The Homerides

Friedrich Schiller (1759–1805) · 1805

iambic tetrameter · 7 lines · from The Poems of Schiller: Third Period

Who is the bard of the Iliad among you? For since he likes puddings,Heyne begs he'll accept these that from Gottingen come."Give them to me! The kings' quarrel I sang!"--"I, the fight near the vessels!"--"Hand me the puddings!I sang what upon Ida took place!"Gently! Don't tear me to pieces! The puddings will not be sufficient;He by whom they are sent destined them only for one.

Words in this poem

heyne n.
A wretch; a rascal. [AS. heán low, mean.]

Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.

About this text

The Homerides is in the public domain. This text is taken from The Poems of Schiller — Third period, Project Gutenberg ebook #6796; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.

Cite as: Friedrich Schiller, The Homerides, in The Poems of Schiller: Third Period (1805), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #6796, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/schiller-third-period/the-homerides.html, id L21909.

Form and metre

The Homerides is 7 lines in a single stanza. This poem did not settle on a metre of its own; the book it comes from is in iambic tetrameter.

See other poems in iambic tetrameter.

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. 1 A--A--- puddingsA · come · sang · puddingsA · place · sufficient · one
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 tetrameter. How this is done.

LineSyl.Stress
Who is the bard of the Iliad among you? For since he likes puddings,17······/˘·······/˘
Heyne begs he'll accept these that from Gottingen come.12···˘/·······
"Give them to me! The kings' quarrel I sang!"--10······/˘··
"I, the fight near the vessels!"--"Hand me the puddings!12·····/˘···/˘
I sang what upon Ida took place!"9·····/˘··
Gently! Don't tear me to pieces! The puddings will not be sufficient;17/˘····/˘·/˘···˘/˘
He by whom they are sent destined them only for one.13······/˘·/˘··

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.

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