Polish alexandrine (Polish: trzynastozgłoskowiec) is a common metrical line in Polish poetry. It is similar to the French alexandrine. Each line is composed of thirteen syllables with a caesura after the seventh syllable. The main stresses are placed on the sixth and twelfth syllables. Rhymes are feminine.
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 1 2 3 4 5 6 o o o o o S x | o o o o S x Moja wdzięczna Orszulo, bodaj ty mnie była S=stressed syllable; x=unstressed syllable; o=any syllable.
The Polish alexandrine was introduced in the 15th century. It was borrowed from Latin poetry.[1] It was widely used by Jan Kochanowski,[2] the first great Polish poet, as exemplified in the first two lines of his "Lament 13", with a formal paraphrase in English:
Moja wdzięczna Orszulo, bodaj ty mnie była |
My Ursula, so charming, I brood in my sighing: |
The Polish national epic, Pan TadeuszbyAdam Mickiewicz, is written in this measure.[4] Polish alexandrines replaced hendecasyllablesinsonnets: in the 16th century poets like Sebastian Grabowiecki and Mikołaj Sęp-Szarzyński wrote sonnets using 11-syllable metre, but in the 17th century Daniel Naborowski translated one of Petrarch's sonnets using 13-syllable lines:
S’amor non è, che dunque è quel ch’io sento? |
Jeśli nie masz miłości, cóż jest, co ja czuję? |
| —Petrarch (endecasillabos) | —Daniel Naborowski |
Adam Mickiewicz composed his famous Crimean Sonnets[5] in 13-syllable lines:
Wpłynąłem na suchego przestwór oceanu, |
Across sea-meadows measureless I go, |
| —Edna Worthley Underwood (translated into iambic pentameter) |
The Polish alexandrine was used by many translators (among others, Franciszek Ksawery Dmochowski) as an equivalent of ancient Greek and Roman dactylic hexameter:
Achilla śpiewaj, Muzo, gniew obfity w szkody,
Który ściągnął klęsk tyle na Greckie narody[6]
As Polish words are longer than English ones, the 13-syllable line is good for translating English iambic pentameter.
Nowadays Polish alexandrine lines are often mixed with hendecasyllable ones in one poem.[7]