Renaissance

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Prosopopoeia

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Inanimate object speaking for speaker

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Reformation

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16th century movement for the reform of abuses in the Catholic Church.

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Chiasmus

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A literary device in which words, structure, or concepts are mirrored. This is useful in emphasizing the duality in some concepts.

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Concatenation

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To "chain together". Concatenation is a method of rhyming in sonnets based around repeating the concluding rhyme of one stanza as the leading rhyme of the next. ABAB BCBC CDCD.

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Sonnet Sequence

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The Sonnet sequence is a group of sonnets that can be read as a whole to create an overlying story, or read individually and still have individual meaning. This was a popular style during the Renaissance, and resulted in a number of poets playing with the Petrarchan style.

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Apostrophe

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Literary device in which the speaker addresses and inanimate object.

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Quatrain

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Stanza consisting of four lines. The quatrain is important to the Renaissance era due to the role it plays in the Sonnet, which typically consists of three quatrains and a couplet.

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Rhyming couplet

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Two lines of equal length that rhyme and complete one thought. Rhyming couplets are frequently found at the end of Sonnets. This allows for poet to throw in one last afterthought, often a frustrated exclamation.

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Epithalamion

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A song or poem celebrating a marriage. This plays a role in following up Spenser's Amoretti, which toys with Petrarchan style. Ending this sonnet sequence with an epithalamion emphasizes that the speaker got the girl, something that rarely happens in Petrarchan poetry.

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Sestet

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The last six lines of an Italian sonnet. Unlike the English sonnet, that consists of three quatrains and a rhyming couplet, the Italian sonnet is made up of an octave (8 lines) and a sestet (6).

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Epistolary Satire

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A poem that takes the form of a letter. This is seen in Wyatt's "Mine Own John Poims".

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Sprezzatura

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"Recklessness." Sprezzatura is characterized by one's ability to seem as if a personal quality (knowledge, charm, etc.) comes naturally and did not require extensive work to achieve. This term first came up in Castiglione's "Book Of The Courtier," and aided in prospective courtier's of the time.

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Poetic Foot

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Basic repeated sequence of meter composed of two or more accented or unaccented syllables. Most commonly we see the Iambic foot (unaccented, accented). Sonnets were regularly written in Iambic pentameter, or five Iambic feet.

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Volta

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"The Turn." Regularly found at line nine of a sonnet, the volta acts as a pivoting point in the tone or subject matter of a poem. This can be used to compare abstract ideas with everyday ideas, external and personal, etc.

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Octave

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Verse form consisting of eight rhyming lines in Iambic pentameter. Shows up as the first eight lines in Italian Sonnets.

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Amaurot

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Greek for "the shadowy or unknown place". Amaurot is the chief city in More's Utopia.

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Muse

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The nine goddesses who preside over the arts and sciences. The muses play a large role in all early creative writing, but are commonly addressed in poetry. It was believed that the muses were who provided a writer with his inspiration/work.