First published 1961.
Kuno Meyer's 'Primer of Irish Metrics', published in 1909, is both out of print and of necessity out of date (largely owing to Meyer's own later researches). It has therefore been decided to publish the present treatise. This treatise, though more detailed, follows on the whole the scheme of Meyer's 'Primer', and sometimes uses his very words. Meyer's list of the Poets of Ireland, published as an appendix to his 'Primer', has, however, been omitted, and also the references to other examples of a metre which Meyer sometimes added to his own example. The present treatise does not therefore wholly replace Meyer’s.
Author(s): Gerard Murphy
Edition: Reprint
Publisher: Royal Irish Academy
Year: 1973
Language: English
Pages: 142
City: Dublin
Foreword v
Abbreviations ix
I. Brief Survey of the Three Main Periods of Irish Versification 1
II. Irish Rimeless Non-Stanzaic Alliterative Verse without Syllabic Equality in Corresponding Lines 2
III. Quantitative Rhythm, Syllabic Equality, and Stress Rhythm 8
IV. Metrical Experimentation in Seventh-Century Ireland 13
V. Trochaic Tetrameter Catalectic (in Irish Dion Midseng): A Concrete Example of the Growth and Development of an Irish Metre 21
VI. The Chief Features of Irish Syllabic Verse, with Explanation of Some of the Terms used by Irish Metrists 26
VII. Analysis of a Representative Selection of Irish Syllabic Metres, followed by Alphabetical Lists of their Irish Names and of Irish Terms connected with Poetry 46
Appendix. On the name 'rhythmus' and a supposed popular Latin stress-rhythm (91)
Vocabulary 93
Index of Names 126
