Editing Dactylic hexameter (section)

===Stylistic features of epic===
Certain stylistic features are characteristic of epic hexameter poetry, especially as written by Virgil.

====Enjambment====
Hexameters are frequently [[Enjambment|enjambed]]—the meaning runs over from one line to the next, without terminal punctuation—which helps to create the long, flowing narrative of epic. Sentences can also end in different places in the line, for example, after the first foot.<ref>Raven (1965), pp. 102–103.</ref> In this, classical epic differs from medieval Latin, where the lines are often composed individually, with a break in sense at the end of each one.

====Poetic vocabulary====
Often in poetry ordinary words are replaced by poetic ones, for example {{lang|la|unda}} or {{lang|la|lympha}} for water, {{lang|la|aequora}} for sea, {{lang|la|puppis}} for ship, {{lang|la|amnis}} for river, and so on. Some ordinary Latin words are avoided, e.g. {{lang|la|audiunt, mīlitēs, hominibus, facilius, mulierēs, familiae, voluptātibus}} etc., simply because they cannot be fitted into a hexameter verse.

====Hyperbaton====
It is common in poetry for adjectives to be widely separated from their nouns, and quite often one adjective–noun pair is interleaved with another. This feature is known as [[hyperbaton]] "stepping over". An example is the opening line of Lucan's epic on the Civil War:

:{{lang|la|<u>bella</u> per Emathios – plus quam <u>civilia</u> – campos}}
:"Wars through the Emathian – more than civil – plains"

Another example is the opening of Ovid's mythological poem [[Metamorphoses]] where the word {{lang|la|nova}} "new" is in a different line from {{lang|la|corpora}} "bodies" which it describes:

:{{lang|la|in <u>nova</u> fert animus mutatas dicere formas / <u>corpora</u>}} (Ovid, Metamorphoses 1.1)
:"My spirit leads me to tell of forms transformed into new bodies."

One particular arrangement of words that seems to have been particularly admired is the [[golden line]],<ref>The term {{lang|la|aureus versus}} was first used in print in 1612: John Owen, epigram 5.51.</ref> a line which contains two adjectives, a verb, and two nouns, with the first adjective corresponding to the first noun such as:

:{{lang|la|<u>barbara</u>qu(e) horribili stridebat <u>tibia</u> cantu}}<ref>Catullus, 64.265.</ref>
:"and the barbarian pipe was strident with horrible music"

Catullus was the first to use this kind of line, as in the above example. Later authors used it rarely (1% of lines in Ovid), but in silver Latin it became increasingly popular.<ref>Heikkinen (2015), p. 61.</ref>

====Alliteration and assonance====
{{main|Alliteration (Latin)}}
Virgil in particular used alliteration and assonance frequently, although it is much less common in Ovid. Often more than one consonant was alliterated and not necessarily at the beginning of words, for example:
:{{lang|la|at ReGina GRavi iamdudum sauCia Cura}}
:{{lang|la|VuLNus aLit VeNis et CaeCo Carpitur igni.}}<ref>Virgil, ''Aen.'' 4.1–2.</ref>
:"But the queen, now long wounded by grave anxiety,
:feeds the wound in her veins and is tormented by an unseen fire"

Also in Virgil:
:{{lang|la|LoCa NoCTe TaCeNTia LaTe}}<ref>Virgil, ''Aen.'' 6.265.</ref> "places silent with night everywhere"
:{{lang|la|iLLae Remis VaDa LiViDa VeRRunt}}<ref>Virgil, ''Aen.'' 6.320.</ref> "those ones with oars sweep the dark shallows"

Sometimes the same vowel is repeated:
:{{lang|la|m<u>ē</u>, m<u>ē</u>, adsum qui f<u>ē</u>ci, in m<u>ē</u> conv<u>er</u>tite f<u>er</u>rum}}<ref>Virgil, ''Aen.'' 9.427.</ref>
:"on me, me, I who did it am here, turn your swords on me!"

:{{lang|la|n<u>e</u>c fr<u>e</u>na r<u>e</u>mittit, / n<u>e</u>c r<u>e</u>tiN<u>e</u>re val<u>e</u>t, N<u>e</u>c N<u>o</u>mina N<u>o</u>vit equ<u>o</u>rum}}<ref>Ovid, ''Met.''  2.192.</ref>
:"he does not let go of the reins, but he is not strong enough to hold them back, and he does not know the names of the horses"

====Rhetorical techniques====
Rhetorical devices such as anaphora, antithesis, and rhetorical questions are frequently used in epic poetry. Tricolon is also common:
:{{lang|la|haec omnis, quam cernis, inops inhumataque turba est;}}
:{{lang|la|portitor ille Charon; hi, quos vehit unda, sepulti.}}<ref>Virgil, ''Aen.'' 6.325–6.</ref>
:"All this crowd that you see, are the poor and unburied;
:that ferryman is Charon; these, that the wave is carrying, are the buried."

====Genre of subject matter====
The poems of Homer, Virgil, and Ovid often vary their narrative with speeches. Well known examples are the speech of Queen Dido cursing Aeneas in book 4 of the ''Aeneid'', the lament of the nymph Juturna when she is unable to save her brother Turnus in book 12 of the ''Aeneid'', and the quarrel between Ajax and Ulysses over the arms of Achilles in book 13 of Ovid's ''Metamorphoses''. Some speeches are themselves narratives, as when Aeneas tells Queen Dido about the fall of Troy and his voyage to Africa in books 2 and 3 of the ''Aeneid''. Other styles of writing include vivid descriptions, such as Virgil's description of the god Charon in ''Aeneid'' 6, or Ovid's description of Daedalus's labyrinth in book 8 of the ''Metamorphoses''; similes, such as Virgil's comparison of the souls of the dead to autumn leaves or clouds of migrating birds in ''Aeneid'' 6; and lists of names, such as when Ovid names 36 of the dogs who tore their master Actaeon to pieces in book 3 of the ''Metamorphoses''.