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.
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 Brown, Theron
If a line ends with two spondees it is a spondaic hexameter.
From Critical and Historical Essays Lectures delivered at Columbia University by Baltzell, W. J. (Winton James)
But in both cases I preferred to lock up by the massy spondaic variety; yet never forgetting to premise a dancing dactyle—'many a'—and 'pinion of.'
From The Posthumous Works of Thomas De Quincey, Vol. 1 by Japp, Alexander H. (Alexander Hay)
Similarly, in the second line, "rushed forth," which an English tongue would here deliver as a spondee—rūshed fōrth—varies the rhythm by this spondaic intervention, but still leaves us the original rhythmic cluster, "into the Strand."
From The English Novel And the Principle of its Development by Lanier, Sidney
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 Baltzell, W. J. (Winton James)
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.
