.  pi. 

63.  Silvicolae  homines  belliqu(e)  inertes. 

Macrobius,3  silvicolae  Faiini.  Zander,  followed 
by  Reichardt,  reads  homones. 

64.  Bland ( e)  et  docet  percontat    Ae|n(ea)  quo  pacto. 

65.  Troiam  urbem  liquerit. 

Nonius,4  Liquerit  significat  et  '  reliquerit?  In 
another  place 5  he  quotes  the  line  again,  this  time 
with  reliquisset,  but  I  agree  with  Zander  6  in  giving 
greater  weight  to  the  former  reading,  because 
there,  Nonius  makes  the  word  the  subject  of  a 
note.  According  to  Havet7  the  Mss.  give  (for 
the  first  place)  enos,  e?ias,  ennius,  and  percontcnas, 
and  (for  the  second)  aen,  aeneam,  acnius,  emiius, 
aencidos.  Quintilian,  however,  says,8  "  Ne  miremur 
quod  ab  antiquorum  plerisque  Aenea  ut  Anchisa 
sit  dictus."  Lindsay  thinks  that,  "  Quo-pacto  is  a 
word-group  like  quomodo"  his  own  remark,  however, 
shows  the  difference.  In  quo-pacto,  the  two  parts 
did  not  coalesce  so  completely  as  to  be  felt  as  a 
single  word,  both  (I  think)  on  account  of  the  long 
penult,  and  the  greater  individuality  of  the  word 
pactum.  But  even  if  one  accepts  his  theory  of 
"sentence  accentuation,"  as  I  do,  in  the  main,  it 


1  1.  198,  15  H. 

2  I.217. 

3  Sat.  vi.  5,  9. 

4  335.  1  M. 

5  474,  5  M. 

6  Op.  cit.  p.  101 

7  Op.  cit.  p.  343. 

8i.  5,  61. 

64        THE  STRESS  ACCENT  IN  LATIN  POETRY 

does  not  follow  that  in  a  primitive  verse  like  the 
Saturnian,  relatively  unimportant  words  should 
never  be  accented. 

66.   Prim(a)  incedit  Cereris         Proserpina  puer. 

Priscian,1  hie  et  haec  puer  vetustissimi. 

*      /    67.    Deinde  pollens  sagittis         inclitus  arquitenens. 
\     68.    Sanctus  love  prognatus        Pythius  Apollo. 

Quoted  by  Priscian2  following  66,  and  by  Macro- 
bius3  (6y  and  68  alone)  for  arquitenens.  Mss. 
Sanctusqne  Delphis  prognatus.  The  -que  is  cer- 
tainly out  of  place  in  68.  Zander  puts  it  in  67, 
reading  inclutusque,  but  this  makes  the  connection 
too  close  between  the  first  and  second  half-lines. 
It  seems  to  me  more  likely  that  sanctusqne  was 
written  by  some  scribe  for  sanctus  love,  who  then 
added  the  meaningless  Delphis.  Zander  rewrites 
the  line,  — 

Sanctus  love  Deli            Putius  prognatus 
Apollo  ....  

but  this  is  unlikely,  (1)  because  prognatus  occupies 
the  third  place  in  lines  8  and  19,  next  to  its 
ablative,  and  (2)  there  is  no  undoubted  instance 
of  a  " run-over"  line  among  the  extant  Satur- 
nians.  It  seems  to  me  that  the  least  violent 
remedy  is  to  lengthen  the  -us,  in  arsi,  on  the 
ground  that  it  is  a  conventional,  formulaic  ex- 
pression, a  sort  of  "  tag,"  which  the  writer  forces 

II.  231,  13  H.  2  I.   231,13  H.  3  Sat.  vi.  5,  8. 


NUMERI  I  TALI  CI  ET  SATURXII  65 

into  the  service  of  his  verse  because  of  its 
familiarity. 

/  69.    Postquam  avem  aspexit  in  |  templo  Anchisa 

70.    Sacr(a)  in-mensa  Penatium     ordine  ponuntur ; 
.    71.    Immolabat  auream  victimam  pulchram. 

Probus1  ad  Verg.  Ec.  vi.  31.  Biicheler  suggests 
Penatum,  and  Havet2  reads  In  auream  molabat, 
quoting  Lucretius,  Vergil,  and  Horace  for  the 
tmesis,  but  no  change  is  necessary,  Penatium 
finding  an  echo  in  the  auream  of  the  following 
line. 

72.  Urit  vastat  populatur        rem  |  hostium  concinnat. 

Nonius,3  Concinnare,  conficere  vel  colligere.  I  have 
followed  Thurneysen's  suggestion 4  in  transpos- 
ing populatur  vastat,  cf.  Fundit,  fugaty  prostemit 

(i.  33). 

73.  Virum  praetor  adveniet     auspicat  auspicium. 

Nonius,5  Auspicavi  pro  auspicatus  sum.  Havet 
reads  adveniens  as  in  1.  41,  Baehrens  adveneit.  The 
double  accentuation  of  auspicium  is  made  probable 
by  the  repetition  of  the  proposition,  so  in  75  foil. 

74.  Censet  eo  venturum         obviam  Poenum. 
Nonius,6    C ens  ere   significat  existimare,    arbiti'ari. 
Mss.  censent  and  censet. 

75.  Su|perbiter  contemtim  content  legiones. 

1  p.  14  K.  2  Op.  cit.  p.  388.  3  90.  23  M. 

4  Op.  cit.  p.  33.       5  p.  468.  20  M.  6  p.  267.  17  M. 

F 


66        THE  STRESS  ACCENT  IN  LATIN  POETRY 

Nonius,1  Contcmtim,  contemncnter.  Lindsay  re- 
marks, "  contcmptim  conterere  recurs  in  Plaut.  Poen. 
537,"  and  then  accents  Siipc'rbiterconte'mtim,giv'mg 
the  short  syllable  su-  a  full  beat,  and  disregarding 
the  alliteration. 

76.  Septimum  decimum  annum         ilico  sedent.  j 
Nonius,2  Ilico,  hi  eo  loco.     Havet  emends  sederent 
to  get  rid  of  the  uncomfortable  short  vowel  in  the 
penultimate  syllable  of  the  line,  L.  Muller  sedentes. 

77.  Sicilienses  paciscit  obsides  ut  reddant. 
Nonius,3  Paciscunt.  One  Ms.4  gives  only  the  verse 
quoted  above,  others,  "Id  qiwque  paciscuntnrh 
moenia  sint  que  Lutantinm  1'econciliant  captivos 
plurimos  idem  Sicilienses  paciscit  obsides  tit  reddant." 
Bucheler  assigns  idem,  I  think  rightly,  to  Nonius, 
but  it  is  possible  that  it  may  begin  line  yy. 

78.  Ei  venit  in-mentem  hominum  fortunas. 
Quoted  by  Priscian6  for  fortunas,  gen.  singular. 
Two  Mss.  have  mentem,  the  majority  mentey  which 
is  probably  an  abbreviation. 

79.  Hone|rariae  honustae         stabant  in  flustris. 
Isidorus,7  Flustrnm   motus   maris  sine  tempe state 
fluctnantis . 

80.  Res  divas  edicit  Praedicit  castus. 
Quoted  by  Nonius 8  under  castitas. 

1  p.  516,  1  M,  also  515.  8  sq.  s.  v.  superbiter.       2  p.  325,  6  M. 
3  474,  16  M.  4  Paris  7665.  5  Paris  7667  paciscunt. 

6  i.  198,  15  H.  7  de  Nat.  Rer.  44.       8  197,  14. 


V 


NUMERI  ITALIC!  ET  SATURNI1  6 J 

81.   Summe  deum  regnatur       quianam  me  genuisti? 
Festus,1  Quianam  pro  quare  et  cur positum  est  apud 
antiquos.     Quianam  genus  isti  is  twice  written  in 
the  Ms.     The  reading  me  genuisti  is  Havet's.2 

/     82.    Sesequ(e)  ii  perire  mavolunt  ibidem. 

83.  Quam  cum-stupro  redire  |  ad  suos  popularis. 

Festus,3  Stuprum  pro  turpitudine.  Lindsay  sug- 
gests poplaris  as  a  possible  reading,  quoting 
Fleckeisen,  Plaut.  Rud.  740,  and  TLoirXapis  (Arch. 
Ep.  Mitth.  i.  p.  7). 

84.  Sin  illos  deserant  fortissimos  viros. 

85.  Magnum  stuprum  populo  fieri  per  gentis. 

Following  82,  83  in  Festus.  In  these  two  pairs 
of  lines  the  similar  ending  in  the  first  half  is  worthy 
of  notice,  in  82  and  83  the  rhyme  perire,  redire,  in 
84  and  85  the  dactyl  (accentual)  instead  of  the 
usual  trochee. 

86.  amborum  uxores. 

87.  Noctu  Troiad  (e)  exibant  capitibus  opertis. 

88.  Flentes  ambae"abeuntes     lacrimis  cum-multis. 

Servius  ad  Aen.  iii.,  10  Nacvius  inducit  uxores 
Acncae  ct  AncJiisae  cum  lacrimis  Ilium  relinqucntes. 
I  have  placed  the  primary  accent  of  c&pitibus  on 
the  first  syllable,  as  infacilius,  bdlineum  in  Plautus, 
and  lengthened  the  last  syllable  in  arsi  following 
Vergil's  P ectoribus  Lillians  spirantia  consulit  extat 

1  p.  340  Th.  de  P.  2  Op.  cit.  p.  301. 

3  p.  460,  27  et  ss.  Th.  de  P.  4  ^Sw.  iv.  64. 


68        THE  STRESS  ACCENT  IN  LATIN  POETRY 

89.  Ferunt  pulchras  creterras     aureas  lepistas. 

This  verse  is  quoted  three  times,  by  Caesius  Bas- 
sus,1  by  Marius  Victorinus,2  who  does  not  think  it 
belongs  to  Naevius,  and  by  Marius  Plotius.3  The 
Mss.  have  pateras  creterras,  cratcras,  creterras,  but 
creterra  seems  to  be  the  old  form.  (See  Georges, 
Lex.  Wortf.  s.v.) 

90.  Magni  metus  tumultus         pectora  possidet. 

Nonius,4  Metus  masculino  Naevius.  One  Ms.  has 
possidit,  the  other  possidet,  which  may,  however, 
be  scanned  possidet  (3d  conj.). 

91.  Novem  Iovis  Concordes       filiae  sorores. 

Caesius  Bassus5  and  Mar.  Victorinus.6  This  verse 
is  slightly  confirmatory  of  the  emendation  Sanctus 
love  prognatus  (1.  68). 

92.  Patrem  suum  supremum         optimum  appellat. 
Varro,7  Naevius  .  .  .  supremum  a  superrimo  dictum. 

93.  Scopas  atque  verbenas         sagmina  sumpserunt. 

Paulus  ex  Fest.,8  Sagmina  dicebant  herbas  ver- 
benas. On  the  opposite  page  after  Naevius  is  the 
line  Ius  sacratum  Iovis  iurandum  sagmine.  Mss. 
scab os,  scapas,  s capos. 

94.  Simul  alis  aliunde  rumitant  inter  sese. 
Paulus  ex  Fest.,9  Rumitant  rumigerantur.     I  have 

1  266  K.    2 139  K.    3  531  K.    *  214.  7.    5  266  K.    6 139  K. 

7  Z.  Z.    vii.  51.  8  p.  469  Th.  de  P.  (JPauli  Excerptd). 

9  p.  369  Th.  de  P.  {PatUi  Excerptd). 


NUMERI  ITALIC!  ET  SATURNII  69 

adopted  Boethius's  suggestion  alls,  to  avoid  the 
double  resolution  in  the  first  half-verse.  Mss. 
alius.  I  can  find  no  Ms.  authority  for  inter  se, 
though  it  is  a  very  slight  change  and  is  read  by 
Havet,  Baehrens,  Zander,  Reichardt,  and  Lindsay. 
Gf.  apud-vos  (11.  4,  ex  em.,  and  10). 

95.  Apud  empori(um)  in-campo     hostium  pro  moene. 

Festus,1  Moene  singulariter  dixit  Ennius.  O.  M til- 
ler was  the  first  to  notice  that  this  line  was  a 
Saturnian,  and  substituted  Naevius  for  Ennius. 
Havet2  may,  however,  be  right  in  suggesting  that 
the  line  of  Ennius  and  the  name  Naevius  have 
been  omitted  by  a  copyist. 

96.  Summas  opes  qui  regum     regias  refregit. 

Quoted  by  Diomedes3  and  by  Atilius.4  It  may 
not  be  by  Naevius. 

97.  Dabunt  malum  Metelli  Naevio  poetae.  — ■ 
Quoted  by  Caesius  Bassus,5  optimus  (Saturnius) 
est  quern  Metelli  proposuerunt  de  Naevio  aliquo- 
tiens  ab  eo  vcrsu  laeessiti,  also  by  Mar.  Vict.6 
Mar.  Plotius,7  Atil.  Fortun.,8  Ter.  Maur.,9  Pseud.- 
Ascon.10    Malum  dabunt  is  given  by  the  first  three. 

98.  Immortales  mortales       si  |  forent  fas  flere. 

99.  Flerent  divae  Camenae  Naevium  poetam. 

!p.  124  Th.  de  P.         2  Op.  cit.  p.  296.  3  i.  p.  512  K. 

4  vi.  p.  293  K.  5  vi.  p.  266  K.  6  139  K. 

7531K.  8294K.  925I7. 

10  In  Cic.   Verr.  i.  10,  29. 


70        THE  STRESS  ACCENT  IN  LATIN  POETRY 

ioo.    Itaque  postamquarrPest  Orcho  traditus  thesauro. 
101.    Obliti-sunt  Romae  loquier  lingua  Latina. 

The  famous  epitaph  written  by  Naevius  to  be 
inscribed  on  his  own  tomb.  Quoted  by  Gellius1 
along  with  similar  epitaphs  of  Plautus  and  Pacu- 
vius.  Thurneysen 2  thinks  that  the  last  verse 
must  either  be  transposed  or  regarded  as  a  later 
imitation,  because  the  caesura  is  neglected  and 
there  are  six  accents.  Similarly  he  considers  the 
verse,  — 

r  r  r  r  r  r 

Terra  pestem  teneto         salus  hie  maneto 

radically  different  from  the  epic  Saturnians.3  Of 
the  other  Numeri  Italici  he  quotes  only  Hlberno 
ptdvere  and  Novzim  vetus,  none  of  those  consist- 
ing of  three  beats,  although  we  found  that  the 
number  was  considerable. 

It  is  rather  the  fashion  with  the  later  editors  to 
throw  doubt  upon  the  antiquity  of  the  Naevius  In- 
scription, but  if  it  was  composed  by  Gellius  on  a 
purely  quantitative  basis,  then  it  is  certainly  an 
inferior  piece  of  work.  Comparing  it  with  four 
lines  taken  at  random  from  Naevius,  the  regard 
(or  perhaps  disregard)  of  quantity  seems  about 
the  same :  — 


KJ ^  W 


98.  Immortales  mortales  si  forent  fas  flere. 

99.  Flerent  divae  Camenae  Naevium  poetam. 
i.  24,  2.               2  Op.  cit.  p.  52.  3  Op.  cit.  p.  54. 


NUMERI  ITALICI  ET  SATURNII  J\ 

WWW W   ±s       

ioo.   Itaque  postquam  est  Orcho       traditus  thesauro. 
101.    Obliti-sunt  Romae  loquier  lingua  Latina. 

W     ^/   W   WW 

75.   Superbiter  contemtim  content  legiones. 

W    W    ^ W w 

91.    Novem  Iovis  Concordes  fi]iae  sorores. 

w  w  w   w     w 

87.  Noctu  Troiade  exibant  capitibus  opertis. 

WW ^     w     

88.  Flerent  ambae  abeuntes  lacrimis  cum  multis. 

It  would  be  hard  to  see  how  a  half-verse  com- 
posed entirely  of  long  syllables  (like  the  first  half 
of  98,  101,  87)  could  be  read  as  poetry  without  a 
stress  beat,  and  to  suppose  that  this  beat  clashed 
with  the  natural  accent  of  the  word  in  all  but  the 
last  foot  would  be  to  make  the  ancient  sing-song 
measure  of  the  native  prophets  more  Greek  than 
the  iambic  and  trochaic  metres  of  Plautus  and 
Terence,  where  word  and  verse  accent  tend  broadly 
to  coincide. 

Alliteration  is  not  of  prime  importance  in  the 
Saturnian  verse,  and  it  is  a  subject  that  has  been 
very  fully  treated.1  Such  evidence  as  it  affords  is 
in  favour  of  the  Accentual  Theory,  scansions  like 
Gnaivod  patre  progndtns  not  only  introducing  a 
violent  clash  between  word  and  verse  accent,  but 
disregarding  the  alliteration  as  well. 

1  Cf.  Keller,  op.  cit.  p.  33  et  ss.,  Loch,  De  Usu  Alliterationis 
apud  Poetas  Latinos,  Halle,  1865;  Dingeldein,  Der  Reim  bei  den 
Griechen  und  R'dmern,  Leipzig,  1892;  and  others. 


72        THE  STRESS  ACCENT  IN  LATIN  POETRY 

A  reading  of  the  verses  based  primarily  upon 
the  natural  accent  of  the  words  (i)  is  in  harmony 
with  the  Latin  or  rather  Italic  principle  of  word 
accent,  and  (2)  brings  the  Saturnians  into  line  with 
what  we  know  of  the  earlier  and  later  popular 
poetry;  while  the  greater  influence  of  quantity  in 
the  last  half  explains  the  early  and  complete 
naturalization  of  the  Greek  hexameter.  It  is  per- 
haps not  without  interest  to  note,  that  in  the 
hexameters  of  Lucilius  which  approach  most  nearly 
to  the  popular  standard,  there  are  293  lines  (49.4%) 
in  which  word  accent  and  quantity  coincide  in  the 
last  three  feet,  and  52  lines  (8.7%)  in  which  there 
is  no  clash  whatever  throughout  the  entire  line. 
But,  on  any  theory,  it  must  be  confessed  that  the 
Saturnians  limp.  In  some  lines  three  unaccented 
syllables  are  slurred  over,  in  others  a  single  long 
syllable  is  held  a  full  beat,  though  both  irregularities 
find  abundant  illustration  in  the  primitive  poetry  of 
every  people. 

In  each  Saturnian  there  is  a  strong  pause  be- 
tween the  two  halves  of  the  line,  often  a  complete 
break  in  the  sense.  This  points,  as  has  been  said, 
to  a  composite  nature.  A  common  type  of  the 
Numeri  Italici  is  x  v;  I  7  w  u  Ku|  (Buos  Lases 
invate,  for  example  ),  which  recurs  in  the  first  half- 
line  in  50  out  of  the  100  Saturnians  quoted  above. 
This  is  varied  to/  Al/uu|  '  kj  |,or/^^l/A| 
'  ^,  or  (rarely)  /v|/wuu|/v;lor/^l  '  ^1 
<  ^  ^  I .     The  second  half -verse  is  less  regular,  the 


NUMERI  I  TALI  CI  ET  SATURNII  73 

type  /^l/ v|  £  \j\  {Jupiter  Dapdlis)  being  varied 
to  7  A  I  /  w  I  /  w  I  ,  or  7  w  I  /  A  I  /  u?  or  S  yj\ 
7  ^  w  I  7  w  I  (  or  7  wu|  x  aI  7^  I,  very  rarely 
7  vuin  the  last  foot.  In  the  midst  of  these  ir- 
regularities, however,  there  is  one  rule  that  is  never 
violated ;  the  third  and  sixth  beats  fall,  de  rigueurt 
on  the  primary  accent  of  the  word.  After  the 
strong  caesura  and  the  falling  {i.e.  trochaic)  metre, 
this  seems  to  me  the  most  important  characteristic 
of  the  Saturnians.  In  some  of  the  verses  all  six 
beats  coincide  with  the  primary  accent  of  the 
word,  as,  — 

Gnaivod  patre  prognatus  fortis  vir  sapiensque 

Honos  fama  virtu sque  glori(a)  atqu(e)  ingenium 

Ne  quairatis  honore  quei-minus  sit  mandatus 

Quando  dies  adveniet  quern  profata  Morta^est 

but  very  often  it  is  necessary  to  hold  a  long  syllable 
for  one  full  beat.  This  is  more  often  the  first 
syllable  of  a  word,  as,  — 

Hone  oino  ploirume  con  sentiont  Romai 

Aetate  cum  parva  posidet  /loc-saxsum 

rarely  (there  are  seven  instances  in  all)  the  last,  in 
a  proparoxytone  word  of  three  syllables  as,  — 

Taurasis  Cisauna  Samnitf  cepit. 

The  last  beat  in  each  half-verse  is,  therefore,  the 
strong  beat ;  the  voice,  slipping  over  the  less  im- 
portant first  and  second,  beats  to  rest  with  satisfac- 


74        THE  STRESS  ACCENT  IN  LATIN  POETRY 

tion  upon  the  third.  This  explains,  too,  the  fact 
that  the  thesis  is  most  frequently  suppressed  in 
the  fifth  foot ;  coming  next  to  the  last  beat  of  the 
whole  line,  it  is  the  weakest  of  the  six  and  falls 
quite  indifferently  on  a  single  long  syllable,  a  long 
followed  by  a  short,  or  on  the  first  of  three  short 
syllables — though  never  on  a  short  followed  by 
a  single  short  syllable.  The  same  preponderance 
of  the  last  beat  in  each  hemistich  is  characteristic 
of  the  longer  ariyoi  ttoXltlkol — namely,  those  of  fif- 
teen syllables,  developed  out  of  the  iambic  tetram- 
eter catalectic  of  Classical  times 1  —  and  as  Gaston 
Paris2  has  shown,  of  French  poetry.  It  would  be 
insufficient  in  English  or  German  verse  on  account 
of  the  heavy  stress  accent  of  both  languages,  but 
it  harmonizes  perfectly  with  the  nature  of  the 
accent  in  French,  in  late  Greek,  and  in  Latin,  and 
it  seems  to  restore  a  fugitive  beauty  even  to  the 
verses  contemptuously  relegated  by  Ennius  to  the 
fauns  and  satyrs. 

1  Christ,  Metrik  der  Griechen  und  Romer,  Leipzig,  1879,  p.  375. 

2  J&tude  sur  le  Role  de  V Accent  latin  dans  la  Langue  fracaise, 
Paris  and  Leipzig,  1862,  p.  106  et  ss. 


Ill 

THE   QUANTITATIVE   METRES 

In  the  Numeri  Italici  and,  as  we  have  seen  rea- 
son to  believe,  in  the  Numeri  Saturnii,  metrical 
accent  and  word  accent  coincide.  The  same  is 
true,  to  a  great  extent,  of  the  verses  of  Plautus  and 
Terence,  where  a  syllable  may  be  shortened  either 
by  the  word  stress  or  the  verse  stress.1  That  this 
view  of  the  versification  of  Plautus  and  Terence 
was  taken  by  the  Romans  themselves  is  strongly 
suggested  by  the  following  passage  :2  "  Annianus 
poeta  praeter  ingenii  amoenitates  literarum  quoque 
veterum  et  rationum  in  Uteris  oppido  quam  peri- 
tus  fuit  et  sermocinabatur  mira  quadam  et  scita 
suavitate.  Is  dffatim  ut  ddmodum  prima  acuta, 
non  media,  pronuntiabat  atque  ita  veteres  locutos 
censebat.  Itaque  se  audiente  Probum  grammati- 
cum  hos  versus  in  Plauti  Cistcllaria  legisse  dicit : 
Potine  tu  homo  facimis  facere  strenuum  ?  aliorum 
dffatim  est.  Qui  faciant  sane  ego  vie  nolo  fortem 
perhiberi  virtim,  causamque  esse  huic  accentui 
dicebat,  quod  dffatim  non  essent  duae  partes  ora- 
tionis,  sed  utraque  pars  in  unam  vocem  coaluisset, 
sicuti  in  eo  quoque,  quod  exddversum  dicimus,  se- 
cundam  syllabam  debere  acui  existimabat,  quoniam 

1  Cf.  Klotz,  op.  cit.  p.  88. 

2  Annianus  apud  Gellium,  N.  A.  vi  (vii)  7. 

75 


76        THE  STRESS  ACCENT  IN  LATIN  POETRY 

una  non  duae  essent  partes  orationis  ;  atque  ita 
oportere  apud  Terentium  legi  dicebat  in  his  versi- 
bus :  In  quo  Jiaec  discebat  ludo  exddversum  loco 
Tostrina  erat  quae  dam." 

Did  word  accent  play  any  part  in  the  metres 
borrowed  from  Greece,  or  were  they,  as  Bennett 
holds,1  an  orderly  succession  of  long  and  short 
syllables,  and  nothing  more  f 

We  shall  look  in  vain  for  help  from  the  writers 
of  the  Classical  Period  themselves,  for  the  two 
passages  from  Cicero,  quoted  by  Schoell,2  are  not 
to  the  point.  Schoell  quotes 3  "  non  enim  sunt 
alia  sermonis,  alia  contentionis  verba,  neque  in  alio 
genere  ad  usum  quotidianum,  alio  ad  scaenam 
pompamque  sumuntur."  And  so  far  the  words 
might  seem  to  apply  to  accent ;  but  Cicero  is 
speaking  of  the  different  moods  of  oratory,  and  he 
goes  on,  "  sed  ea  nos  cum  iacentia  sustulimus  e 
medio,  sicut  mollissimam  ceram  ad  nostrum  arbi- 
trium  f ormamus  et  fingimus.  Itaque  ut  turn  graves 
sumus,  turn  subtiles,  turn  medium  quiddam  tene- 
mus,  sic  institutam  nostram  sententiam  sequitur 
orationis  genus  idque  ad  omnem  aurium  volupta- 
tem  et  animorum  motum  mutatur  et  vortitur."  The 
second  quotation  is  even  more  disingenuous.  Schoell 
says  —  and  Bennett  quotes  him,  evidently  without 
looking  up  the  passage  —  that  Cicero 4  praises 
Ennius  "  quod  non  discederet  a  communi  more  ver- 

1  Op.  cit.  p.  362.     Vendryes  quotes  him  with  approval. 

2  Op.  cit.  p.  23.  3  De  Orat.  iii.  177.  4  Or  at.  xi.  36. 


THE    QUANTITATIVE  METRES  J  J 

borum."  What  Cicero  does  say  is  as  follows:1 
"Sed  in  omni  re  difficillimum  est  formam,  quod 
j^apaKTrjp  Graece  dicitur.  exponere  optimi,  quod 
aliud  aliis  videtur  optimum.  Ennio  delector,  ait 
quispiam,  quod  non  discedit  a  communi  more  ver- 
borum  ;  Pacuvio,  inquit  alius  :  omnes  apud  hunc 
ornati  elaboratique  sunt  versus,  multa  apud  alterum 
neglegentius  ;  fac  alium  Accio  ;  varia  enim  sunt 
iudicia  ut  in  Graecis  non  facilis  explicatio,  quae 
forma  maxime  excellat.  In  picturis  alius  horrida, 
iuculta,  abdita  et  opaca,  contra  alius  nitida,  laeta, 
conlustrata  delectatur.  Quid  est  quo  praescriptum 
aliquod  aut  formulam  exprimas,  cum  in  suo  quod- 
que  genere  praestet  et  genera  plura  sint?  Hac 
ego  religione  non  sum  ab  hoc  conatu  repulsus  exis- 
timavique  in  omnibus  rebus  esse  aliquid  optimum, 
etiam  si  lateret,  idque  ab  eo  posse  qui  eius  rei  gnarus 
esset  iudicari."  There  is  nothing  in  all  this  which, 
taking  the  words  in  their  context,  can  be  wrested 
into  evidence.  But  Ouintilian  has  a  remark  that 
seems  to  throw  light  on  the  question.  He  says  : 2 
"  Ceterum  scio  iam  quosdam  eruditos,  quosdam  etiam 
grammaticos,  sic  docere  et  loqui,  ut  propter  quae- 
dam  vocum  discrimina  verbum  interim  acuto  sono 
finiant,  ut  in  illis  :  — 

.  .  .  Quae  circum  litora  circum 
Piscosos  scopulos  .  .  .s 

1 1  quote  the  entire  paragraph.  3  Am.  iv.  254. 

2  Inst.  Orat.  i.  5,  25. 


*]%        THE  STRESS  A  CCENT  IN  LA  TIN  FOE  TR  Y 

ne,  si  gravem  posuerint  secundam,  circus  did  vide- 
atur  non  circuities.  Itemque  cum  quale  interrogan- 
tes  gravi,  comparantes  acuto  tenore  concludunt : 
quod  tamen  in  adverbiis  solis  ac  pronominibus 
vindicant,  in  ceteris  veterem  legem  sequuntur. 
Mihi  videtur  condicionem  mutare,  quod  his  locis 
verba  coniungimus.  Nam  cum  dico  circum  litora, 
tanquam  unum  enuntio  dissimulata  distinctione : 
itaque  tanquam  in  una  voce  una  est  acuta,  quod 
idem  accidit  in  illo  :  — 

.  .  .  Troiae  qui  primus  ab  oris.1 
Evenit,  ut  metri  quoque  condicio  mutet  accentum ; 

.  .  .  Pecudes  pictaeque  volucres  : 2 

nam  volucres  media  acuta  legam,  quia,  etsi  natura 
brevis,  tamen  positione  longa  est,  ne  f  aciat  iambum 
quern  non  recipit  versus  herous.  Separata  vero 
haec  a  praecepto  non  recedent,  aut  ei  consuetudo 
vicerit,  vetus  lex  sermonis  abolebitur." 

In  this  passage,  Quintilian  seems  to  say  that 
the  accent  of  separate  words  may  be  slipped  to 
another  syllable  when  the  words  are  joined  in  a 
sentence,  i.e.  word  accent  is  subordinate  to  sen- 
tence accent —  Troiae  qui  primus.  Here,  it  seems 
to  me,  is  the  opening  wedge  by  which  stress  forced 
its  way  back  to  supreme  importance. 

We  know  that  the  early  Latin  verses  were  based 
on  accent,  that  in  the  popular  poetry  of  the  Clas- 
sical Period,  of  which  we  have  a  few  fragments, 

1  Aen.  i.  I.  2  Georg.  iii.  243. 


THE   QUANTITATIVE  METRES  79 

like  the  Mille  song  of  Caesar's  legions,  quantity 
and  word  accent  coincide,  as  they  do  to  a  great 
extent  in  the  New  Poetry  of  the  second  century 
after  Christ  —  the  P ervigilium  Veneris,  for  ex- 
ample ;  and,  not  to  mention  the  curious  melange 
of  accent  and  quantity  in  the  Carmen  Apologeti- 
cutn  and  Instrnctiones  of  Commodianus  (250  a.d.), 
that,  little  by  little,  accent  took  the  place  of  quan- 
tity in  the  Christian  hymns.  It  seems  impossible 
that,  for  a  short  period,  under  foreign  influence, 
the  principle  with  which  Latin  poetry  began  and 
ended,  should  have  been,  not  subordinated  to 
quantity,  —  for  that  is  granted,  —  but  turned  abso- 
lutely out  of  doors. 

An  examination  of  the  hexameter  from  Ennius 
to  Claudius  shows  the  following  percentage  of 
coincidences  between  word  accent  and  "  quanti- 
tative prominence"  —  to  borrow  a  phrase  from 
Professor  Bennett:  Ennius  60.5%;  Lucilius, 
66.2%;  Lucretius  (500  lines),  64.3%;  Vergil, 
Eclogues  (209  lines),  63  %  ;  Georgics  (200  lines), 
62.9  %  ;  Aeneid  (400  lines),  60. 1  %  ;  Horace,  Epis- 
tles (180  lines),  63  %  ;  Satires  (164  lines),  60.4%  ; 
Ovid,  Metamorphoses  (300  lines),  65  %  ;  Persius, 
Sat.  i  (135  lines),  64.5  %  ;  Lucan  (200  lines),  57.9%; 
Petronius,  Bellum  Civile  (150  lines),  62.4  %  ;  Juve- 
nal, Sat.  i  (171  lines),  56.7%;  Ausonius,  Mosella 
(200  lines),  60.6%  ;  Auctor  Contra  Paganos  (120 
lines),  53.6%;  Prudentius  (200  lines),  62.3%; 
Claudian  (200  lines),  56.8%.     It  is  worth  noting 


80        THE  STRESS  ACCENT  IN  LATIN  POETRY 

that  (a)  we  find  the  highest  percentage  (66.2  %)  of 
coincidences  in  Lucilius,  who  wrote  with  scarcely 
more   care  than   he  would    speak,   dashing  off  a 
couple  of  hundred  verses,  as  Horace  says,  stans 
pede  in  uno ;  and  that  the  only  line  which  shows 
a   clash   in   each   foot   between  word  accent  and 
"quantitative    prominence"   is    in    the    passage1 
where  he  is  showing  how  not  to  write.     It  runs  :  — 
Quo  me  habeam  pacto,  tarn  etsi  non  quaeris,  docebo 
Quando  in  eo  numero  mansi  quo  in  maxima  non  est 
Pars  hominum,  (ut  valeam ;  cum  tu  tam  mente  labores) 
Ut  periisse  velis,  quem  visere  nolueris,  cum 
Debueris.     Hoc  '  nolueris  '  et  '  debueris  '  te 
Si  minus  delectat,  quod  Te^vtW.     Eisocratium  est 
XrjpuSes  que  simul  totum  ac  cru/A/xapa/acoSes, 
non  operam  perdo. 

{b)  In  Lucretius,  who  rigorously  subordinated 
form  to  matter,  the  percentage  is  the  third  highest 

(64.3%). 

(c)  In  Vergil  it  decreased  from  the  more  fa- 
miliar Eclogues  to  the  carefully  elaborated  Geor- 
gics  and  A  eneid  (though  it  is  about  the  same  for 
the  first,  sixth,  and  twelfth  books  of  the  A  eneid)  \ 
and  even  more  interesting  is  the  fact  that  the  last 
forty-six  lines  of  the  eighth  Eclogue  —  the  answer 
of  the  shepherdess  to  her  lover  —  not  only  contain 
the  inter-rhymed  line,  — 

Limus  ut  hie  durescit  et  haec  ut  cera  liqueseit, 
but  also  70  °/o  of  accords. 

1  Baehrens,  Poetae  Latifii  Minor es}  vol.  v.  145. 


THE   QUANTITATIVE  METRES  8 1 

(d)  Finally,  in  the  smooth  hexameters  of  Ovid, 
when  the  last  difficulty  of  technique  had  been 
overcome,  the  percentage  reaches  the  second  high- 
est (65  %). 

It  seems  fair  to  say  from  the  percentages  above 
quoted,  that  not  until  the  hexameter  degenerated 
into  a  mere  declamation  of  the  schools,  and  lost 
all  claim  to  being  called  poetry,  did  its  authors 
come  to  disregard  accent  altogether  in  favour  of 
quantity.  Further,  as  has  been  remarked,1  the 
percentage  of  accords  is  far  higher  for  the  second 
half  of  the  hexameter  than  for  the  first.  Taking 
the  lines  previously  examined,  in  Ennius  38  %  of 
all  the  lines  show  the  reading  ^wUwUy  | 
for  the  last  three  feet ;  in  Lucilius,  49.4  %  ;  Lucre- 
tius, 51.8%;  Vergil,  Eclogues,  48.4;  Georgics, 
36  %  ;  Aeneid,  35.7  %  ;  Horace,  Epistles,  53.3  %  ; 
Satires,  50  % ;  Ovid,  46  %  ;  Persius,  54  %  ;  Lucan, 
41.5  %;  Petronius,  54.6  %  ;  Juvenal,  38  %  ;  Auso- 
nius,  51%;  Aicctor  Conti'a  Pciganos,  15%;  Pru- 
dentius,  48.5  %  ;  Claudian,  22  %. 

These  figures  would  be  inexplicable  if  quantity 
were  the  only  principle  at  work  in  the  versification 
of  the  Latin  hexameter.  The  Law  of  the  Last 
Half  is  a  part  of  the  heritage  of  the  hexameter  from 
the  native  accentual  Saturnian  metre,  —  for  we  do 
not  find  it  in  Greek,  —  and  helped  out  by  allitera- 
tion and  assonance,  from  the  same  source,  accounts 

1  Ritschl,  Opusc.  i,  ii,  praef.  p.  xii. 


82        THE  STRESS  ACCENT  IN  LATIN  POETRY 

for  the  immediate  popularity  of  the  Annales  of 
Ennius.  It  was  the  echo  of  the  older  stressed  verse 
in  the  second  half  of  the  quantitative  hexameter 
that  made  it  at  once  intelligible  to  the  people. 

Now  to  return  to  the  question  of  how  Latin 
poetry  was  read  in  the  Classical  Period.  First, 
I  think,  we  may  consider  that  Hendrickson  has 
proved  Bennett's  dictum,  "  Latin  poetry  is  to  be 
read  exactly  like  Latin  prose,"  paying  no  regard 
whatever  to  accent  {i.e.  stress)  to  be  untenable, 
for  then  it  would  no  longer  be  poetry ;  and  that 
Bennett  means  when  he  states  his  belief  that  it 
was  so  read  by  the  "ancients,"  not  "  Servius  and 
the  other  ancient  metricians,"  but  the  Romans  of 
the  time  of  Vergil  and  Horace,  the  present  writer 
has  heard  him  say  again  and  again.  But  how  are 
we  to  account  for  the  clashes  between  word  accent 
and  verse  accent,  as  determined  solely  by  quan- 
tity? As  has  been  shown,  the  proportion  of  ac- 
cords to  clashes  is  about  60  %  to  40  %.  In  each 
foot,  therefore,  if  the  word  accent  coincides  with 
the  verse  accent  on  the  first  syllable  —  the  dactylic 
hexameter  alone  is  here  considered  —  that  syllable 
is  pronounced  with  a  slightly  increased  stress  ;  if  it 
does  not,  the  two  stresses  nullify  each  other  in  the 
mind,  and  the  foot  is  read  with  absolutely  "  level 
stress."  But  the  number  of  feet  in  which  they 
coincide  is  sufficient  to  carry  the  verse,  especially 
since  in  the  first  foot  they  coincide  three  times  out 
of  four,  and  in  the  fifth  and  sixth  feet  they  coin- 


THE    QUANTITATIVE  METRES  83 

cide  in   an   overwhelmingly   large   proportion    of 
lines.1 

To  illustrate,  take  the  opening  lines  of  the 
Aeneid,  because  they  represent  the  least  favourable 
showing,  the  number  of  accords  being  smaller  in 
the  first  fifty  lines  than  in  any  other  group  of  fifty 
lines  examined.2  The  verses  are  marked  as  fol- 
lows :  in  the  top  line  of  markings,  which  represent 
stress,  the  feet  in  which  word  accent  and  quantity 
coincide,  have  the  stress-mark  on  the  first  syllable; 
the  feet  in  which  they  do  not  coincide  are  read 
without  change  of  stress,  and  this  is  indicated  by 
a  line  over  the  entire  foot,  in  place  of  the  stress 
mark.  The  second  line  of  markings  represents 
quantity. 

Stress  

quantity  Z.  \j     kj\  A.  \j      \j\ | 1^-^     w|jL_ 

1 .  Arma  virumque  cano,  Troiae  qui  primus  ab  oris 
Stress  

quantity     _w| |_  w  \j  | |  _^w  u  |Z^ 

2.  Italiam,  fato  profugus,  Lavinaque  venit. 

1  Humphreys,  Infltience  of  Accent  in  Latin  Dactylic  Hexam- 
eters, T.  A.  P.  A.,  vol.  ix.  (1878),  p.  39  ss.  The  percentages  found 
by  Professor  Humphreys  are  for  the  fifth  and  sixth  feet  only. 

2  The  figures  are,  — 

Bk.  i.            1-50,  168  accords  to  132  clashes 

50-100,  182  accords  to  118  clashes 

100-150,  178  accords  to  122  clashes 

150-200,  177  accords  to   123  clashes 

Bk.  vi.    236-285,  184  accords  to  116  clashes 

286-335,  I9I  accords  to  109  clashes 

Bk.  xii.  670-720,  187  accords  to   113  clashes 

720-770,  176  accords  to  124  clashes 


84        THE  STRESS  ACCENT  IN  LATIN  POETRY 


Stress 


quantity     Zuv|Z     _    | | \Zkjkj\Z.— 

3.  Litora,  multum  ille  et  terris  iactatus  et  alto 

Stress  


quantity  Zuu|_    _|_     w    kj     | |  _£  w    w  |  Z.  _ 

4.  Vi  superum  saevae  memorera  Iunonis  ob  iram, 
Stress  — 

quantity  S_    w    w  |   ^_    _  | | \  Z.    uu|Z_ 

5 .  Multa  quoqueet  bella  passus,  dum  conderet  urbem . 
Stress  

quantity  Z_  _  |  Z.  w    kj  \  _kj  kj  \  _  w  w  I  —  w  w  !  ^L_ 

6.  Inferretque  deos  Latio,  genus  unde  Latinum 

Stress  \ 

quantity  /__  \Z_kj  ^  I I    Z^  _    UuvU_\ 

7.  Albanique  patres  atque  altae  moenia  Romae, 
Stress  

quantity  S_  kj    kj\ I  _  w   w    I I    ZLkjkj\  ZL_ 

8.  Musa,  mihi  causas  memora,  quo  numine  laeso, 
Stress  

quantity  Z.  \j    \j     | |Zww| |£vv]Z_ 

9.  Quidve  dolens,  regina  deum  tot  volvere  casus 
Stress  

quantity |_v^u|Zvv|    _      w    w|_£wvy|Z._ 

10.  Insignem  pietate  virum,  tot  adire  labores 
Stress  

quantity  _   Uu|_     _  !  Z  w    w  | |Zwu|Z_ 

11.  Impulerit.   Tantaene   animis  caelestibus    irae? 
Stress  

quantity       /_     _|  Zu  w|_wv|_ww|Zuw|  Z_ 

12.  Urbs  antiqua  fuit,    Tyrii  tenuere  coloni, 

Stress  

quantity |    _  w  w  I l-wuUuwlZ_ 

13.  Karthago,  Italiam  contra  Tiberinaque  longo 


THE    QUANTITATIVE   METRES  85 

Stress  ^  

quantity  Z^w  |ZWwl    —  w    ul--   !-   vw|Z_ 

14.  Ostia,  dives  opum  studiisque  asperrima  belli; 

Stress  

quantity  Z        _| 1 1—  w     wl     Zw  w  I  Z  _ 

15.  Quam  Iuno  fertur  terris  magis  omnibus  unam 

Stress  

quantity  \j  \j  |_  \j\j\jL\j  \j  \ |Zww|  Z 

16.  Posthabita  coluisse  Samo  ;  hie  illius  arma, 
Stress  

quantity  £_      _l_uu|Z_  |_   v;    w  I  Z  w  w  I  Z  vy 

17.  Hie  currus  fuit;  hoc  regnum  dea  gentibus  esse* 

Stress  

quantity  Z    _|  Zvu|_    _  |  Z  _  |    Z    \j     \j\  Z    w 

18.  Si  qua  fata  sinant,  iam  turn  tenditque  fovetque. 

Stress  

quantity  _ww|_w^|_      _|Z_|  ZuuU- 

19.  Progenium  sed  enim  Troiano  a  sanguine  duci 

Stress  \ 

quantity  _w^|_ww| 1 UuwU- 

20.  Audierat,  Tyrias  olim  quae  verteret  arces ; 

Stress  

quantity  Z  wu| 1 | |  Z  ^  w  I  Z  _ 

21.  Hinc  populum  late  regem  belloque  superbum 

Stress  1 \ 

quantity 1  —^-^j  w| |_      _|Z^w|Z_ 

22.  Venturum  exscidio  Libyae  :  sic  volvere  Parcas. 
Stress  

quantity  Z      uwl-wuUuul-    _|Z^W|Z_ 

23.  Id  metuens  veterisque  memor  Saturnia  belli, 
Stress  

quantity  Z    ^       \j    |_    _l_     _|Z_|Z^w|Z_ 

24.  Prima  quod  ad  Troiam  pro  caris  gesserat  Argis 


86        THE  STRESS  ACCENT  IN  LATIN  POETRY 


Stress 
quantity 

25. 

Stress 
quantity 

26. 

Stress 

quantity 

27. 

Stress 

quantity 

28. 

Stress 

quantity 

29. 

Stress 
quantity 

Stress 
quantity 

31- 

Stress 

quantity 

32. 

Stress 

quantity 

33- 


Z.       w^_wl l_._|-_     -1-^    v/l^_ 

Nec  dum  etiam  causae  irarum  saevique  dolores 

/ 

—  ww  I  —  wwl —      t   UU   I- 1     —    \J  \j\  —   

Exciderantanimo  :  manet  alta  mente  repostum 


_ww|_   ww| I  Z_4/.._^|  Z._ 

Iudicium  Paridis  spretaeque  iniuria  formae, 


\jL    _ 


IZ- 


Et  genus  invistHH,  et  rapti  Ganymedis  honores ; 


jL    _|  Z  w  w! I  Z_|  /  w  w  i^_ 

His  accensa  super  iactatos  aequore  toto 


Z_|_ww|_w^l-/w_      I    /    wwl^_ 
Troas,  relliquias  Danatun  atque  inmitis  Achilli, 


I i_ww| IZ.W        w    |Z._ 

Arcebat  longe  Latio,  multosque  per  annos 


|_     _| |_ww|/wu|/_  x 

Errabant,  acti  fatis,  maria  omnia  circum. 


Zw  w| \Z. 


W    W    I 


Tantae  rriolis  erat  Romanam  condere  gentem. 

An  examination  of  these  lines  proves  beyond 
question  that  coincidence  between  word  accent  and 
quantity  is  not  wholly  dependent  on  the  caesura, 
as  Plessis  thinks.1     For  in  lines  1,  7,   12,   15,   18, 

1  Metrique  grecque  et  latine,  Paris,  1889,  p.  32  ss. 


THE   QUANTITATIVE  METRES  87 

19,  26,  27,  28,  29,  and  33,  where  the  caesura  falls 
after  the  long  syllable  of  the  third  foot,  the  accords 
agree  neither  in  number  nor  position.  Lines  4,  5, 
8,  15,  and  21  show  accords  in  the  first,  fifth,  and 
sixth  feet,  but  the  caesura  falls  in  very  different 
parts  of  the  line.  So  lines  2,  22,  26,  and  32  re- 
semble each  other  in  having  accords  only  in  the 
fifth  and  sixth  feet,  but  this  resemblance  does  not 
extend  to  the  caesura ;  and,  while  in  the  lines  with 
five  accords,  7,  14,  18,  29,  and  33,  it  is  always  the 
third  foot  that  is  read  with  level  stress,  line  14 
differs  from  the  others  in  having  the  main  caesura 
after  the  first  foot.  There  are,  in  fact,  no  two 
successive  lines  that  resemble  each  other  both  in 
the  number  and  position  of  the  accords,  and  in  the 
position  of  the  caesura,  thus  bringing  to  light 
another  element  in  that  greatest  marvel  of  Vergil's 
metrical  technique  —  its  infinite  variety.  More- 
over, if  for  two  or  three  successive  lines  more  than 
the  average  number  of  feet  are  read  with  level 
stress,  in  the  following  lines  less  are  read;  but  each 
time  the  climax  is  marked  by  a  line  containing  five 
accords.  Nor  does  it  seem  likely  that  the  poet 
was  unconscious  of  this  method  of  avoiding  mo- 
notony, when  he  uses  it  with  such  extraordinarily 
marked  effect.  In  form,  therefore,  as  well  as  in 
matter,  Vergil  is  a  thoroughly  Latin  poet.  And 
just  as  he  made  the  Trojan  Aeneas  an  essential 
part  pf  Roman  tradition,  the  founder  of  the  State, 
Quires  of  the  Quirites,  so  he  naturalized  the  Greek 


88        THE  STRESS  ACCENT  IN  LATIN  POETRY 

hexameter,  subordinating,  but  not  obliterating, 
stress,  the  fundamental  principle  of  the  native 
poetry. 

In  the  passage  quoted  above,  Quintilian  speaks 
rather  tentatively  of  sentence  accentuation,  as  if  it 
were  a  new  doctrine  and  not  the  conventional 
teaching,  iam  quidam  eruditi,  quidam  etiam  gram- 
matici  docent,  he  writes,  and  rnihi  videtur,  and  in 
the  very  next  sentence  he  returns  to  the  vetus  lex 
sermonis.  "  Namque  in  omni  voce  acuta  intra 
numerum  trium  syllaborum  continetur,  sive  eae 
sunt  in  verbo  solae  sive  ultimae,  et  in  eis  aut 
proxima  extremae,  aut  ab  ea  tertia.  Trium  porro 
de  quibus  loquor,  media  longa  aut  acuta  aut  flexa 
erit;  eodem  loco  brevis  utique  gravem  habebit 
solum,  ideoque  positam  ante  se,  id  est  ab  ultima 
tertiam  acuet.  Est  autem  in  omni  voce  utique 
acuta,  sed  nunquam  plus  una,  nee  unquam  ultima, 
ideoque  in  disyllabis  prior.  Praeterea  nunquam 
in  eadem  flexa  et  acuta  quoniam  in  flexa  est  acuta. : 
itaque  neutra  cludet  vocem  latinam."  The  same 
teaching  is  found  in  Bk.  xii.,  10.  33:  "Sed 
accentus  quoque,  cum  rigore  quodam,  turn  simili- 
tudine  ipsa  minus  suaves  habemus ;  quia  ultima 
syllaba  nee  acuta  umquam  excitatur,  nee  flexa 
circumducitur,  sed  in  gravem,  vel  duos  graves  cadit 
semper.  Itaque  tanto  est  sermo  Graecus  Latino 
iucundior,  ut  nostri  poetae,  quotiens  dulce  carmen 
esse  voluerint  illorum  id  nominibus  exornent."  It 
does  not  seem  likely  that  they  would  wish  so  to 


THE  QUANTITATIVE  METRES  89 

"adorn  "  their  verses,  if  the  law  of  sentence  accent 
had  a  very  wide  application.  After  Quintilian  the 
subject  is  not  infrequently  mentioned  by  the  gram- 
marians. Lindsay  has  collected  the  instances  in 
Ch.  hi.  of  his  Latin  Language ;  p.  165  ss.  Two 
words  are  thought  of  as  forming  a  word  group, 
with  but  a  single  accent.  As,  for  instance,  Pom- 
peius  writes :  "  Quotienscumque  duae  partes  ora- 
tionis  in  unam  colliguntur,  iam  quoniam  pro  una 
sunt,  unum  accentum  habebunt,  prout  fuerit  syllaba 
ilia.  Si  dicas  '  interea  loci,'  interea  una  pars  ora- 
tionis  est,  loci  una  pars  orationis  est.  Quando  iam 
sic  utramque  dicis,  ut  pro  una  sint,  ambae  partes 
unum  habebunt  accentum.  Ergo  duae  partes  ora- 
tionis quando  unam  faciunt,  necesse  est  ut  unum 
accentum  habeant."  1  On  the  next  page,  speaking 
again  of  separate  words,  he  writes,  "Ultima  enim 
numquam  habet  [accentum]  aut  in  versu  aut  in 
prosa."  Schoell  2  quotes  this  last  sentence  from 
Pompeius  and  on  the  same  page  Consentius,3  his 
treatment  of  whom  shows  the  same  lack  of  direct- 
ness of  which  we  have  before  had  occasion  to 
speak.  Consentius  is  writing  De  Scandendis  Ver- 
szbns,  and  Schoell  begins  his  quotation  :  — 

"  Sine  accusatione  consistit  versus  huius  modi : 
Conditus  in  nubem  medioque  refulserit  orbe,4  et 
Tu  quoque  litoribus  nostris  Aeneia  nutrix.5 
Hi  et  tales  non  auctoritate  aliqua  praerogativa  artis 

1  v.  p.  130,  22  K.  2  Op.  cit.  p.  27.  3  v.  398,  24  K. 

4  Georg,  i.  442.  5  ALn.  vii.  1. 


90        THE  STRESS  ACCENT  IN  LATIN  POETRY 

aut  consuetudinis  defenduntur  ;  nihil  additum,  nihil 
detractum,  nihil  mutatum  habent,  sed  iuxta  commu- 
nis linguae  enuntiationem  integri  nati  sunt,  neque 
ulla  ea  parte  aliquid  dubitationis  admittunt."  On 
this  he  remarks,  "  Hoc  dicere  non  potuit  Consen- 
sus, nisi  cum  Bentleio 1  conditus  in  nubem  et  tit 
qtcoque  litoribiis,  pronuntiaret,  non  nubem  ac  litori- 
bus."  Consentius  goes  on  to  say  that  the  verses 
quoted  are  " without  apology"  because  they  con- 
tain no  short  syllable  lengthened  in  arsis  as  (and 
he  quotes) 

"Emicat  Eurya/kr  et  munere  victor  amici;"  2 

no  short  vowel  followed  by  a  mute  and  liquid,  as 
(he  quotes)  "et  vol?/mim  linguas,"  and  " pecudes 
pictaeque  voices' '  ;3  no  lengthening  or  shortening 
like  "  X&nton  me  crimine  dignum  duxisti"  ;  or  relli- 
quias  Danaum,"  or  Ennius's  "<?batu  Athenis,"  or 
" /talium  "  4  (with  long/)  or  "aquosus  Orz<?n,"  or 
Horace's  "feraeque  s?/£'tae"  and  Lucan's  dixisse 
Plwbus ;  and  finally  no  elisions.  The  section 
ends  with  a  discussion  of  elision,  nor  is  there  a 
word  in  it,  from  beginning  to  end,  about  accent. 
With  such  misrepresentations  as  this,  both  at  first 
and  at  second  hand,  it  is  small  wonder  that  the 

1  Sched.  d.  m.  Ter.  p.  xix.,  ed.  Lips. 

2  jEn.  v.  337. 

3  Quintilian,  1.  I.,  and  Sergius,  ad  A  en.  i.  384,  have  a  word  to 
say  on  this  point. 

4  Mentioned  also  by  Quintilian,  op.  cit.  i.  5,  18. 


THE   QUANTITATIVE  METRES  91 

teachings  of  the  grammarians  should  seem  "cha- 
otic," as  they  are  pronounced  by  Professor  Bennett. 

Now,  the  step  from  Troide  qui  to  cano  is  not  a 
long  one,  and  it  seems  to  me  likely  that  it  was 
taken  by  such  uninspired  declaimers  as  the  Auctor 
Contra  Paga?ias  and  by  the  ecclesiastical  versifiers 
of  the  Middle  Ages.  For  then  Latin  had  become, 
if  it  had  not  always  been,  a  stressed  language,  as 
is  universally  acknowledged,  and  this  offers  a  per- 
fectly reasonable  explanation  for  the  utter  disre- 
gard of  word  accent  in  the  late  hexameters. 

Naturally  the  common  people  never  saw  the 
sense  in  this  subordination  of  word  stress  to  verse 
stress,  and  so  in  the  soldiers'  songs  and  other  frag- 
ments of  popular  poetry  that  have  come  down  to 
us,  word  and  verse  stress  tend  to  coincide,  as,  for 
instance :  — 

1.  "  Gallias  Caesar  subegit,  Nicomedes  Caesarem 

Ecce  Caesar  nunc  triumphat,  qui  subegit  Gallias 
Nicomedes  non  triumphat,  qui  subegit  Caesarem."1 

2.  Urbani  servate  uxores,  moechum  calvum  adducimus 
Aurum  in  Gallia  effutuisti,  hie  sumpsisti  mutuom.2 

3.  Gallos  Caesar  in  triumphum  ducit,  idem  in  curiam 
Gallos  bracas  deposuerunt,  latum  clavum  sumpserunt.3 

4.  Mille,  mille,  mille,  mille,  mille  decollavimus 

Unus  homo,  mille,  mille,  mille  decollavimus 
Mille,  mille,  mille,  mille,  bibat  qui  mille  occidit 
Tantum  vini  nemo  habet  quantum  fudit  sanguinis.4 

1  Suetonius,  life  of  Julius  Caesar,  c.  49.         3  Op.  cit.  ch.  80. 

2  Op.  cit.  ch.  5L  4  Volpiscus,  Life  of  Aurelian,  ch.  6. 


92        THE  STRESS  ACCENT  IN  LATIN  POETRY 

5.  Mille  Francos,  mille  semel  Sarmatas  occidimus 
Mille,  mille,  mille,  mille,  mille,  Persas  quaerimus.1 

The  same  is  true  of  the  semi-popular  poetry, 
which  began  to  appear  early  in  the  second  century 
after  Christ,  for  example  :  — • 

6.  Floro2  poetae  scribenti  ad  se 

Ego  nolo  Caesar  esse 
Ambulare  per  Britannos 
Latitare  per  Germanos 
Scythicos  pati  priunas 
rescripsit  Hadrianus 

Ego  nolo  Florus  esse 
Ambulare  per  tabernas 
Latitare  per  popinas 
Culices  pati  rotundos. 

7.  The  iambics  quoted  by  Baehrens  3  from  the 
Liber  Ludicrorum  of  Apuleius  :  — 

Calpurniane  salve  properis  versibus  ! 
Misi,  ut  petisti,  mundicinas  dentium, 
Nitelas  oris  ex  Arabicis  frugibus, 
Tenuem  candificum  nobilem  pulvisculum,  j 
Complanatorem  tumidulae  gingivulae, 
Converritorem  pridianae  reliquiae, 
Ne  qua  visatur  tetra  tabes  sordium, 
Restrictis  forte  si  labellis  riseris. 

8.  The  Pervigilium  Veneris  —  in  which  not  only 
are  words  and  phrases  repeated  with  a  peculiarly 

1  Op.  cit.  ch.  7.  3  Op.  cit.  p.  376. 

2  Quoted  by  Spartianus,  Vit.  Hadr.  1 6. 


THE   QUANTITATIVE  METRES  93 

charming  naivete,  while  assurance,  "alliteration  and 
even  rhyme  are  found,  but  word  accent  and  quan- 
tity tend  all  through  the  poem  to  coincide,  and  do 
entirely  coincide  in  one-third  of  the  lines. 
t  Finally,  in  the  Christian  hymns,  the  versification 
is  based,  now  on  word  accent,  now  on  quantity  — 
sometimes  even  on  a  simple  count  of  the  syllables, 
as  it  is  in  the  GTiyoi  ttoXltlkoi  of  the  Byzantine 
writers  —  until  in  the  end  quantity  was  displaced,  and 
accent  alone  determined  the  structure  of  the  verse. 
This  new  kind  of  versification,  which  was,  at  the 
same  time,  oldest  of  all,  is  first  clearly  distinguished 
from  the  Classical  versification  based  on  quantity, 
by  Marius  Victorinus  (4th  century ).  Although 
the  words  of  Laberius1  a  writer  of  Mimes  who 
flourished  50  B.C.,  Versorum  11011  numerorwAi  uu- 
mero  studuimus,  and  of  Quintilian,2  Pocma  nemo 
dubitaverit  imperito  qnodcini  initio  fusum  et  auriutn 
mensura  et  similiter  de curve ntiam  spatiornm  obser- 
vation esse  generatum,  seem  to  point  to  the  same 
distinction.  Marius  Victorinus  writes : 3  "  Metro  : 
quid  videtur  esse  consimile  ?  Rhythmus.  Rhy- 
thmus  quid  est  ?  Verborum  modulata  compositio 
non  metrica  ratione,  sed  numerosa  scansione  ad 
iudicium  aurium  examinata,  ut  puta  veluti  sunt 
cantica  poetarum  vulgarium.  Rhythmus  ergo  in 
metro  non  est  ?  Potest  esse.  Quid  ergo  distat  a  me- 
tro ?    Quod  rhythmus  per  se  sine  metro  esse  potest, 

1  Laberius,  v.  55,  ed.  Ribb.  (2).  3  vi.  p.  206  K. 

2  Inst.   Qr.  ix.  4,  114. 


94        THE  STRESS  ACCENT  IN  LATIN  POETRY 

metrum  sine  rhythmo  esse  non  potest1  Quod 
liquidius  ita  definitur,  metrum  est  ratio  cum  modu- 
lation, rhythmus  sine  ratione  metrica,  modulatio. 
Plerumque  tamen  casu  quodam  etiam  invenies 
rationem  metricam  in  rhythmo,  non  artificii  obser- 
vatione  servata,  sed  sono  et  ipsa  modulatione 
ducente."  Diomedes'  definition,  rhythmus  est 
versus  imago  modulata?  is  to  the  same  effect,  as  is 
also  what  Servius  says  (of  the  Saturnian  verse 3), 
carminibus  Saturnio  metro  compositis,  quod  ad 
ryhythmum  solum  vulgares  componere  consuerunt. 
At  the  end  of  the  fourth  century,  therefore,  the  dis- 
tinction was  already  thoroughly  established.4  Later. 
Beda  Venerabilis  (died  672),  enlarging  on  Victo- 
rinus's  words,  writes  :  5  "  Videtur  autem  rhythmus 
metris  esse  consimilis,  quae  est  verborum  modulata 
compositio,  non  metrica  ratione,  sed  numero  sylla- 
barum  ad  iudicium  aurium  examinata,  ut  sunt  car- 
mina  vulgarium  poetarum ;  quern  (sc.  rhythmum) 
vulgares  poetae  necesse  est  rustice,  docti  faciant 
docte.  Quo-modo  et  ad  instar  iambici  metri  pul- 
cherrime  factus  est  hymnus  ille  praeclarus :  — 

O  rex  aeterne  domine 

Rerum  creator  omnium. 

Qui  eras  ante  saecula 

Semper  cum  patre  filius.  6 

1  This  bears  hard  on  Professor  Bennett's  theory  of  "  quantitative 
prominence." 

2  p.  470  K.  3  ad  Georg.  ii.  385. 

4  Hiimer,  Untersuchungen  uber  die  dltesteif  lateinish-echristlichen 
Rhythmen,  p.  6  et  ss.  6  vii.  p.  258  K,  P  5th  century. 


THE    QUANTITATIVE  METRES  95 

et  alii  Ambrosiani  non  pauci.  Item  ad  formam 
metri  trochaic  canunt  hymnum  de  die  iudicii 
alphabetum :  — 

Apparebit  repentina 

Dies  magna  domini 

Fur  obscura  velut  nocte 

Improvisos  occupans." 
In  the  Rex  aeterne  domine,  the  first  beat  in  the 
second  and  fourth  lines  would  seem  to  be  deter- 
mined by  quantity  rather  than  by  word  accent. 
But,  as  Greenough1  has  pointed  out,  in  Christian 
poetry  there  were  so  many  dissyllables,  like  Christe, 
Dens,  Pater,  Lueis,  demanding  naturally  the  first 
place,  that  the  license  came  in  of  giving  a  trochaic 
accent  to  the  first  foot  instead  of  an  iambic,  as  in 
the  modern  hymn,  — 

From  all  that  dwell  below  the  skies 
Let  the  Creator's  praise  arise. 
It  is  also  worthy  of  note  that  while  the  accentual 
Greek  poetry  was  content  with  the  coincidence  of 
word  and  verse  accent  in  the  last  foot  of  the  line, 
or,  in  the  longer  lines,  of  each  hemistich  —  which 
is  true  also  of  modern  French  poetry  —  in  Latin, 
where  the  influence  of  stress  is  greater  and  more 
persistent,  it  is  demanded  in  every  foot. 

Professor  Greenough  shows2  that  Horace  in  his 

1  "Accentual  Rhythm  in  Latin,"  in  Harvard  Studies  in  Classical 
Philology,  vol.  iv.  p.  113  ss. 

2  /.  /. ;  cf.  also  Metres  Lyriques  d^  Horace,  par  O.  Riemann,  Paris, 
1883,  pp.  65  and  70. 


g6        THE  STRESS  ACCENT  IN  LATIN  POETRY 

two  favourite  metres,  the  Sapphic  and  Alcaic,  by 
observing  the  strong  caesura  after  the  fifth  syllable 
—  which  is  not  done  in  Greek  —  makes  word-  and 
verse-accent  coincide  in  a  very  large  proportion  of 
feet.  Incidentally  he  remarks,  "In  a  large  num- 
ber of  iambic  verses  taken  consecutively  from  the 
remains  of  Ennius  and  Naevius,  as  they  are  given 
in  Merry's  collection,  out  of  1500  ictuses,  only 
about  22  per  cent  fail  to  conform  to  the  word 
accent,  and  this  counting  all  cases  of  verbs  com- 
pounded with  prepositions,  though  it  may  well  be 
that  the  preposition  was  at  that  time  accented,  and 
all  cases  of  a  dissyllable  at  the  end  of  a  verse, 
though  the  last  verse  ictus  must  have  been  very 
weak."  Also  that  in  a  thousand  verses  of  Seneca, 
the  tragedian,  there  is  "not  one  that  cannot  be 
read  in  the  Christian  fashion."  As  has  been  said, 
word-  and  verse-ictus  tend  to  coincide  in  the  dia- 
logue of  Plautus  and  Terence,  though  the  theory 
must  not  be  pushed  too  far.  "There  is  just  so 
much  disregard  of  accent  as  to  produce  what  Ritschl 
happily  calls  the  harmonische  Disharmonie  of  Plau- 
tine  verse."  1  So  it  would  seem  that  there  is  no  real 
break  from  the  early  accentual  verses,  like  Mars 
pater  te  precor,  to  the  Dies  irae,  dies  ilia,  of  Chris- 
tian times,  but  that,  from  first  to  last,  Stress  is 
responsible,  not  only  for  the  formation  of  words, 
but,  in  a  greater  or  less  degree,  for  the  structure 
of  verse  as  well. 

1  Lindsay,  Appendix  to  his  edition  of  Plautus'  Captivi,  p.  372. 


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