Prosodic Restrictions on the Short Dip in Late Middle English Alliterative Verse

Abstract

Recent reconstructions of late Middle English alliterative metre can be confirmed and developed further by an observation that monosyllabic dips in the second half-line may contain only syllables with schwa. The restriction applies to final dips and (possibly with a lesser regularity) to the monosyllabic dips between the two metrical stresses. Corollaries of such a rule include the metrical significance of more than two levels of linguistic stress and rhythmical differentiation of the first and second half-lines.