Alcaic stanza four lines; the first two lines are divided into two parts by a caesura after the fifth syllable. The metrical pattern of an Alcaic stanza would look like this: Horace frequently used the Alcaic stanza in his Odes, as can be seen from this example : An English translation, which suggests the metre, is : A famous example of English Alcaics is Tennyson's "Milton": <poem style="margin-left:2em"> O mighty-mouth'd inventor of harmonies, O skill'd to sing of Time or Eternity, </poem> The Alcaic stanza was adapted to use in English and French during the Renaissance. It was very frequently used in
Decasyllabic quatrain lines of verse in 304 stanzas, each with a period at the end to show a "completeness" in each stanza. While the form had achieved fame with other poets of Dryden's era and was considered "fashionable" by figures of the literary world, Dryden's poem quickly became known as the standard-bearer of the genre. In 1751, Thomas Gray published "Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard", composed in the heroic stanza. Written in iambic pentameter, the poem followed the same metrical and structural patterns seen in "Annus Mirabilis", but the use of the poetic form in an elegy gave it the title