adjective
Etymology
Origin of spondaic
1715–25; < Late Latin spondaicus, metathetic variant of spondīacus < Greek spondeiakós, equivalent to spondeî ( os ) spondee + -akos, variant of -ikos -ic
Vocabulary lists containing spondaic
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
In the series of dactylic lines 17-22, Catullus no doubt intended to convey the idea of rapidity, as, in the spondaic line immediately following, of labour.
From The Poems and Fragments of Catullus by Robinson Ellis
The result so far attained has been unsatisfactory, for the rhythms are all given as spondaic.
From Critical and Historical Essays Lectures delivered at Columbia University by W. J. (Winton James) Baltzell
Their first group singing of a Sunday consisted of Negro spirituals in spondaic and trochaic verse, and phrased in many minors.
From Kelly Miller's History of the World War for Human Rights by Kelly Miller
All the chorals that carry it have substantially the same movement—for the spondaic accent of the long lines is compulsory—but their offerings sing “to one clear harp in divers tones.”
From The Story of the Hymns and Tunes by Theron Brown
If a line ends with two spondees it is a spondaic hexameter.
From Critical and Historical Essays Lectures delivered at Columbia University by W. J. (Winton James) Baltzell
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
