CHAPTER VI. THE PSALM-METRES. By this name we have hitherto designated a class of metres, which seem to have been borrowed from the Church-hymns, and used, in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, chiefly for purposes connected with the Churchservice. The name of Church-metres, however, would have been too comprehensive; and the present title was thought not inappropriate, inasmuch as the staves, which are commonly used in our versions of the Psalms, may be directly traced to these metres, as their origin. The Church-hymns may be divided into two classes, accordingly as the rhythm is measured by quantity or accent. The versification of the first class seems to have been known by the name of "metrum," and that of the latter by the name of "rhythmus." Bede, in his work De Metris, after noticing such of the classical metres as were popular in his time, has a chapter upon "Rhythmus." It presents us with difficulties, arising as well from the nature of the subject, as from the discrepancies which are found to exist between the different copies. I think however we may gather, that in "rhythmus " quantity was disregarded, and the number of syllables fixed-so that, although in "metrum" a foot of three syllables might, in some cases, be used for one of two, this license was not allowed in the corresponding "rhythmus." He quotes as an instance of accentual verse, made in imitation of the Iambic metre, "that celebrated hymn, "Rex æterne Domine,* Rerum Creator omnium, Qui eras ante sæcula Semper cum Patre Filius, &c. and many others of Ambrosius."+ "They sing," he also tells us, "in the same way as the trochaic metre, the hymn on the day of judgment, running through the alphabet.‡ Apparebit repentina dies magna Domini, Fur obscurâ velut nocte improvisos occupans," &c. Some critics are of opinion, that the laws, which governed these accentual verses, corresponded with those that regulated the accentus, or sharp tones of the classical metres; while others consider their accents as substitutes for the metrical ictus. I shall not venture to discuss a question, which Bentley and Dawes and Foster have failed in answering satisfactorily-more especially as there still exist MSS. which treat expressly of the structure and peculiarities of this class of verses. § It may, however, be observed, that, as the later Latin poets seem to have preferred, and in some feet required, the coincidence of the sharp tone with the ictus, the question whether the accent of the "rhythmus " represented the ictus or the accentus of the "metrum," is not of that very great importance it would appear at first sight. I incline also to think, that some of these "rhythmi" had their accents determined by causes, which were wholly independent both of the one and of the other. * This verse is deficient by a syllable. Must we split the diphthong, and read aeterne? †The celebrated Bishop of Milan. The first verse, it will be seen, begins with A. § When we remember how little is known, and what different opinions have been holden, on the subject of arsis and thesis, and how much light must necessarily be thrown upon it by an examination of these MSS. it is by no means creditable to modern scholarship, that they have been so long neglected. The Iambic "rhythmus," noticed by Bede, was a favourite one during the middle ages; and is probably the origin of the common metre of eight syllables, now so common throughout Europe.* His trochaic "rhythmus was modelled on the Catalectic Tetrameter; and, in his verses on the year, was used with final rhime. Annus solis continetur : quatuor | temporibus " From the sixth to the fourteenth century, this "rhythmus was common throughout Europe. The complete tetrameter (though little, if at all, known to the monks) was doubtless the classical metre, on which St. Austin modelled his verses against the Donatists. : Abundantia † peccatorum: so let fratres conturbare Propter hoc | Dominus nos ter voluit | nos præmone re Com parans regnum coelorum reticulo mis so in marle Congreganti multos pisces: omne genus hinc | et in de Quos cum traxissent | ad littus: tunc | cœperunt separa re Bon os in vasa | miserunt : reliquos | malos | in mare, &c. In one of the letters § of the Irish Saint Columban, we find a rhythmus, which, from its pause and cadence, seems to have been formed upon the trochaic septenarius. It was written about the year 600. Mundus is te transit et : quotidie | decrescit Nemo vivens man [ebit] : nullus | vivus | reman sit Toltum humanum | genus ortu | utitur pari, Et de simili | vitâ| : fine | cadit | æqua|li,|| &c. * Whether our English metre of four accents originated in this "rhyth. mus," or was merely influenced by it, has been discussed in Chapter IV. † Among the licenses taken by the writers of "rhythmus," crasis appears to have been one of the most frequent. Here is no rhyme. § See Usher's Vet. Epist. Hib. Sylloge, p. 9. Here we have a specimen of the Irish or vowel rhime. Another rhythmus, closely resembling the last, was very popular in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, particularly among our countrymen. The first stave of Walter Mapes' celebrated drinking song may serve as an example. I cannot satisfactorily connect it with its "metrum." Mihi est propositum : in | taberna mo|ri Ut dicant | cum venerint] : angelorum chori But no "rhythmus " has left more traces in our English versification, than that which was borrowed from the Greek church in the twelfth century, and modelled on the Catalectic Iambic Tetrameter. One of the earliest specimens is the work of Psellus on the Civil Law, addressed to Michael Ducas, the "Royal Kaisar," or heir apparent. As he ascended the throne in 1071, it must have been written before that year. It opens thus, Πολὺ καὶ δυσθεώρητον τὸ μάθημα τοῦ νόμου, : Wide spread and hard to theorize the Law's important science! : Strange to say, Foster, whose learning and good sense no man will question, considered the orixo ToλÍTIKOι not as " iambics regulated by accent, but loose trochaics, as independent of it as any in Euripides ;" and a writer in one of our Reviews,* who acknowledges them as accentual, nevertheless connects them with the Trochaic metre. Were they so connected, we should have the Trochaic "rhythmus" of the Latins accented on the odd, and that of the Greeks on the even syllables-a discrepancy that might well startle us. The Reviewer asserts, that the Iambic Tetrameter has not the same division, and but rarely the same cadence. I believe neither of these assertions will bear examination. The cadence of the Catalectic Tetrameter, or in other words the position of its sharp-toned syllables, is very commonly found to be the same, as in these accentual verses; and, both in the metrum and rhythmus, the pause immediately follows the close of the second metre. The full tetrameter, indeed, divided after the first syllable of the third metre, and this very probably led to the Reviewer's mistake. In the same rhythm, as these Greek verses, was written, during the latter half of the twelfth century, a very long and curious English poem. The writer tells us, he was christened by the name of Ormin; and, in another place, he gives the title of Ormulum to his work, "because that Orm it made." Of his mode of spelling we have already spoken; † it appeared to some of our critics so barbarous, that they at once denounced him as a Dane, and fixed him as a native in one of our eastern counties. A later writer, who entertains juster notions of his orthography, tells us § nevertheless, that "Orm's dialect merits, if any, to be called Dano-Saxon; his name also betrays a Scandinavian descent." Why his name should be "Scandinavian," I cannot tell, unless it be that the Danish word orm answers to our * Edin. Rev. xii. 10. † See Vol. 1. p. 108. What would Ormin have said to the orthography, in which these gentlemen conveyed their censures ? § Analecta Anglo-Saxonica, p. x. |