O metrach

Abstract

On metres, as we have it today, is an abridged version (one book) of the work written originally in forty-eight books by an Alexandrian grammarian Hephaestion (2nd century AD). Though so significantly reduced, it was over centuries, and remains until now, a primer of ancient doctrine on Greek metre. For many generations of students and scholars it was the most important handbook of versification and the principal source of the technical vocabulary still used nowadays in metrical studies. The text is also a treasury of many ancient poetic fragments which otherwise would be utterly lost to us. The book presents the first Polish translation of the treatise On metres with a detailed commentary explaining the metrical terms, analyses and views held by Hephaestion. The text of the treatise is also supplemented and compared with other ancient sources.