Alliteration is the repetition of syllable-initial consonant sounds between nearby words, or of syllable-initial vowels if the syllables in question do not start with a consonant. It is often used as a literary device. A common example is "Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers".
The word alliteration derives from the Latin word littera, meaning "letter of the alphabet". It was first coined in a Latin dialogue by the Italian humanist Giovanni Pontano in the 15th century. Pontano, however, used the term in a broader sense to include examples where the repeated letter does not start a word or a stressed syllable, e.g. ex áere rigéntem.
Alliteration is used in the alliterative verse of Old English poems like Beowulf, Middle English poems like Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, Old Norse works like the Poetic Edda, and in Old High German, Old Saxon, and Old Irish. It was also used as an ornament to suggest connections between ideas in classical Latin, Greek, and Sanskrit poetry.
Today, alliteration is used poetically in various languages around the world, including German, Welsh, Mongolian, Hungarian, American Sign Language, Somali, Finnish, and Icelandic. It is also used in music lyrics, article titles in magazines and newspapers, and in advertisements, business names, comic strips, television shows, video games and in the dialogue and naming of cartoon characters.
There are several concepts to which the term alliteration is sometimes applied:
Literary or poetic alliteration is often described as the repetition of identical initial consonant sounds in successive or closely associated syllables within a group of words. However, this is an oversimplification; there are several special cases that have to be taken into account:
The identical consonant sounds must be stressed in alliteration. However, the term "stressed" includes any syllable that counts as an upbeat in poetic meter.[citation needed] For example, in James Thomson's verse, "Come . . . dragging the lazy languid line along," the syllable "long" in "along" alliterates with the three previous words.
Some prosodists debate on whether the repetition of syllable-initial vowels functions count as alliteration, though they typically are considered to be able to alliterate. Syllable-initial vowels can alliterate regardless of which vowels are used. Vowel alliteration is not used infrequently; John Milton uses the device in about 6.2% (670 lines) of all lines Paradise Lost including "Where entrance up from Eden easiest," to name an example. However, same-vowel alliteration proves quite rare: in Milton only uses it ten times in his magnum opus (excluding same-word repetitions).
There are two contending theories on the reason that vowel alliteration works: the sonority of the vowel, which argues that despite the vowel's differing positions, a common element permits alliteration between any vowel (however, this fails to address why all consonants would not alliterate with each other); the other theory is related to the ubiquity of the glottal stop in pronouncing vowels which does not prompt the same issue as the latter theory.
Consonant clutters are able to alliterate with each other and the onset consonant; for example, the phrase "Bring a blessed boon" is alliterates thrice with the br-, bl-, and b-.
However, some claim[who?] that the consonant clusters sp-, st-, and sk- are unable to alliterate with s- but are able to alliterate within their same consonant though many of this claims are baseless; for instance in Barack Obama's phrase "same high standards of strength and sacrifice" it is nearly universally agreed same alliterates with sacrifice and standards with strength, some may argue the two pairs do not alliterate with each other
Alliteration may also refer to the use of different but similar consonants, often because the two sounds were identical in an earlier stage of the language. For example, Middle English poems sometimes alliterate z with s (both originally s), or hard g with soft (fricative) g (the latter represented in some cases by the letter yogh – ȝ – pronounced like the y in yarrow or the j in Jotunheim).
Consonance is a broader literary device involving the repetition of consonant sounds at any point in a word (for example, coming home, hot foot). Alliteration can then be seen as a special case of consonance where the repeated consonant sound opens the stressed syllable.
Head rhyme or initial rhyme involves the creation of alliterative phrases where each word literally starts with the same letter; for example, "humble house", "potential power play", "picture perfect", "money matters", "rocky road", or "quick question". A familiar example is "Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers".
Symmetrical alliteration is a specialized form of alliteration which demonstrates parallelism or chiasmus. In symmetrical alliteration with chiasmus, the phrase must have a pair of outside end words both starting with the same sound, and pairs of outside words also starting with matching sounds as one moves progressively closer to the center. For example, with chiasmus: "rust brown blazers rule;" with parallelism: "what in earlier days had been drafts of volunteers were now droves of victims." Symmetrical alliteration with chiasmus resembles palindromes in its use of symmetry.
Poets can call attention to certain words in a line of poetry by using alliteration. They can also use alliteration to create a pleasant, rhythmic effect. In the following poetic lines, notice how alliteration is used to emphasize words and to create rhythm:
Alliteration can also add to the mood of a poem. If a poet repeats soft, melodious sounds, a calm or dignified mood can result. If harsh, hard sounds are repeated, on the other hand, the mood can become tense or excited. In this poem, alliteration of the s, l, and f sounds adds to a hushed, peaceful mood:
Source:
Literary alliteration has been used in various spheres of public speaking and rhetoric. It can also be used as an artistic constraint in oratory to sway the audience to feel some type of urgency, or another emotional effect. For example, S sounds can imply danger or make the audience feel as if they are being deceived. Other sounds can likewise generate positive or negative responses. Alliteration serves to "intensify any attitude being signified".: 6–7
An example is in John F. Kennedy's Inaugural Address, in which he uses alliteration 21 times; the last paragraph of his speech is given as an example here:
"Finally, whether you are citizens of America or citizens of the world, ask of us here the same high standards of strength and sacrifice which we ask of you. With a good conscience our only sure reward, with history the final judge of our deeds, let us go forth to lead the land we love, asking His blessing and His help, but knowing that here on Earth God's work must truly be our own." — John F. Kennedy
Translation can lose the emphasis developed by this device. For example, in the accepted Greek text of Luke 10:41 the repetition and extension of initial sound are noted as Jesus doubles Martha's name and adds an alliterative description: Μάρθα Μάρθα μεριμνᾷς (Martha, Martha, merimnas). This is lost in the English NKJ and NRS translations "Martha, Martha, you are worried and distracted by many things."
For vch mon had meruayle quat hit mene myȝt
Þat a haþel and a horse myȝt such a hwe lach,
As growe grene as þe gres and grener hit semed,
Þen grene aumayl on golde glowande bryȝter.
mikado alliteration
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