heptameter

[ hep-tam-i-ter ]

noun

, Prosody.

1. a verse of seven metrical feet.

heptameter

/ ˌhɛptəˈmɛtrɪkəl; hɛpˈtæmɪtə /

noun

1. prosody a verse line of seven metrical feet

Derived Forms

• heptametrical, adjective

Other Words From

• hep·ta·met·ri·cal [hep-t, uh, -, me, -tri-k, uh, l], adjective

Word History and Origins

Origin of heptameter¹

1895–1900; < Medieval Latin heptametrum < Greek heptámetron a verse of seven feet. See hepta-, meter ²

Example Sentences

Usually it is told in a sequence of quatrains, with one rhyme to a stanza, and usually the line is the iambic heptameter—or rather the stanza consists of two iambic tetrameters and two iambic trimeters.

From Project Gutenberg

The former is trochaic—the latter is octameter acatalectic, alternating with heptameter catalectic repeated in the refrain of the fifth verse, and terminating with tetrameter catalectic.

From Project Gutenberg

Heptameter, hep′tam-e-tėr, n. a verse of seven measures.

From Project Gutenberg

Librettist Jeremy Gury preserved the 13 stanzas of iambic heptameter intact, but also worked up a good deal of added story business besides two more stanzas.

From Time Magazine Archive

Of this translation Mr. Swinburne says that it was undertaken from a consideration of the fact that the "marvellous metrical invention of the anapestic heptameter was almost exactly reproducible in a language to which all variations and combinations of anapestic, iambic, or trochaic metre are as natural and pliable as all dactylic and spondaic forms of verse are unnatural and abhorrent."

From Project Gutenberg