Abstract

In an earlier article in Classical Quarterly, S. J. Harrison explored the varying frequency of hexameter-endings of the type discordia taetra, where a noun that ends in short a is followed by its epithet with the same termination. It appears from this that while most pre-Augustan poets allow a fairly high frequency of such verse-endings, some Augustan poets and their imitators show a distinct tendency to avoid them, while some almost exclude them altogether. The hexameters of elegiac poetry might be subject to the same restriction; the following are figures for elegy from Catullus to Martial.