The Marriage of the Cid's Daughters LXXV
The Cid and his companions they rested in the placeUnto the King of Seville the tiding came apace:Ta'en is Valencia city; for him 'tis held no more.
With thirty thousand armed men he came to look them o'er.Nigh to the plain a battle they pitched both stiff and strong.But the lord Cid long-bearded hath overthrown that throng.And even unto Játiva in a long rout they poured.You might have seen all bedlam on the Jucar by the ford,For there the Moors drank water but sore against their will.With bet thee strokes upon him 'scaped the Sovereign of Seville.And then with all that booty the Cid came home again.Great was Valencia's plunder what time the town was ta'en,But that the spoils of that affray were greater yet, know well.An hundred marks of silver to each common soldier fell.How had shed that noble's fortune now lightly may you guess.
Words in this poem
- apace adv.
- With a quick pace; quick; fast; speedily. [Pref. a- + pace. OE. a pas at a walk, in which a is the article. See Pace.]
- valencia n.
- A kind of woven fabric for waistcoats, having the weft of wool and the warp of silk or cotton. [Perhaps fr. Valence in France.]
- bedlam n.
- A place appropriated to the confinement and care of the insane; a madhouse. Abp. Tillotson. [See Bethlehem.]
- drank n.
- Wild oats, or darnel grass. See Drake a plant. [Cf. 3d Drake.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
The Marriage of the Cid's Daughters LXXV is in the public domain. This text is taken from The Lay of the Cid, Project Gutenberg ebook #6088, the R. Selden Rose and Leonard Bacon translation; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Anonymous, The Marriage of the Cid's Daughters LXXV, in The Lay of the Cid (1919), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #6088, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/lay-of-the-cid/the-marriage-of-the-cid-s-daughters-lxxv.html, id L15081.
Form and metre
The Marriage of the Cid's Daughters LXXV is 15 lines in 2 verse paragraphs. It is in rhyming couplets, 67% of the lines. This poem did not settle on a metre of its own; the book it comes from is in iambic heptameter. 80% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 13.7 syllables. 7% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
See other poems in rhyming couplets, other poems in iambic heptameter.
Measured by Laurel's pipeline, not copied from a handbook: how stress and metre are counted, how rhyme is lettered, how a drifted rhyme is found. Where the dictionary cannot confirm a rhyme the letter is withheld, not guessed.
Rhyme words, stanza by stanza
The word that ends each line, lettered by the rhyme it makes; a dash is a line whose rhyme the dictionary could not confirm.
- 1 AA- placeA · apaceA · more
- 2 -AABBCC--DD- o'er · strongA · throngA · pouredB · fordB · willC · sevilleC · again · ta'en · wellD · fellD · guess
Scansion, line by line
Each line with its syllable count and the stresses the words themselves fix: / stressed, ˘ unstressed, · a syllable the word leaves free and the metre decides. Read against iambic heptameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| The Cid and his companions they rested in the place | 13 | ····˘/˘·/˘··· |
| Unto the King of Seville the tiding came apace: | 13 | ·····˘/·/˘·˘/ |
| Ta'en is Valencia city; for him 'tis held no more. | 14 | ··˘/˘˘/˘······ |
| With thirty thousand armed men he came to look them o'er. | 14 | ·/˘/˘·˘······· |
| Nigh to the plain a battle they pitched both stiff and strong. | 14 | ·····/˘··˘···· |
| But the lord Cid long-bearded hath overthrown that throng. | 13 | ·····/˘··˘/·· |
| And even unto Játiva in a long rout they poured. | 14 | ·/˘··········· |
| You might have seen all bedlam on the Jucar by the ford, | 14 | ·····/˘······· |
| For there the Moors drank water but sore against their will. | 13 | ·····/˘······ |
| With bet thee strokes upon him 'scaped the Sovereign of Seville. | 14 | ·········/˘·˘/ |
| And then with all that booty the Cid came home again. | 13 | ·····/˘····˘/ |
| Great was Valencia's plunder what time the town was ta'en, | 14 | ··˘/˘˘/˘······ |
| But that the spoils of that affray were greater yet, know well. | 14 | ······˘/·/˘··· |
| An hundred marks of silver to each common soldier fell. | 14 | ·/˘··/˘··/˘/˘· |
| How had shed that noble's fortune now lightly may you guess. | 14 | ····/˘/˘·/˘··· |
The reader shows the same poem with its rhymes coloured and a stress row above each line, the notes beside their stanzas, and any word's definition on a tap; the analysis page takes the whole book apart. How every part of this site was made.