# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Alliteration

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​ALLITERATION (from Lat. ad, to, and littera, letter), the commencing of two or more words, in close juxtaposition, with the same sound. As Milton defined rhyme to be “the jingling sound of like endings,” so alliteration is the jingle of like beginnings. All language has a tendency to jingle in both ways, even in prose. Thus in prose we speak of “near and dear,” “high and dry,” “health and wealth.” But the initial form of jingle is much more common—“safe and sound,” “thick and thin,” “weal or woe,” “fair or foul,” “spick and span,” “fish, flesh, or fowl,” “kith and kin.” The poets of nearly all times and tongues have not been slow to seize upon the emphasis which could thus be produced.
Although mainly Germanic in its character, alliteration was known to the Latins, especially in early times, and Cicero blames Ennius for writing “O Tite tute, Tati, tibi tanta, tyranne, tulisti.” Lucretius did not disdain to employ it as an ornament.
We read in Shakespeare:—
“Full fathom five thy father lies: Of his bones are corals made.”
In Pope:—
“Here files of pins extend their shining rows,   Puffs, powders, patches, bibles, billet-doux.”
In Gray:—
“Weave the warp and weave the woof,  The winding-sheet of Edward’s race.”
In Coleridge:—
“The fair breeze blew, the white foam flew,   The furrow followed free;  We were the first that ever burst   Into that silent sea.”
Churchill describes himself, in his Prophecy of Famine, as one
“Who often, but without success, had prayed For apt alliteration’s artful aid,”—
an example which is itself a proof of his failure; for alliteration is never effective unless it runs upon consonants. As thus far considered, alliteration is a device wholly dependent on the poet's fancy. He may use it or not, or use it much or little, at his pleasure. But there is an extensive range of Teutonic poetry whose metrical laws are entirely based on alliteration. This, for example, is the principle on which Icelandic verse is founded; and we have a yet nearer interest in it, because it furnishes the key to Anglo-Saxon and a large portion of early English verse. For a specimen take the following lines, the spelling modernized, from the beginning of Piers the Plowman:—
“But in a May morning | on Malvern hills, Me befel a ferly | of fairy methought; I was weary of wandering | and went me to rest Under a broad bank | by a burn-side; And as I lay and leaned | and looked on the waters, I slumbered in a sleeping | it sounded so merry.”
The rule of this verse is indifferent as to the number of syllables it may contain, but imperative as to the number of accented ones. The line is divided in the middle by a pause, and each half ought to contain two accented syllables. Of the four accented syllables, the first three should begin with the same letter; the fourth is free and may start with any letter. Those who wish for a more minute analysis of the laws of alliterative verse, as practised by the Anglo-Saxon and early English poets, may consult an exhaustive essay on the subject by Professor W. W. Skeat, prefixed to vol. iii. of Bishop Percy’s Folio Manuscript; only the reader must be on his guard against an error which pervades it, and which this able writer seems to have derived from Rask. The question arises—What is the nature of the cadence in alliterative verse? Now all metrical movement is of two kinds, according as the beat or emphasis begins the movement or ends it. If the beat is initial, we say in classical language that the movement is trochaic or dactylic, according to the number of its syllables; and if the beat is final, we in like manner say that the movement is iambic or anapaestic. Skeat and many others object with some reason to use the classical terms, and therefore brushing them aside, let us put the question in the simplest form—Has the movement of alliterative
“A cobbler there was, and he lived in a stall.”