elegiac couplet

British  

noun

1. classical prosody a couplet composed of a dactylic hexameter followed by a dactylic pentameter

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Example Sentences

Apart from his single tragedy, from a few didactic or mock-didactic pieces, imitated from Alexandrian originals, and from his great poem of the Metamorphoses, the whole of Ovid's work was executed in the elegiac couplet.

From Latin Literature by Mackail, J. W. (John William)

Distich, couplet; usually in classical prosody the elegiac couplet of a hexameter and a pentameter, 162.

From The Principles of English Versification by Baum, Paull Franklin

Tate's little treatise on the elegiac couplet correctly analyses the formal side of Ovid's versification.

From The History of Roman Literature From the earliest period to the death of Marcus Aurelius by Cruttwell, Charles Thomas

I have a mind to try how it would bear translation; but what metre have we to answer in feeling to the elegiac couplet of the Greeks?

From Specimens of the Table Talk of Samuel Taylor Coleridge by Coleridge, Henry Nelson

The professor told me that in his opinion the best elegiac couplet ever written in English was: "Three Patagonian apes with their arms extended akimbo: Three on a rock were they—seedy, but happy withal."

From A New Medley of Memories by Hunter-Blair, David