Vedic Metre in its Historical Development c13.176

c13.176

Modern European verse, though based on accent instead of quantity, agrees with Greek and Latin in taking the foot for its unit, and assumes an iambic or trochaic rhythm as the necessary basis for almost every metre. All Western scholars are under the temptation to attribute to the poets of the Rigveda at least a wish to follow the same standard: but the facts prove that the types which really floated before their minds were often of a quite different character.