Resolution is the metrical

Meter (poetry)

In poetry, metre is the basic rhythmic structure of a verse or lines in verse. Many traditional verse forms prescribe a specific verse metre, or a certain set of metres alternating in a particular order. The study of metres and forms of versification is known as prosody...

 phenomenon in classical poetry of replacing a longum with two brevia

Brevis

Brevis is the Latin word for short, and may refer to:* a musical note in mensural notation, see Mensural notation* Brevis , a light syllable in Ancient Greek and Latin poetry** Brevis in longo, a short syllable in place of a long syllable...

. It is generally found in Greek lyric poetry

Lyric poetry

Lyric poetry is a genre of poetry that expresses personal and emotional feelings. In the ancient world, lyric poems were those which were sung to the lyre. Lyric poems do not have to rhyme, and today do not need to be set to music or a beat...

 and in Greek

Ancient Greece

Ancient Greece is a civilization belonging to a period of Greek history that lasted from the Archaic period of the 8th to 6th centuries BC to the end of antiquity. Immediately following this period was the beginning of the Early Middle Ages and the Byzantine era. Included in Ancient Greece is the...

 and Roman

Ancient Rome

Ancient Rome was a thriving civilization that grew on the Italian Peninsula as early as the 8th century BC. Located along the Mediterranean Sea and centered on the city of Rome, it expanded to one of the largest empires in the ancient world....

 drama, most frequently in comedy.

It should not be confused with a biceps

Biceps (prosody)

Biceps is a point in a metrical pattern that can be filled either with one long syllable or two short syllables . It is found in the dactylic hexameter and the dactylic pentameter....

, which is a point in a meter which can equally be two shorts or a long, as is found in the dactylic hexameter

Dactylic hexameter

Dactylic hexameter is a form of meter in poetry or a rhythmic scheme. It is traditionally associated with the quantitative meter of classical epic poetry in both Greek and Latin, and was consequently considered to be the Grand Style of classical poetry...

. The biceps is freely able to be two shorts or a long, while resolution, particularly in tragedy, can only occur within very restricted situations. Two resolved longa in the same line is very unusual, for instance, while a biceps that is two shorts can freely be followed by another biceps that is two shorts. Also, two shorts that resolve into a long are almost always within the same word-unit.

One example from iambic trimeter

Iambic trimeter

iambic trimeter is a meter of poetry consisting of three iambic units per line.In ancient Greek poetry, iambic trimeter is a quantitative meter, in which a line consisted of three iambic metra and each metron consisted of two iambi...

:

u - u - u u u u - - - u -

(Sophocles, Oedipus at Colonus 41)

Marking metra with | and using "uu" to mark the resolution, we can take this as:

u - u - | u uu u - | - - u -

Note that the resolved pair is the word ὄνομ', so the resolution stays within the same word-unit.

External links

• Iambic Trimeter: Resolutions