Editing Dactylic hexameter (section)

===Later writers===

Later Republican writers, such as [[Lucretius]], [[Catullus]], and even [[Cicero]], wrote hexameter compositions, and it was at this time that the principles of Latin hexameter were firmly established and followed by later writers such as [[Virgil]], [[Horace]], [[Ovid]], [[Marcus Annaeus Lucanus|Lucan]], and [[Satires of Juvenal|Juvenal]]{{cn|date=March 2025}}. [[Virgil]]'s opening line for the ''[[Aeneid]]'' is a classic example:

:{{lang|la|Arma vi/rumque ca/nō, Trō/iae quī/ prīmus ab/ ōrīs}} 
:"I sing of arms and of the man who first from the shores of Troy ..."

In Latin, lines were arranged so that the metrically long syllables —- those occurring at the beginning of a foot -— often avoided the natural stress of a word. In the earlier feet of a line, meter and stress were expected to clash, while in the last two feet they were expected to coincide, as in {{lang|la|prímus ab/ óris}} above. The coincidence of word accent and meter in the last two feet could be achieved by restricting the last word to one of two or three syllables.<ref>Raven (1965), pp. 98–101.</ref>

Most lines (about 85% in Virgil){{cn|date=March 2025}} have a caesura or word division after the first syllable of the 3rd foot, as above {{lang|la|ca/nō}}. Because of the penultimate accent in Latin, this ensures that the word accent and meter will not coincide in the 3rd foot. But in those lines with a feminine or weak caesura, such as the following, there is inevitably a coincidence of meter and accent in the 3rd foot{{r|raven1965|p=98}}:

:{{lang|la|insequi/tur cla/<u>mórque</u> vi/rum stri/dórque ru/déntum}}
:"there follows shouting of men and rattling of ropes"

To offset this, whenever there was a feminine caesura in the 3rd foot, there was usually also a masculine caesura in the 2nd and 4th feet, to ensure that in those feet at least, the word accent and meter did not coincide.