Page:The Theatre of the Greeks, a Treatise on the History and Exhibition of the Greek Drama, with Various Supplements.djvu/428

 402 ON THE LANGUAGE, METRES AND PROSODY be said. If it is not a Trochee, but a Spondee, what causes it to be so ? Evidently the final short vowel of each word being touched in utterance by the initial tt of xj/, or tto-, with which the next word commences. Then, so far from any pause or break of the sense intervening, on which condition alone the Canon operates, there is an absolute con- tinuity of sound and sense together ; and the verse ends with a quin- quesyllabic termination, as complete as in Phoeniss. 32. 53, where i^avSpovjxevos and (TvyKoifjiOifjLivr] terminate the line : even so, ovScTrcravo- jxev, aXXdiraevcrcTaL, KaraTro-evSo/x-at. (This was stated so long ago as 1802. Yide Dalzel, Collect Grcec. Maj. t. ii. Nott. p. 164.) 6. Several modifications of the line, according to the connexion of the words by which it is concluded, come next to be considered. Some of these cases, when the words are duly separated, present a dissyllabic, some a quadri syllabic ending ; in others the combination is such as to exhibit a collective termination of five syllables, or more : a. (Ed. R. 435. 7jiieL<s ToiotS' ecfivfiev, co^ fxiv ctol So/cet* This line, even so read, would not violate the Canon ; for it does not present a Cretic separately pronounced. But it stands far more correctly thus in Elmsley's Edition, — ws a-ol filv | 8oKet, with an ending clearly dissyllabic. y8. The following line again as clearly presents a termination of four syllables : Q^d. R. 1157. eSoiK' oXiaOai 8' w^eXov | ttJS yfjiipa. The three following instances are taken from Elmsley, ad (Ed. Col. 115. y. Iph. A. 858. SovXo?, ov)( djSpvvoixat t<38'* T] Tvyr} yap fx ovk ea. Here the ending is not trisyllabic ; for fx ovk go together, and the enclitic /xe hangs upon yap : and as yap in collocation is attached to the precedent y Tvxrj, the accumulation of syllables in continuity amounts to seven. 8. Ion 808. SeaTTOLva, TrpoSeSo/Aecr^a* avv yap crol voao). Here the words avv yap (tol, being under the vinculum of Syntax, cannot be disjoined. And avv aol yap, if so read, from the law of collocation in words like yap, must go together. Either way the structure of the verse is legitimate, with a dissyllabic ending. €. Eur. Electr. 275. rjpov to8'; alaxpov y eiTras- ov yap vvv aKfXTj. Here ov negatives vvv, and of course must be uttered in the same breath with it, ov yap vvv aKfxTJ.