Czech alexandrine Czech alexandrine Czech alexandrine (in Czech "český alexandrín") is a verse form found in Czech poetry of the 20th century. It is a metre based on French alexandrine. The most important features of the pattern are number of syllables (twelve or thirteen) and a caesura after the sixth syllable. It is an unusual metre, exhibiting characteristics of both syllabic and syllabotonic (accentual-syllabic) metre. Thus it occupies a transitional position between syllabic and accentual patterns of European versification. It stands out from the background of modern Czech versification, which is modeled chiefly after German practice. The Czech alexandrine is also metrically
Alexandrine line were occasionally used in Polish literature, it was Mikołaj Rej and Jan Kochanowski who, in the 16th century, introduced the syllabically strict line as a vehicle for major works. The Czech alexandrine is a comparatively recent development, based on the French alexandrine and introduced by Karel Hynek Mácha in the 19th century. Its structure forms a halfway point between features usual in syllabic and in accentual-syllabic verse, being more highly constrained than most syllabic verse, and less so than most accentual-syllabic verse. Moreover, it equally encourages the very different rhythms of iambic hexameter and dactyllic tetrameter to emerge by