page_title: Alliterative verse
section_title: Dróttkvætt
hierarchical_section_title: Alliterative verse / Old Norse poetic forms / Dróttkvætt
caption_attribution_description: English: copper box with runes: U Fv1912;8.
context_page_description: In prosody, alliterative verse is a form of verse that uses alliteration as the principal ornamental device to help indicate the underlying metrical structure, as opposed to other devices such as rhyme. The most commonly studied traditions of alliterative verse are those found in the oldest literature of the Germanic languages, where scholars use the term 'alliterative poetry' rather broadly to indicate a tradition which not only shares alliteration as its primary ornament but also certain metrical characteristics. The Old English epic Beowulf, as well as most other Old English poetry, the Old High German Muspilli, the Old Saxon Heliand, the Old Norse Poetic Edda, and many Middle English poems such as Piers Plowman, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, and the Alliterative Morte Arthur all use alliterative verse.
  Alliterative verse can be found in many other languages as well. The Finnish Kalevala and the Estonian Kalevipoeg both use alliterative forms derived from folk tradition. Traditional Turkic verse, for example that of the Uyghur, is also alliterative.
context_section_description: These verse forms were elaborated even more into the skaldic poetic form called dróttkvætt, meaning "courtly metre", which added internal rhymes and other forms of assonance that go well beyond the requirements of Germanic alliterative verse and greatly resemble the Celtic forms (Irish and Welsh).  The dróttkvætt stanza had eight lines, each having usually three lifts and almost invariably six syllables.  Although other stress patterns appear, the verse is predominantly trochaic. The last two syllables in each line had to form a trochee (there are a few specific forms which utilize a stressed word at line-end, such as in some docked forms). In addition, specific requirements obtained for odd-numbered and even-numbered lines.
  In the odd-numbered lines (equivalent to the a-verse of the traditional alliterative line):
  Two of the stressed syllables alliterate with one another.
  Two of the stressed syllables share partial rhyme of consonants (which was called skothending) with dissimilar vowels (e.g. hat and bet), not necessarily at the end of the word (e.g. touching and orchard).
  In the even lines (equivalent to the b-verse of the traditional alliterative line):
  The first stressed syllable must alliterate with the alliterative stressed syllables of the previous line.
  Two of the stressed syllables rhyme  (aðalhending, e.g. hat and cat), not necessarily at the end of the word (e.g. torching and orchard).
  The requirements of this verse form were so demanding that occasionally the text of the poems had to run parallel, with one thread of syntax running through the on-side of the half-lines, and another running through the off-side. According to the Fagrskinna collection of sagas, King Harald III of Norway uttered these lines of dróttkvætt at the Battle of Stamford Bridge; the internal assonances and the alliteration are emboldened:
  Krjúpum vér fyr vápna,
  (valteigs), brǫkun eigi,
  (svá bauð Hildr), at hjaldri,
  (haldorð), í bug skjaldar.
  (Hátt bað mik), þar's mœttusk,
  (menskorð bera forðum),
  hlakkar íss ok hausar,
  (hjalmstall í gný malma).
  In battle, we do not creep behind a shield before the din of weapons [so said the goddess of hawk-land {a valkyrja} true of words.]  She who wore the necklace bade me to bear my head high in battle, when the battle-ice [a gleaming sword] seeks to shatter skulls.
  The bracketed words in the poem ("so said the goddess of hawk-land, true of words") are syntactically separate, but interspersed within the text of the rest of the verse.  The elaborate kennings manifested here are also practically necessary in this complex and demanding form, as much to solve metrical difficulties as for the sake of vivid imagery.  Intriguingly, the saga claims that Harald improvised these lines after he gave a lesser performance (in fornyrðislag); Harald judged that verse bad, and then offered this one in the more demanding form.  While the exchange may be fictionalized, the scene illustrates the regard in which the form was held.
  Most dróttkvætt poems that survive appear in one or another of the Norse Sagas; several of the sagas are biographies of skaldic poets.
caption: The copper Sigtuna box with a dróttkvætt verse written with the runic alphabet
exif: {"Image Make": "Canon", "Image Model": "Canon PowerShot A630", "Image Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Image XResolution": "180", "Image YResolution": "180", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image DateTime": "2008:07:12 12:39:14", "Image YCbCrPositioning": "Centered", "Image ExifOffset": "2258", "Image Padding": "[]", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "1/96", "Thumbnail YResolution": "1/96", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "7398", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "3667", "EXIF ExposureTime": "1/60", "EXIF FNumber": "41/10", "EXIF ExifVersion": "0220", "EXIF DateTimeOriginal": "2008:07:12 12:39:14", "EXIF DateTimeDigitized": "2008:07:12 12:39:14", "EXIF ComponentsConfiguration": "YCbCr", "EXIF CompressedBitsPerPixel": "3", "EXIF ShutterSpeedValue": "189/32", "EXIF ApertureValue": "65/16", "EXIF ExposureBiasValue": "0", "EXIF MaxApertureValue": "65/16", "EXIF MeteringMode": "Pattern", "EXIF Flash": "Flash fired, auto mode, red-eye reduction mode", "EXIF FocalLength": "146/5", "EXIF FlashPixVersion": "0100", "EXIF ColorSpace": "sRGB", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "3264", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "2448", "Interoperability InteroperabilityIndex": "R98", "Interoperability InteroperabilityVersion": "[48, 49, 48, 48]", "Interoperability RelatedImageWidth": "3264", "Interoperability RelatedImageLength": "2448", "EXIF InteroperabilityOffset": "7226", "EXIF FocalPlaneXResolution": "1632000/143", "EXIF FocalPlaneYResolution": "1224000/107", "EXIF FocalPlaneResolutionUnit": "2", "EXIF SensingMethod": "One-chip color area", "EXIF FileSource": "Digital Camera", "EXIF CustomRendered": "Normal", "EXIF ExposureMode": "Auto Exposure", "EXIF WhiteBalance": "Auto", "EXIF DigitalZoomRatio": "1", "EXIF SceneCaptureType": "Standard", "EXIF Padding": "[]", "EXIF OffsetSchema": "4146"}