Definition
The golden line is variously defined, but most uses of the term conform to the oldest known definition from Burles' Latin grammar of 1652:
- If the Verse does consist of two Adjectives, two Substantives and a Verb only, the first Adjective agreeing with the first Substantive, the second with the second, and the Verb placed in the midst, it is called a Golden Verse: as,
- Lurida terribiles miscent aconita novercae. (Ovid, Metamorphoses 1.147)
- Pendula flaventem pingebat bractea crinem.
These lines have the abVAB structure, in which nouns are placed at the end of the line in an interlocking order. Pendula is an adjective modifying bractea and flaventem is an adjective modifying crinem.
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- Pendula flaventem pingebat bractea crinem.
- adjective a, adjective b, VERB, noun A, noun B (abVAB)
Another would be Virgil, Aeneid 4.139
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- aurea purpuream subnectit fibula vestem,
- "a golden clasp bound her purple cloak"
word-by-word the line translates as "golden purple bound clasp cloak". The endings on the Latin words indicate their syntactical relationship, whereas English uses word order to do the same job. So a Latin listener or reader would know that golden and clasp go together even though the words are separated.
The term "golden line" originates in England. The definition quoted above is the earliest known use of the term, in an obscure Latin textbook published in England in 1652, which never sold well and of which only four copies are extant today. It appeared in some American and British Latin Grammars in the 19th and early 20th century. Only a few scholars outside the English-speaking world discuss the golden line. It is not found in any current handbooks on Latin grammar or metrics except for Mahoney's online Overview of Latin Syntax and Panhuis's Latin Grammar.
The term "golden line" did not exist in Classical antiquity. Classical poets probably did not strive to produce them (but see the teres versus in the history section below). Winbolt, the most thorough commentator on the golden line, described the form as a natural combination of obvious tendencies in Latin hexameter, such as the preference for putting adjectives towards the beginning of the line and nouns at the emphatic end. The golden line is an extreme form of hyperbaton.
There are about ten different definitions of the “golden line.” Often scholars do not explicitly offer a definition, but instead present statistics or lists of golden lines, from which one must extrapolate their criteria for deeming a verse golden.
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