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1882
Volume 30, Issue 1
  • ISSN: 0890-2917
  • E-ISSN: 2031-0242

Abstract

Abstract

This article investigates the nature of hiatus and elision in fourteenth-century alliterative verse by using a series of case studies from within and beyond the alliterative tradition. In particular the article considers whether elision between the - suffix and a following word beginning with a vowel (or + vowel) was a possibility in alliterative poetry. The author concludes that the degree to which poets and their scribes exploited the - and - suffixes as doublets for metrical purposes to avoid hiatus was variable from poem to poem and proposes several possible explanations for the observable differences in usage.

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2016-01-01
2025-12-05

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