Ямб: метрическая стопа в поэзии

Metrical foot

An iamb ('/aɪ//æ//m/ EYEam) or iambus is a metrical foot used in various types of poetry. Originally the term referred to one of the feet of the quantitative meter of classical Greek prosody: a short syllable followed by a long syllable (as in καλή "beautiful (f.)"). This terminology was adopted in the description of accentual syllabic verse in English, where it refers to a foot comprising an unstressed syllable followed by a stressed syllable (as in abóve). Thus a Latin word like íbī, because of its short long rhythm, is considered by Latin scholars to be an iamb, but because it has a stress on the first syllable, in modern linguistics it is considered to be a trochee.

R. S. P. Beekes has suggested that the ἴαμβος iambos has a Pre Greek origin. An old hypothesis is that the word is borrowed from Phrygian or Pelasgian, and literally means "Einschritt", i. e., "one step", compare dithyramb and thriambus, but H. S. Versnel rejects this etymology and suggests instead a derivation from a cultic exclamation. The word may be related to Iambe, a Greek minor goddess of verse, especially scurrilous, ribald humour. In ancient Greece iambus was mainly satirical poetry, lampoons, which did not automatically imply a particular metrical type. Iambic metre took its name from being characteristic of iambi, not vice versa.

Through iambic shortening, a word with the shape light–heavy or short–long changes to become light–light; for example, ibī changes to ibi with two short syllables. In modern linguistics this change is sometimes referred to as "trochaic shortening", since íbī has a stress on the first syllable and is thus in modern linguistic terms a trochee.