{{short description|Poetic device}} {{overcolored|date=April 2026}} In Latin and Greek poetry, '''correption''' ({{langx|la|correptiō}} {{IPA|la|kɔrˈrɛpt̪ioː|}}, "a shortening")<ref>{{L&S|correptio|correptio|ref}}</ref> is the shortening of a long vowel at the end of one word before a vowel at the beginning of the next.<ref name=Stanford>{{cite book|last=Stanford|first=W.B.|title=Homer: Odyssey I-XII|year=2009|publisher=Duckworth|isbn=978-1853995026|pages=lv|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ZyEJAAAACAAJ}}</ref> Vowels next to each other in neighboring words are in hiatus.

Homer uses correption in dactylic hexameter:

* {{lang|grc|Ἄνδρα μοι ἔννεπε, Μοῦσα, πολύτροπον, ὃς μάλα πολλὰ<br>πλάγχθ'''η, ἐ'''πεὶ Τροίης ἱερὸν πτολίεθρον ἔπερσε·}}<br>— ''Odyssey'' [http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:1999.01.0136:book=1:card=2 1.1-2] * Tell me, O Muse, of the man of many devices, who wandered full<br>many ways after he had sacked the sacred citadel of Troy.<br>— [http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:1999.01.0136 translation by A.T. Murray]

Here the sequence η ε in bold must be pronounced as ε ε to preserve the ''long—short—short'' syllable weight sequence of a dactyl. Thus, the scansion of the second line is thus:

'''{{color|steelblue|πλαγχ θε,}} {{color|darkgreen|ε}}''' {{pipe}} {{color|darkgreen|πει}} {{color|saddlebrown|Τροι}} {{pipe}} {{color|saddlebrown|η ς}}{{color|steelblue|ι ε}} {{pipe}} {{color|steelblue|ρον}} {{color|darkgreen|πτο λι}} {{pipe}} {{color|darkgreen|εθ ρο ν}}{{color|saddlebrown|ε}} {{pipe}} {{color|saddlebrown|περ σε}}

==Attic==

Typically, in Homeric meter, a syllable is scanned long or "closed" when a vowel is followed by two or more consonants. However, in Attic Greek, a short vowel followed by a plosive and a liquid consonant or nasal stop remains a short or "open" syllable.<ref name=Smyth>{{cite book|last=Smyth|first=Herbert|title=Greek Grammar|year=1984|publisher=Harvard University Press|isbn=0674362500|pages=35|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=M3EyjIa6IPgC&pg=PA10}}</ref> This is called '''Attic correption''', sometime known by its Latin name ''correptio Attica''.

Therefore, the first syllable of a word like δᾰ&#x301;κρυ could be scanned as "δά {{pipe}} κρυ" (open/short), exhibiting Attic correption, or as "δάκ {{pipe}} ρυ" (closed/long), in keeping with the conventions of Homeric verse.

==See also== * Metaplasm * Hiatus * Synalepha {{wiktionary}}

==References== {{reflist}}

Category:Phonology Category:Figures of speech Category:Poetic rhythm Category:Homeric Greek

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