hendecasyllabics, verses written in lines of eleven syllables. Hendecasyllabic verse is found in some ancient Greek works, and was used frequently by the Roman poet Catullus. The hendecasyllable later became the standard line of Italian verse, both in sonnets and in epic poetry, and was also used by some Spanish poets. It is very rare in English, although Tennyson and Swinburne attempted imitations of Catullus's metre, as in this line from Swinburne's ‘Hendecasyllabics’ (1866):
Sweet sad straits in a soft subsiding channel.
