|
|
|
|
|
|
|
irrational rhythm. The rhythmicians called it 'cyclic', and distinguished it from the ordinary anapaest. A lyric fragment quoted to exemplify it looks as if it may come from Stesichorus. It would be understandable if Stesichorus, whose lengthy narrative songs were very epic in character, and who made much use of  . . . and  . . . sequences, gave these metres the same rhythmic values as the Homeric singers employed.17 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
It may be that dactyls sometimes had this rhythm even in dramatic song in the late fifth century, as there are certain cases where  and  seem to be treated as almost equivalent, which is easier to understand if  was something like  than if it was  .18 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
In other cases, no doubt, dactyls had the rationalized rhythm  . The rhythmicians in fact adopted 'dactylic' as a generic term for all kinds of foot in which thesis and arsis were of equal duration. In the case of the dactyl the long note was the thesis and the two short ones made up the arsis.19 As in epic verse, the arsis could sometimes be filled by one long syllable instead of two short ones, though this was done much more sparingly in lyric song than in epic. Presumably such a long syllable was sometimes divided between two notes of the melody. It was quite exceptional for the thesis-long to be divided between two short syllables. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
When a sequence of dactyls continued up to a pause or a break in the melodic flow, it ended with a bar of the form  or  or  . |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Anapaests in the classical period are especially associated with parading choruses, who chanted verse in this metre with an aulete playing an accompaniment. In tragedy there were also some anapaestic songs, mainly for soloists, but again tending to go with entries and perambulations. It was the natural metre for marching to. The unit of composition is practically always the two-foot measure corresponding to a double pace:  . The short notes formed the arsis and the long one the thesis. Substitution of a long for two shorts and vice versa is frequent, but generally so managed (at any rate |
|
|
|
 |
|
|
|
|
17 Dion. Hal. ibid.; PMG 1027e (misprinted). |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
18 See my Greek Metre, 131 f., and cf. Dion. Hal.'s comment on Od. 11. 598 in Comp. 144 (ii. 93. 15f. U.-R.), that the dactyls in the line 'have irrational syllables mixed in with them, so that some of them do not differ much from trochees'. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
19 Cf. Damon ap. Pl. Resp. 400b, Aristox. Rhythm. 2. 30, Aristid. Quint. 1. 15, etc. |
|
|
|
|
|