We have had a few passages from the Homeric epics as well as some from ancient tragedies to translate in Greek class, but we did not have the time to tackle the subject of metre, recitation, and the general music of Greek poetry. I decided to learn about it on my own, and I will be attempting to compare it to English and French poetry, with which I am more familiar.

Poetry is an art of creation, and is founded on language. The poet’s work is to effectively use the language and its specific characteristics to give an impression, convey an emotion, etc. Therefore he needs to make use of the language’s musicality. French, English, and Ancient Greek differ immensely in terms of this music.

French has what is known as a rhythmical metre, meaning that the length of a poetic line is determined simply by the number of syllables in it. Typically, they are 8, 10, or 12 syllables long. That is a very unsophisticated way to use rhythm, so French poetry makes up for it with rhyme, with a whole system of poor, sufficient, and rich rhymes.

A rhyme is poor when both rhyming words only have one common sound, like bee and tree. A rhyme is sufficient when both words have two common sounds, like tree and free. A rhyme is rich when both words have three or more common sounds, like despair and prepare. The general rule is that one should avoid using poor rhymes and be consistent with the chosen rhyme style, whether it be sufficient or rich.

A French poet would also needs to alternate between masculine and feminine rhymes. A feminine rhyme is one that contains a silent e like “femme” and “flamme”, and a masculine one is one that does not, like “grand” and “prend”.

In English, the metre plays a greater role. It uses what we call a qualitative metre. The length of a line is not determined by the number of syllables, but by the number of feet, each containing a number of syllables, stressed or unstressed. For instance we have the iambic pentameter:

If music be the food of love, play on;
u   / u   /   u  /   u    /     u  /

English arranges itself naturally in iambs. Try to read that but as a series of five trochees:

If music be the food of love, play on;
/   u /   u   /  u   /   u      /  u

Of course, in some case, other feet are used, like the anapest, and dactyl, but English poetry is mostly composed of iambs. This adds rhythmical complexity, compared to the French poetic metre, meaning that an English verse can survive with metre alone, without the need of rhymes. That was the case especially in drama, whereas one could not imagine a play by Jean Racine or Pierre Corneille without rhymes. Of course, English being the hybrid language that it is, rhymes are often used in poetry too, depending on the time period.

Ancient Greek is another story altogether, and very foreign to anyone who only speaks European languages.

Rhymes are practically nonexistant in Greek poetry, and when they are used, they are only a small stylistic device, and never consistent. Greek revolves greatly around rhythm and metre, but not in the way an English person would imagine.

The Ancient Greek metre is not qualitative but quantitative, meaning that it a line is not composed of a succession of stressed and unstressed syllables, but short and long syllables. An iamb for example would not be an unstressed syllable followed by a stressed syllable (u /) but rather a short syllable followed by a long syllable (u -).

A long syllable is one that has a long vowel (omega or êta), a short vowel followed by two consonants, a circumflex accent on the vowel or a diphtong, everything else would be a short syllable. Here is one example from the Iliad:

μῆνιν ἄειδε, θεά, Πηληϊάδεω Ἀχιλῆος
|- u  u|- u  u|-   -|-uu|-  u u|-u|

Sing, goddess, of Achilles son Peleus's wrath

This is what is called a dactylic hexameter: four feet, either spondees (–) or dactyls (-uu), followed by a dactyl (-uu) followed by a trochee(-u) or spondee(–). For instance all of the following scansions can be dactylic hexameters:

|-uu|-uu|-uu|-uu|-uu|-u|

|--|--|-uu|--|-uu|--|

|-uu|-uu|--|--|-uu|-u|

and so on…

The dactylic hexameter is found in all kinds of poetry but especially epic poetry, the Aeneid included. Unlike English, Greek does not arrange itself naturally into any type of feet. The dactylic hexameter might be just as common as the iambic trimeter x-u-x-u-x-u- (x being a short or long vowel):

πόλλ' οἶδ' ἀλώπηξ, ἀλλ' ἐχῖνος ἓν μέγα
|-     -   u -|-   -    u -|u  -   u -|

The fox knows many tricks but the hedgehog knows a good one.

It is for the poet to decide which metre to use, and some go as far as inventing their own metre. This is the case for Anacreon, inventor of the anacreontic: |u u – u – u – –|.

To me, metre is more than a simple tool in poetry, just like time signature is more than a mere ornament in a musical piece. Someone listening to a minuet in 3/4 time would dance very differently to someone listening to a gavotte in 4/4 time, and it is not because of the music’s tone or melody, but solely because of the rythm. I think it is precisely the same for poetry. The freedom and creativeness a poet can display when writing in Ancient Greek is one great reason why I think this language is so musically unique and beautiful to listen to.

Like any piece of music, Ancient greek does not just have a certain rhythm, but also pitch. Indeed, the accents you see are not stress accents like you would find in Western languages, but pitch accents, like you would find in Mandarin Chinese.

While it is not certain how an aoidos would sing his epic poem, and accompanied by which instrument, some have speculated that pitch accents contributed more to the music than what we could think. There have been some modern interpretations in which the performer sings only two notes: one for when there is no accent and one slightly higher pitched note for when there is an accent.

While it is unlikely that poems were sung in such a fashion, it would not be outlandish to assume that they played an important role in how the ears received the poem, especially considering the fact that accents and long vowels often came hand in hand.

Ancient Greek is a language with specificities that are foreign to us westerners, even though the West is the part of the World with the most interest in Ancient Greek litterature. These particularities can be used as musical tools, and make for some very rich and beautiful poetry.