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Colometric

Structure
Pronunciation

Understanding ARPABET Pronunciation

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The pronunciation guide uses the ARPABET phonetic system—the same system used in speech recognition and text-to-speech applications.

Vowel Examples:
AE1 = cat, bat
EH1 = bed, head
IY1 = see, me
OW1 = go, boat
UW1 = boot, do
Stress Numbers:
0 = no stress (unstressed)
1 = primary stress (loud)
2 = secondary stress (medium)
Example:
AH0 TH IY1 N AH0
= a-THEE-na (Athena)

The stressed syllable (marked with 1) is pronounced louder and clearer than others.

Quick Definition

Verse organized into cola (rhetorical sense units) rather than metrical feet, prioritizing syntactic and semantic phrasing over strict rhythmic regularity.

Detailed Definition
Colometric refers to the metrical analysis or structuring of poetic lines based on rhythmic cola (segments), especially in ancient Greek and Latin poetry; it emphasizes the division of verse into balanced, breath-based units for performance and interpretation.
Example
Example in poetry:
Colometric: Ancient Greek line division by sense, not meter; In Sappho fragments, colometry reveals emotional units; Modern colometric analysis: breaking free verse into breath-units (Williams’ triadic lines)
Additional Notes
Pertaining to cola (metrical units) in Greek and Latin verse. Technical term for analyzing classical meter. Related to: prosody, classical metrics. Study ancient versification.
Also Known As
sense-unit verse phrasal organization
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