Amphibrach: Difference between revisions

Metrical feet and accents

Disyllables
◡ ◡	pyrrhic, dibrach
◡ –	iamb
– ◡	trochee, choree
– –	spondee
Trisyllables
◡ ◡ ◡	tribrach
– ◡ ◡	dactyl
◡ – ◡	amphibrach
◡ ◡ –	anapaest, antidactylus
◡ – –	bacchius
– ◡ –	cretic, amphimacer
– – ◡	antibacchius
– – –	molossus
See main article for tetrasyllables.

An amphibrach /ˈæmfibræk/ is a metrical foot used in Latin and Greek prosody. It consists of a long syllable between two short syllables. The word comes from the Greek αμφίβραχυς, amphíbrakhys, "short on both sides".

In English accentual-syllabic poetry, an amphibrach is a stressed syllable surrounded by two unstressed syllables. It is rarely used as the overall meter of a poem, only appearing in experimental poems. The individual amphibrachic foot often appears as a variant within, for instance, anapaestic meter.

Amphibrachs are a staple meter of Russian poetry. A common variation in an amphibrachic line, in both Russian and English, is to end the line with an iamb, as Thomas Hardy does in "The Ruined Maid": "Oh did n't / you know I'd / been ru in'd / said she".