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Prose-Rhythm and the Comparative Method

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 February 2009

W.H. Shewring
W.H. Shewring
Affiliation:
Ampleforth College, York
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Extract

The theory of the comparative method has been discussed in a previous article. I pass on to the results obtained—the actual history of prose-rhythm in the practice of particular authors. I give below the figures of normal frequency on which my statements are based. For Greek prose, as I have already said, Thucydides may be considered a practically unmetrical author, since nearly all his clausulae occur with about the same frequency as might be expected from the natural proportion of long and short syllables in the Greek language, and since there is little difference between his sentence-metre and his clausula-metre. (A slight difference between the two is natural, because there are some words, such as the article, which can scarcely be used to close a sentence.) Thus the theoretical frequency of — ∪ — is 14·19 per cent.; its frequency in Thucydides' clausula-metre is 14·2, in his sentence-metre 14·4. But there are two cases where the difference in these proportions seems too great to be due altogether to chance. Compared with the theoretical calculation and with the sentence-metre, —∪∪—— occurs in the clausula considerably more frequently (6·1 per cent, as against 2·6 per cent.) and —∪—∪ considerably less (3·7 per cent, as against 5·1 per cent.). The first form seems to be sought by Thucydides; the second seems to be avoided (doubtless as suggesting an iambic trimeter ending). For these two forms, therefore, I have considered as normal the average percentages of 2,000 cases in the sentence-metre of Thucydides and Xenophon (1,000 each), for the rest the percentages of 2,000 cases in the clausula-metre of Thucydides. For normal frequency in Latin metrical prose I have used de Groot's figures, based on 2,000 cases from nineteenth-century Latin translations of Gregory and Athanasius.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Classical Quarterly , Volume 25 , Issue 1 , January 1931 , pp. 12 - 22
Copyright
Copyright © The Classical Association 1931

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References

page 12 note 1 It is also sought by Xenophon, but is avoided by most other Greek authors. Curiously enough, the same form is sought in Latin by Sallust and Livy, but avoided by the Ciceronian school.

page 12 note 2 The figures in each case are reproduced by the courtesy of Professor de Groot from his Handbook and Prosarhythmus.

page 14 note 1 One thousand cases in Books II., III., IV.

page 15 note 1 The 25·3 per cent, includes —∪——∪—, —∪∪——∪— and —∪∪—∪—. Elsewhere in my Latin list —∪——∪— and —∪∪——∪ are not included under —∪— if statistics for the former are given. I have generally neglected —∪∪—∪—.

page 17 note 1 Of the authors named in my list. But (according to de Groot) reaches 6·0 per cent, in Pomponius Mela.

page 19 note 1 His percentage for —∪∪∪— (2·2) is below the normal (2·4). Subdivision might show a preference for —∪∪∪—∪ only. But since he gives some recognition to this clausula, it may be asked whether he does not use it consciously as a good form in spite of its relative infrequency—a question which might apply to other recognized and recognizable forms as well. I would answer: (1) Doubtless so sensitive a scholar was conscious of —∪∪∪— when he used it—the ideal writer of prose would be conscious of every syllable he used—but he must have been conscious too off —∪∪— which he also used occasionally; (2) that a preference supposed a priori merely can never be established in the same way as the many objective preferences shown by a relatively high percentage; (3) that Cicero in speaking of —∪— says that its very excellence makes the excessive search for it the more undesirable; but that in spite of the high normal frequency of this clausula (17·2 per cent.), Cicero's percentage is well above it (25·3).

page 19 note 2 Here again it may perhaps be merely ————∪∪ which he rejects, and subdivision of ————∪ might show a preference for ————∪— only.