Sievers' theory of Anglo-Saxon meter

Eduard Sievers developed a theory of the meter of Anglo-Saxon Alliterative verse. This most likely would have been the theory of Anglo-Saxon prosody that Ezra Pound would have been familiar with.

A line of Anglo-Saxon verse is made up to two half-lines. Each of these half-lines contains two main stresses (or 'lifts'). Sievers categorized three basic types of half-line that were used. Here a stressed syllable is represented by the symbol '/' and an unstressed syllable by the symbol 'x'.

Type	Description	Example 1	Example 2
Type A	Falling	/ x / x	/ x x x / x
Type B	Rising	x / x /	x x x / x x /
Type C	Rising / Falling	x / / x	x x x / / x x

He also noted that three possible types of half-line were not used:

• / x x /
• / / x x
• x x / /

However the first two of these can be used if one of the 'dips' is changed into a half-stress (or 'half lift' ... notated here 'x́'):

Type D	Two stresses at start	/ / x́ x	/ / x x́
Type E	Falling / Rising	/ x x́ /	/ x́ x /

References

1. ^ Brooke-Rose, Christine, A ZBC of Ezra Pound, Faber and Faber, 1971. ISBN 0-571-09135-0 (page 88)