| iambic pentameter |
| Definition: A line of verse consisting of five consecutive iambs (i.e., an unstressed syllable followed by a stressed syllable). |
| Example:
Shall I compare thee to a summer's day? Thou art more lovely and more temperate: Rough winds do shake the darling buds of may. And summer's lease hath all too short a date: (Shakespeare, Sonnet XVIII) |
| Etymology:
(1) The word pentameter derives via Latin from the Greek adjective pentametros, having five measures (from the Greek pente, five + metron, meter). (2) The word iambic derives via Latin from the Greek iambos, a metrical foot consisting of an unaccented syllable followed by an accented syllable. Note: The Greek word iambos derives from iaptein, to attack with words. To the classical Greeks, iambic meter was the meter of both invective and lampoon, and had been considered such from the 7th century BCE when it was first used for this purpose by Archilochos. |