Ad Infinitum offers up a little gem in one of its footnotes. It's by Hugh Primas of Orleans, a twelfth century writer. He summarizes the Bible in two hexameters:
Quos anguis tristi virus mulcedine pavit"Those whom the serpent's venom filled with its dire magic, these Christ's astonishing blood washed in sweetness." More or less. Notice how each word in the first line is paired with a word in the second line. Obsessive rhyme was big in the Middle Ages, but this is the first time I've seen it pushed this far. And it's still in hexameter.
hos sanguis Christi mirus dulcedine lavit.
Anyone want to take a stab at pulling off something similar in English?
Labels: constraint writing, Hugh Primas, Latin, medieval, rhyme
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