trochee
/ˈtrəʊkiː
/noun Prosody
A foot consisting of one long or stressed syllable followed by one short or unstressed syllable.Although not one line of iambic hexameter appears, lines sometimes begin with a trochee or spondee or two, drift gently toward an iambic norm, and then depart from it....
- We hear iambs, trochees, Virgil's hexameters, the Norse alliterative lines, each arranged in their various couplets, quatrains, choric stanzas, gnomic verses, and much more besides.
- The first line, for example, appears to begin with two unstressed syllables followed by two stressed ones, while the second line unquestionably contains a trochee and an iamb and therefore forms a choriambic foot.
Origin
Late 16th century: via Latin from Greek trokhaios (pous) 'running (foot)', from trekhein 'to run'.