Taktovik

one of the meters of Russian tonic versification; it is generally understood as a line in which the intervals between stresses (ictuses) range from one to three syllables, and occasionally from zero to two syllables. Stresses are rarely omitted on the strong syllables, but in the three-syllable intervals an additional stress often occurs on the middle syllable. Consequently, in Russian versification the taktovik occupies an intermediate place between the more inflexible dol’nik, in which the intervals between stresses may be one or two syllables, and the freer accentual verse, in which there is no limit to the length of these intervals.

A meter similar to the taktovik occurs in folk poetry and its literary imitations, for example, Pushkin’s Songs of the Western Slavs. The taktovik appeared in Russian lyric poetry in the first decade of the 20th century and acquired definitive form in the poetry of V. A. Lugovskoi, I. L. Sel’vinskii, and N. N. Aseev. An example of the taktovik is

Takáia bylá nóch’—chto ni shág, to okóp,

Vprisiádku vypliásyval ogón’,

Podskákival Chongár, i revél Perekóp,

I rúshilsia makhnóvskii kón’.

The term taktovik was introduced into prosody by A. P. Kviat-kovskii, but he defined it with respect to declamation, not meter. The term was used in a broad sense by Sel’vinskii and in a restricted sense by G. A. Shengeli; some theorists have rejected it altogether.