Polish alexandrine (Polish: trzynastozgłoskowiec) is a common metrical line in Polish poetry. It is similar to the French alexandrine. Each line is composed of thirteen syllables with a caesura after the seventh syllable. The main stresses are placed on the sixth and twelfth syllables. Rhymes are feminine.
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 1 2 3 4 5 6 o o o o o S x | o o o o S xMoja wdzięczna Orszulo, bodaj ty mnie byłaS=stressed syllable; x=unstressed syllable; o=any syllable.
The Polish alexandrine was introduced in the 15th century. It was borrowed from Latin poetry.[1] It was widely used by Jan Kochanowski,[2] the first great Polish poet, as exemplified in the first two lines of his "Lament 13", with a formal paraphrase in English:
The Polish national epic, Pan Tadeusz by Adam Mickiewicz, is written in this measure.[4] Polish alexandrines replaced hendecasyllables in sonnets: in the 16th century poets like Sebastian Grabowiecki and Mikołaj Sęp-Szarzyński wrote sonnets using 11-syllable metre, but in the 17th century Daniel Naborowski translated one of Petrarch's sonnets using 13-syllable lines:
Adam Mickiewicz composed his famous Crimean Sonnets[5] in 13-syllable lines:
The Polish alexandrine was used by many translators (among others, Franciszek Ksawery Dmochowski) as an equivalent of ancient Greek and Roman dactylic hexameter:
Achilla śpiewaj, Muzo, gniew obfity w szkody,
Który ściągnął klęsk tyle na Greckie narody[6]
As Polish words are longer than English ones, the 13-syllable line is good for translating English iambic pentameter.
Nowadays Polish alexandrine lines are often mixed with hendecasyllable ones in one poem.[7]