Traditions and Continuities - Alliteration in Old and Modern Icelandic Verse, is a lucid and authorative treatment of Old Icelandic alliterative metre, and of the subtle changes it underwent as the language evolved into later and modern Icelandic. It falls into four sections, beginning with an exhaustive account of the mechanics of alliteration and their development up until the present; a review of the development of research into the subject; the author's own research into the nature of alliterative verse, with special attention to complex phenomena such as vowel alliteration, s-clusters an hv-alliteration; and final section summarizing the main conclusions.

Written by a scholar and poet, this is an essential handbook for the English-speaking research student in the subject.

• Coverpage
• Titlepage
• Copyright
• Contents
• Foreword
• Introduction
• PART ONE METRICS AND ALLITERATION
  • 1 What is alliteration?
    • 1.1 Germanic alliteration
      • 1.1.1 Old English poetry
      • 1.1.2 Old Germanic poetry on the continent
      • 1.1.3 Other Nordic countries
      • 1.1.4 Reviving the tradition
    • 1.2 Ireland, Finland, Somalia
      • 1.2.1 The Irish alliterative traditon
      • 1.2.2 Finnish poetry: Kalevala
      • 1.2.3 Somalia
    • 1.3 Some basic principles of systematic alliteration
    • 1.4 Equivalence classes in Icelandic poetry: What alliterates with what?
      • 1.4.1 Initial clusters in Icelandic: the sound /s/
      • 1.4.2 The twenty-six equivalence classes
    • 1.5 Positioning the alliteration
      • 1.5.1 Alliterating elements: number and location
      • 1.5.2 Line pairs and line length
      • 1.5.3 Repetition: one alliterating stressed syllable
    • 1.6 Origins of the Icelandic alliterative tradition
      • 1.6.1 The poetic ear
      • 1.6.2 Learned alliteration, heard alliteration
      • 1.6.3 The tradition alive and well in Iceland: first syllable stress?
      • 1.6.4 Innovation and experiment in Icelandic alliteration
    • 1.7 History of metrics and studies on metrics in Icelandic and Nordic poems
      • 1.7.1 Metrics of dróttkvætt metre
      • 1.7.2 The late Middle Ages
      • 1.7.3 The Reformation
      • 1.7.4 Origins of formal studies in metrics: the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries
      • 1.7.5 Studies on metrics in the twentieth century
      • 1.7.6 An overview of articles discussing Icelandic (Old Norse) metrics
      • 1.7.7 Summary
• PART TWO A HISTORICAL STUDY OF ICELANDIC ALLITERATION
  • 2 Methodology
    • 2.1 Research questions
      • 2.1.1 Key questions
      • 2.1.2 Subsidiary questions
    • 2.2 Method
    • 2.3 Sample
    • 2.4 Overview of the poets
    • 2.5 Methodology
    • 2.6 Statistical tests
      • 2.6.1 Frequency tests
      • 2.6.2 t-tests
      • 2.6.3 Analysis of variance (ANOVA)
      • 2.6.4 Percentage measurements
• PART THREE ANALYSIS AND RESULTS
  • 3 Alliteration with vowels
    • 3.1 What enables vowel alliteration?
      • 3.1.1 Glottal stop
      • 3.1.2 Historical origins of vowel alliteration: the Kock-Classen Theory
      • 3.1.3 A common feature of vowels [+vocalic]: Jiriczek and Kauffmann
      • 3.1.4 An empty prop: the sonority minimum
    • 3.2 Vowel alliteration in Icelandic poetry: some results
      • 3.2.1 The theory of the glottal stop questionable
      • 3.2.2 Lack of data support for the theory of historical origin of vowel alliteration
      • 3.2.3 Jiriczek’s theory: an empty prop and compressed results
  • 4 Gnýstuðlar, s-alliteration, epenthetic alliteration
    • 4.1 Jón Ólafsson Svefneyingur: gnýstuðull pioneer
      • 4.1.1 Problematic uses of gnýstuðlar
      • 4.1.2 Diverse opinions on gnýstuðlar among poets and scholars
    • 4.2 Epenthetic alliteration and s-alliteration
    • 4.3 Gnýstuðlar explained by sonority minimum
    • 4.4 Summary
    • 4.5 Gnýstuðlar, s-alliteration and epenthetic alliteration in Icelandic poetry: conclusions
      • 4.5.1 Gnýstuðlar sk, sp and st
      • 4.5.2 S-alliteration
      • 4.5.3 S-alliteration in the eighteenth, nineteenth, and twentieth centuries
      • 4.5.4 Ratio of s-alliteration in poetry before 1400
      • 4.5.5 S-alliteration by no means universal
    • 4.6 The sm-cluster in alliteration
    • 4.7 Gnýstuðlar sl, sm, and sn
    • 4.8 Epenthetic alliteration
    • 4.9 Sm-alliteration with sp
  • 5 Alliteration with h
    • 5.1 Words beginning with h form one equivalence class
      • 5.1.1 Arguments about words beginning with h
      • 5.1.2 Hv-alliteration; kv-pronunciation
    • 5.2 Alliteration with h in Icelandic poetry: some results
      • 5.2.1 Hl, hr, hn, and hj
      • 5.2.2 Hv-alliteration
      • 5.2.3 Summary
  • 6 Alliteration with j, v, and é
    • 6.1 J and v in alliteration with a vowel
    • 6.2 The letter j in Icelandic poetry: some results
    • 6.3 The alternating alliteration of j
    • 6.4 V in Icelandic poetry: some results
    • 6.5 Alliteration with e/é
    • 6.6 Alliteration with e/é: some results
  • 7 Grammatical categories, rhythm and alliteration
    • 7.1 Differing strength of words and feet in poetry
      • 7.1.1 Combinations of feet
      • 7.1.2 Rules on alliteration and word strength
      • 7.1.3 Elasticity of the props
    • 7.2 Relationship between alliteration and grammatical categories in Icelandic poetry: some results
      • 7.2.1 Why do these changes occur?
      • 7.2.2 ‘Accentual’ and ‘metrical’ verse
  • 8 Hyper-alliteration and secondary alliteration
    • 8.1 Hyper-alliteration
    • 8.2 Secondary alliteration
    • 8.3 Hyper-alliteration and secondary alliteration in Icelandic poetry: some results
      • 8.3.1 Hyper-alliteration
      • 8.3.2 Hyper-alliteration until 1300
      • 8.3.3 Hyper-alliteration with j
      • 8.3.4 Hyper-alliteration increases during the fourteenth century
      • 8.3.5 The eighteenth-century decline in hyper-alliteration
      • 8.3.6 Secondary alliteration and hyper-alliteration
    • 8.4 Summary
• PART FOUR RESULTS IN SUMMARY
  • 9 What changed and what did not?
    • 9.1 Changes in alliterative practice
    • 9.2 Changes in the number of alliterative sounds
    • 9.3 Changes in grammatical categories carrying alliteration
    • 9.4 Changes in alliteration
      • 9.4.1 J with vowels
      • 9.4.2 Hv with k
      • 9.4.3 Increased number of gnýstuðlar
      • 9.4.4 S-alliteration
      • 9.4.5 Epenthetic alliteration
    • 9.5 Some things did not change
    • 9.6 There are three basic rules
      • 9.6.1 Similarity of sounds
      • 9.6.2 Sonority minimum
      • 9.6.3 Position and number of alliteration sounds
    • 9.7 Conclusion
• APPENDICES
• REFERENCES
• ABBREVIATIONS
• INDEX