E. T. Merrill, Commentary on Catullus, Metres., para 84

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Early Lyric Poetry at Rome .

Date of birth and of death.

Family and circumstances.

Journey to Bithynia .

Later years. Relations with Caesar.

Friends and foes.

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84. The SAPPHIC stanza (cc. 11, 51) as used by Catullus has the following scheme: -

“ -u-x -uu- u--
-u-x -uu- u--
-u-x -uu- u--
-uu--

”

In allowing a trochee thrice in place of the irrational spondee (cc. 11. 6; 11. 15; 51.13), and in indifference to the caesura, Catullus resembles Sappho more closely than does Horace.¹

1 By "trochee in place of irrational spondee," Merrill means that Catullus, like Sappho, allows variation in the Aeolic base, at the position marked anceps in the schema. Later poets, like Horace, make that syllable always long.

Catullus. Catullus. E. T. Merrill. Cambridge. Harvard University Press. 1893.

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