The very remarkable poem called The Pearl, and three Alliterative Poems by the same author, were first edited by Dr Morris for the E.
The spirited romance generally known as the alliterative Morte Arthure must also belong here, though the MS.
The translation is in alliterative measures, called by the translator imitative of the Old English.
Some may ask why I have not preserved the Anglo-Saxon alliterative Metre.
This we know from their language, in which a Gospel Harmony, in alliterative metre, a fragmentary translation of the Psalms, and a heroic rhapsody called Hildubrant and Hathubrant have come down to us.
The 'Geste Hystoriale' of the Destruction of Troy, edited by Panton and Donaldson for the Early English Text Society, is a translation of Guido's Historia into Middle English alliterative verse.
At the same time it would be interesting to know what version of Guido Chaucer followed; for it is a very singular fact, that whilst the story of Hypsipyle is neither in the alliterative Eng.
Another alliterative poem in the northern dialect, of 15th-century origin, is based on the Historia de proeliis, and was edited by Skeat for the E.
It may therefore be quite right to speak of Anglo-Saxon alliterative poetry as trochaic or dactylic, and quite wrong to apply the same terms to the cadence of our later alliterative verse.
Some of the sermons in the second series had been written in a kind of rhythmical, alliterative prose, and in the Lives of the Saints (ed.
Besides the English editions quoted in the text, the alliterative English poems were partially edited by J.
The question arises--What is the nature of the cadence in alliterative verse?
Percy made a serious mistake when he gave the name of Alexandrine to anapaestic verse; but he is quite right in his general statement that alliterative verse became lost in a measure the movement of which had the final beat.
Skeat and many others object with some reason to use the classical terms, and therefore brushing them aside, let us put the question in the simplest form--Has the movement of alliterative verse got the initial or the final beat?
Those who wish for a more minute analysis of the laws of alliterative verse, as practised by the Anglo-Saxon and early English poets, may consult an exhaustive essay on the subject by Professor W.
There are two considerable fragments of an English alliterative romance on the subject written in the west midland dialect, and dating from the second half of the 14th century.
Saxon poet was the author of a vigorous alliterativeversion of the Gospel story, the Heliand (c.
This alliterative epic--for epic it may be called--is the one poem of this age in which the Christian tradition has been adapted to German poetic needs.
In alliterative metres a certain {500} number of words, within a certain period, must begin with a similar articulation.
Heliand, a Gospel Harmony in alliterative metre, and the chief Old Saxon composition extant.
In spite of the great popularity which the regular alliterative line enjoyed down to the beginning of the Modern English period, numerous and important rivals had arisen in the meantime, viz.
We now come to =the structure of the whole alliterative line=.
It is quite incorrect to say that the author in the course of his work not unfrequently fell back into the alliterative verse.
But the form of verse in these Mysteries, owing to the loss of regular alliteration, cannot with propriety be described as the four-beat alliterative long line, but only as the four-beat long line.
In modern times a few attempts have been made to revive the old four-beat alliterative line without rhyme, but also without a regular use of alliteration.
Furthermore, in the Old English alliterative line, endings consisting of an accented and an unaccented syllable (feminine endings) prevailed; and type B was the only one of the symmetrical types ending with an accented syllable.
Previous to the version of the Archdeacon a translation of the Psalms had been made into Welsh by William Middleton, an officer in the naval service of Queen Elizabeth, in the four-and-twenty alliterative measures of the ancients bards.
In the Cotton library is a volume of ancient English poems[891], two of which are written in thisalliterative metre, and have the division of the lines into distichs distinctly marked by a point, as is usual in old poetical MSS.
It is well observed by Mr. Tyrwhitt on Chaucer's sneer at this old alliterativemetre (vol.
Since the foregoing essay was first printed, the Editor hath met with some additional examples of the old alliterative metre.
Thus have we traced the alliterative measure so low as the sixteenth century.
As Langland was not the first, so neither was he the last that used this alliterative species of versification.
In the same book are also specimens ofalliterative French verses.
The alliterative metre was no less popular among the old Scottish poets, than with their brethren on this side the Tweed.
On theAlliterative Metre, without Rhyme, in Pierce Plowman's Visions 377 INDEX.
Where are youralliterative translations from Ab Gwilym--of which you were always talking, and with which you promised to astonish the world?
For a description of the Manuscript, and particulars relating to the authorship and dialect of the present work, the reader is referred to the preface to Early English Alliterative Poems.
They were part of the common inheritance--as much so as the strong verbs {52} or the alliterative line.
This failure to fall in with the alliterative scheme, and the absence of confirmation from external evidence, are, of course, not in themselves enough to prove that the reign of Beowulf over the Geatas is a poetic figment.
The Early English Alliterative Poems, though noticed long ago by Dr.
Early English Alliterative Poems in the West Midland Dialect of the fourteenth century (ab.
Norne is to entreat, ask (see Alliterative Poems Glossary), and may have something to do with this expression, but it is hardly so probable as the above.
It is to be observed that the ordinary Servian metre is decasyllabic, the verse not being appreciably shorter than the average Teutonic alliterative verse.
It can scarcely be doubted that these early poems were products of court-minstrelsy and that their form was that of the old Teutonic alliterative verse.
It is not in the old Teutonic alliterative metre which we find in Anglo-Saxon poetry and in the Hildebrandslied, but in the later rhyming verse.
Poems which are preserved by oral tradition alone are manifestly liable to small verbal changes, especially in a metre so flexible as that of the Teutonic alliterative verse.
Sir Clyomon and Sir Clamydes is written in tedious alliterative heptameters.
The fourteenth century is the last in which alliterative verse really flourished, though it survived even beyond the Renaissance.
The famous Visions of Langland, in the fourteenth century, are in alliterative verse; under Elizabeth alliteration became one of the peculiarities of the florid prose called Euphuism.
Both are in alliterative verse; the first composed about the end, and the second about the middle, of the fourteenth century.
Troilus is described by Guido delle Colonne; see the translations, in the alliterative Destruction of Troy, ed.
The alliterative Destruction of Troy duly records the circumstance, ll.
Pertaining to, or characterized by, alliteration; as, alliterative poetry.
AngloÐSaxon poetry is characterized by alliterative meter of this sort.
It is used in the alliterative poem on the Deposition of Richard II, p.
It appears to be the same word which occurs in the alliterative poem on the Deposition of Richard II, p.
Though we find instances of irregularity in the sub-letters (or alliterative letters in the first line) in Pierce Plowman, the chief letter is not so often neglected.
In theAlliterative Poem on the Deposition of Richard II (printed for the Camden Society), p.
The fantastic, alliterative title of this volume does no justice to the genuine value of its contents, and we hope Miss Chesebro' will hereafter avoid such poverty-struck devices of ambitious second-rate writers.
