Crossword clues for dactylic
The Collaborative International Dictionary
Dactylic \Dac*tyl"ic\ (d[a^]k*t[i^]l"[i^]k), a. [L. dactylicus, Gr. daktyliko`s, fr. da`ktylos.] Pertaining to, consisting chiefly or wholly of, dactyls; as, dactylic verses.
Dactylic \Dac*tyl"ic\, n.
A line consisting chiefly or wholly of dactyls; as, these lines are dactylics.
pl. Dactylic meters.
Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
1580s, from Latin dactylicus, from Greek daktylikos "pertaining to a dactyl," from daktylos (see dactyl).
Wiktionary
a. 1 of or consisting of dactyls. 2 of a dactyl. n. a dactylic verse.
WordNet
adj. of or consisting of dactyls; "dactylic meter"
Wikipedia
Usage examples of "dactylic".
Alcaic, also in tetrameter, consists of two dactylic feet followed by two iambic feet.
This dictates their form, as verse, in this case dactylic hexameter: the stichic, or line-by-line, verse form as common to Greek and Latin epic as iambic pentameter is to English.
So powerful has the dactylic rhythm proved, in fact, that I have taken liberties with the accents of certain words for prosodic reasons, much as a composer might set the occasional syllable in such a way as to outrage its spoken pattern while preserving his tune.
He wrote perhaps two and a half centuries after Homer but in his style: a poem in dactylic hexameter, brief where the epics are long, having as its hero the writer, where the Homeric epics are anonymous.