Constraint-based metrics

This paper offers an analysis of Middle English Alliterative Verse in terms of Prosodic Metrics (Golston and Riad 1995, 1997a, b, 1998) using the ranked and violable constraints of Optimality Theory (Prince and Smolensky 1993). The analysis uses purely phonological constraints without recourse to language-specific or meter-specific constraints and without an abstract metrical template (Helsloot 1997). I show that the number of tokens per metrical type correlates with phonological well-formedness in one of five areas: binarity, weight, alignment, identity, and rhythm. In addition, I show that poems written in this meter have no perfectly metrical lines in them: every line violates some constraint because absolute metrical well-formedness is not possible given the constraints in this type of meter. Gradient well-formedness in meter (Youmans 1989) is shown to be both demonstrable and formalizable.