Editing Dactylic hexameter (section)

===Middle Ages===
{{further|Latin rhythmic hexameter}}

By the Middle Ages, some writers adopted more relaxed versions of the meter. [[Bernard of Cluny]], in the 12th century, for example, employs it in his ''De Contemptu Mundi'', but ignores classical conventions in favor of accentual effects and predictable rhyme both within and between verses, e.g.:

:{{lang|la|Hora no/vissima, / tempora / pessima / sunt: vigi/lemus.}}
:{{lang|la|Ecce mi/naciter / imminet / arbiter / ille su/premus.}}
:{{lang|la|Imminet / imminet / ut mala / terminet, / aequa co/ronet,}}
:{{lang|la|Recta re/muneret, /  anxia / liberet, / aethera / donet.}}

:"These are the last days, the worst of times: let us keep watch.
:Behold the menacing arrival of the supreme Judge.
:He is coming, he is coming to end evil, to crown just actions,
:Reward what is right, free us from anxieties, and give the heavens."

Not all medieval writers are so at odds with the Virgilian standard, and with the rediscovery of classical literature, later Medieval and Renaissance writers are far more orthodox, but by then the form had become an academic exercise. [[Petrarch]], for example, devoted much time to his ''[[Africa (Petrarch)|Africa]]'', a dactylic hexameter epic on [[Scipio Africanus]], completed in 1341, but this work was unappreciated in his time and remains little read today. It begins as follows:<ref>On this poem see: Mustard, W. P. (1921). [https://www.jstor.org/stable/289235 "Petrarch's Africa"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220511220217/https://www.jstor.org/stable/289235 |date=2022-05-11 }}. ''The American Journal of Philology'', 1921, Vol. 42, No. 2 (1921), pp. 97–121.</ref>

:{{lang|la|Et michi / conspicu/um meri/tis bel/loque tre/mendum,}}
:{{lang|la|Musa, vi/rum refe/res, Ita/lis cui / fracta sub / armis}}
:{{lang|la|Nobilis / eter/num prius / attulit / Africa / nomen.}}

:"To me also,<ref>Imitating ''Odyssey'' line 10: "Tell of these things, goddess, to us also".</ref> o Muse, tell of the man, 
:conspicuous for his merits and fearsome in war,
:to whom noble Africa, broken beneath Italian arms,
:first gave its eternal name."

In contrast, [[Dante]] decided to write his epic, the ''[[Divine Comedy]]'' in Italian—a choice that defied the traditional epic choice of Latin dactylic hexameters—and produced a masterpiece beloved both then and now.<ref>{{cite book|first=Guy P.|last=Raffa|editor-first=Dante|editor-last=Alighieri|date=1995|chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=TPkqYo-6QwkC&pg=PA267|title=Dante's Inferno, The Indiana Critical Edition (Indiana Masterpiece Editions)|chapter=Dante's Beloved Yet Damned Virgil|page=267|isbn=0253209307|publisher=Indiana University Press|access-date=2019-07-25|archive-date=2024-05-25|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240525095841/https://books.google.com/books?id=TPkqYo-6QwkC&pg=PA267#v=onepage&q&f=false|url-status=live}}</ref>

With the [[Neo-Latin]] period, the language itself came to be regarded as a medium only for serious and learned expression, a view that left little room for Latin poetry. The emergence of [[Recent Latin]] in the 20th century restored classical orthodoxy among Latinists and sparked a general (if still academic) interest in the beauty of Latin poetry. Today, the modern Latin poets who use the dactylic hexameter are generally as faithful to Virgil as Rome's Silver Age poets.