Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Tables
- Preface
- Symbols and Abbreviations
- 1 Bases of Old Saxon metre: an introduction
- 2 Metrical types and positions: levelling and reorganisation
- 3 Resolution and alliteration: repatterning and reconstitution
- 4 Hypermetric verses and lines: diversification and restructuring
- 5 The remaking of alliterative tradition: gradation and harmonisation
- Appendix 1 Foreign names
- Appendix 2 The metre of the Old Saxon Genesis
- References
- Index to the scansion of the Heliand
- Index to the scansion of the Old Saxon Genesis
- Index of authors
- Index of subjects
- Index of verses cited for discussion or exemplification
Appendix 2 - The metre of the Old Saxon Genesis
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 12 September 2012
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Tables
- Preface
- Symbols and Abbreviations
- 1 Bases of Old Saxon metre: an introduction
- 2 Metrical types and positions: levelling and reorganisation
- 3 Resolution and alliteration: repatterning and reconstitution
- 4 Hypermetric verses and lines: diversification and restructuring
- 5 The remaking of alliterative tradition: gradation and harmonisation
- Appendix 1 Foreign names
- Appendix 2 The metre of the Old Saxon Genesis
- References
- Index to the scansion of the Heliand
- Index to the scansion of the Old Saxon Genesis
- Index of authors
- Index of subjects
- Index of verses cited for discussion or exemplification
Summary
The primary objective of this appendix is to see whether and to what extent the Old Saxon Genesis (Behaghel and Taeger 1984; Doane 1991) shares the major innovative features that were introduced to the Heliand metre, as summarised in Chapter 5 of this book. To the extent that the Genesis falls short of the Heliand in gradation and harmonisation in its metrical organisation, we can hardly fail to recognise the Heliand poet's admirable competence and ingenuity in designing and implementing metrical innovations. Since the corpus of the Old Saxon Genesis, about one-twentieth of the Heliand in size, is highly limited, however, we cannot be definitive about whatever tendencies observable in the extant data.
Of central concern are the following metrical properties: identification of metrical types and their major realisation variants along with their characteristic distribution patterns (section 1); the status of anacrusis (section 2); implementation and suspension of resolution (section 3); alliterative patterns of heavy verses (section 4); CV-alliteration (section 5).
Metrical types and variants
Type A1
The absence of the configurations PSx#Px and PS#xP, as well as of the configuration PS#Px with single alliteration (either in the a-verse or the b-verse), as shown in Table A2.1, would appear to justify us in regarding the configuration PS#Px as an independent metrical type, type A2a, as in the traditional metre. The rare occurrence of this configuration even when provided with double alliteration, however, would make this characterisation less definitive.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- The Metre of Old Saxon PoetryThe Remaking of Alliterative Tradition, pp. 353 - 365Publisher: Boydell & BrewerPrint publication year: 2004