‘An unexplored sea’. The Metres of Greek Drama in Early Modern England

This article aims to explore whether and how the lyric metres of Greek drama were studied in early modern English schools and universities. To this end, it examines the treatises and book chapters on prosody which were either published in England or imported from continental Europe. My analysis points out that the study of prosody was mainly focused on Latin. Greek prosody was conceived after the model of the Latin one and included a limited selection of feet: mainly hexameters, pentameters, iambic trimeters, and sapphic odes. Greek verses were less systematically composed than Latin ones and the utility of this exercise was disputed. Moreover, the different performative value of the different metres of Greek drama was not fully perceived. On the evidence of documental data, the article eventually argues that the standard education in grammar schools and universities hardly allowed the educated Englishman to get truly acquainted with the lyric metres of Greek tragedy or comedy