pentameter

Dictionary: pen·tam·e·ter (pĕn-tăm'ĭ-tər) pronunciation

A line of verse consisting of five metrical feet.
English verse composed in iambic pentameter.

[Latin, from Greek pentametros : penta-, penta- + metron, measure; see meter¹.]

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pentameter [pen‐tamm‐it‐er], a metrical verse line having five main stresses, traditionally described as a line of five ‘feet’ (see foot). In English poetry since Chaucer, the pentameter—almost always an iambic line normally of 10 syllables—has had a special status as the standard line in many important forms including blank verse, the heroic couplet, ottava rima, rhyme royal, and the sonnet. In its pure iambic form, the pentameter shows a regular alternation of stressed and unstressed syllables, as in this line by Percy Bysshe Shelley:

If Winter comes, can Spring be far behind?

There are, however, several permissible variations in the placing of stresses, which help to avoid the monotony of such regular alternation (see demotion, promotion, inversion); and the pentameter may be lengthened from 10 syllables to 11 by a feminine ending. In classical Greek and Latin poetry, the second line of the elegiac distich, commonly but inaccurately referred to as a ‘pentameter’ is in fact composed of two half‐lines of two and a half feet each, with dactyls or spondees in the first half and dactyls in the second.

Classical Literature Companion: pentameter

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pentameter, in Greek and Latin, line of verse containing five metrical units (metra); see METRE, GREEK 1 and 2. In practice the term almost always refers to the elegiac pentameter.

Columbia Encyclopedia: pentameter

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pentameter (pĕntăm'ətər) [Gr.,=measure of five], in prosody, a line to be scanned in five feet (see versification). The third line of Thomas Nashe's "Spring" is in pentameter: "Cold doth / not sting, / the pret / ty birds / do sing." Iambic pentameter, in which each foot contains an unaccented syllable and an accented syllable, is the most common English meter. Chaucer first used it in what was later called rhyme royal, seven iambic pentameters rhyming ababbcc; as Chaucer pronounced a final short e, his pentameters often end in an 11th, unstressed syllable. In his Canterbury Tales the pentameters are disposed in rhyming pairs. The pentameter couplet was used also by his imitators in Scotland, with the important difference that when the final e disappeared from speech the couplet became one of strict pentameters. This, known as the heroic couplet, became important in the 17th and 18th cent., notably in the hands of Dryden and Pope.

True wit is Nature to advantage dress'd,What oft was thought, but ne'er so well express'd.

-- Pope, "Essay on Criticism"

Blank verse, a succession of unrhymed iambic pentameters, is primarily an English form and has been used in the loftiest epic and dramatic verse from Shakespeare and Milton to the present.

And, like the baseless fabric of this vision,The cloud-capp'd towers, the gorgeous palaces,The solemn temples, the great globe itself,Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolveAnd, like this insubstantial pageant faded,Leave not a rack behind. We are such stuffAs dreams are made on, and our little lifeIs rounded with a sleep.

-- Shakespeare, The Tempest, iv:1

The sonnet is one of the most familiar and successful uses of iambic pentameter in English poetry.

Poetry Glossary: Pentameter

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A line of verse consisting of five metrical feet.

Translations: Pentameter

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Dansk (Danish)
n. - pentameter, femfodet vers

Nederlands (Dutch)
pentameter (versregel van vijf voet)

Français (French)
n. - pentamètre

Deutsch (German)
n. - Pentameter (Versmaß)

Ελληνική (Greek)
n. - (προσωδ.) πεντάμετρο

Italiano (Italian)
pentametro

Português (Portuguese)
n. - pentâmetro (m)

Русский (Russian)
пентаметр

Español (Spanish)
n. - pentámetro

Svenska (Swedish)
n. - pentameter, femfotad vers

中文（简体）(Chinese (Simplified))
五音步诗行, 五音步之诗

中文（繁體）(Chinese (Traditional))
n. - 五音步詩行, 五音步之詩

한국어 (Korean)
n. - 5보격, (특히) 약강 5보격

日本語 (Japanese)
n. - 五歩格
adj. - 五歩格の

العربيه (Arabic)
‏(الاسم) وزن من أوزان السعر الأوروبي ذو خمسه تفاعيل‏

עברית (Hebrew)
n. - ‮משקל בשירה, פנטמטר‬

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	blank verse
	elegiac couplet
	elegiac stanza

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		Dictionary. The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition Copyright © 2007, 2000 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Updated in 2009. Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved. Read more
		Literary Dictionary. The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Literary Terms. Copyright © Chris Baldick 2001, 2004. All rights reserved. Read more
		Classical Literature Companion. The Concise Oxford Companion to Classical Literature. Copyright © 1993, 2003 by Oxford University Press. All rights reserved. Read more
		Columbia Encyclopedia. The Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition Copyright © 2003, Columbia University Press. Licensed from Columbia University Press. All rights reserved. www.cc.columbia.edu/cu/cup/. Read more
		Poetry Glossary. Copyright © 2007, ILOVEPOETRY, Inc, All Rights Reserved. Read more
		Translations. Copyright © 2007, WizCom Technologies Ltd. All rights reserved. Read more