Hexameter Verse
.A line of poetry consisting of six measures, the fifth being a dactyl and the sixth either a spondee or a trochee. The other four may be either dactyls or spondees. Homer’s two epic poems and Virgil’s Æneid are written in hexameters. The latter begins thus:
Arms and the | man I | sing, who | driven from | Troy by ill- | fortune
First into | Italy | came, as | far as the | shores of La- | vina.
Much was he harassed by land, much tossed on the pitiless ocean,
Or rhyming with the Latin,
“Arma virumque cano Trojæ qui primus ab oris.”
Arms and the man I sing who first from the Phrygian shore is.
“Italiam Fato profugus, Lavinaque venit …”
Tossed to the land of Lavina, although Jove’s queen didnʹt mean it.
⁂ Longfellow’s Evangeline is in English hexameters.
