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

But the poetical capabilities of the elegiac couplet are of a Elegy. wholly different kind from those of heroic verse. ἔλεγος seems to be the Greek form of a name given by the Carians and Lydians to a lament for the dead.

From Project Gutenberg

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 Project Gutenberg

He also brought in the elegiac couplet, which was to attain perfection at the hands of Propertius and Ovid.

From Project Gutenberg

Whatever his own particular teaching subject may be, he will be expected, within the course of a single evening's "prep," to be able to unravel a knotty passage in Æschylus, "unseen," solve a quadratic equation on sight, compose a chemical formula, or complete an elegiac couplet.

From Project Gutenberg

As the epic impulse faded, and before Greek genius for tragedy rose, the same race and dialect which had given epic narrative the proud, full verse that filled like a sail to zephyr and to storm alike, devised the elegiac couplet.

From Project Gutenberg