IL Ponte Vecchio Di Firenze
Gaddi mi fece; il Ponte Vecchio sono;Cinquecent' anni gia sull' Arno piantoIl piede, come il suo Michele SantoPianto sul draco. Mentre ch' io ragionoLo vedo torcere con flebil suonoLe rilucenti scaglie. Ha questi affrantoDue volte i miei maggior. Me solo intantoNeppure muove, ed io non l' abbandono.Io mi rammento quando fur cacciatiI Medici; pur quando GhibellinoE Guelfo fecer pace mi rammento.Fiorenza i suoi giojelli m' ha prestati;E quando penso ch' Agnolo il divinoSu me posava, insuperbir mi sento.
Words in this poem
- draco n.
- The Dragon, a northern constellation within which is the north pole of the ecliptic. [L. See Dragon.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
IL Ponte Vecchio Di Firenze is in the public domain. This text is taken from The Complete Poetical Works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Project Gutenberg ebook #1365; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, IL Ponte Vecchio Di Firenze, in The Complete Poetical Works (1839–1882), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #1365, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/longfellow-poems/il-ponte-vecchio-di-firenze.html, id L17752.
Form and metre
IL Ponte Vecchio Di Firenze is 14 lines in a single stanza. It rhymes ABBAABBACDECDE, the pattern of the Italian sonnet. The metre is trochaic hexameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 74%). 94% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 11.5 syllables. 1 line ends on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 64% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
See other Italian sonnets, other poems in trochaic hexameter.
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 ABBAABBACDECDE sonoA · piantoB · santoB · ragionoA · suonoA · affrantoB · intantoB · abbandonoA · cacciatiC · ghibellinoD · rammentoE · prestatiC · divinoD · sentoE
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 trochaic hexameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| Gaddi mi fece; il Ponte Vecchio sono; | 10 | ······/˘·· |
| Cinquecent' anni gia sull' Arno pianto | 11 | ·······/˘·· |
| Il piede, come il suo Michele Santo | 9 | ·····˘//˘ |
| Pianto sul draco. Mentre ch' io ragiono | 13 | ···/˘/˘·/˘··· |
| Lo vedo torcere con flebil suono | 10 | ·········· |
| Le rilucenti scaglie. Ha questi affranto | 13 | ············· |
| Due volte i miei maggior. Me solo intanto | 12 | ·······/···· |
| Neppure muove, ed io non l' abbandono. | 12 | ····/˘······ |
| Io mi rammento quando fur cacciati | 12 | /˘·········· |
| I Medici; pur quando Ghibellino | 11 | ·˘/˘······· |
| E Guelfo fecer pace mi rammento. | 10 | ·········· |
| Fiorenza i suoi giojelli m' ha prestati; | 13 | ˘/˘·········· |
| E quando penso ch' Agnolo il divino | 13 | ············· |
| Su me posava, insuperbir mi sento. | 12 | ············ |
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.