Cursus

CURSUS. - The ancient orators, in delivering their speeches, were accustomed to modulate the ends of sentences in order to make their cadence stand out and to prepare the pause. This inflection of the voice rested on special combinations of short or long, unstressed or stressed syllables. The oratorical period thus took the form of a free strophe and was divided into members more or less long, which the Greeks called cola and commata and the Latins membra and incisa.

Cicero, to indicate the rhythmic flow of discourse, which facilitated its melodic recitation and reading aloud, sometimes employs the word c. (c. orationis: De orat., II, 10, 39; 19, 82; Orat., 58, 198, etc.; c. verborum: De orat., I, 35, 161; III, 33, 136, etc.); Quintilian too (IX, 4, 70) and Aulus Gellius (XI, 13) use c. in this sense. The medieval masters of ars dictaminis employ the term c. to indicate both the rhythmic flow of the whole period and the sonorous cadences at the close of sentences. The classical rhetoricians prefer, in this latter case, the word clausula. Modern scholars have called metric or quantitative clausulae those cadences that are founded on the quantity of the syllables, rhythmic or accentual clausulae those that are based on the accent of the words.

The rhythmic structure of the period with harmonious clausulae was a spontaneous phenomenon in the great Greek and Latin orators, because the ear naturally prefers certain cadences and shrinks from others; but very soon the rhetoricians began to fix norms both concerning the rhythmic structure of the period and concerning the clausulae. Such norms were derived from the use that the great orators had spontaneously made of them. These rules, taught in the schools, recommended by the masters, were applied with greater or lesser rigor by the great majority of Greek and Latin prose writers. Thus what had previously been a spontaneous and aesthetic phenomenon became a reflective and literary fact.

Isocrates in particular cultivated with meticulous exactness the harmony of his periods. He himself says that, having abandoned judicial eloquence, he wishes to compose speeches that are similar to the works of art that accompany music. He desires that his speeches may be read and reread and that, without calling to their aid the expedients used by the poets, they may let readers taste a delight equal to that which one experiences in reading beautiful verses. At Rome, Cicero, following in the footsteps of Isocrates, and cultivating, with knowledge and love, the musical element inherent in the language, perfected the Latin period. The principal clausulae used by him, in the orations and in the rhetorical and philosophical treatises, are:

Form 1 cretic-trochee
Form 2 double cretic
Form 3 dichoree
Form 4 trochaic catalectic tripody

Zielinski has grouped these clausulae in a synthetic manner, maintaining that they are formed by a cretic base and a trochaic cadence, catalectic or entire:

Base Cadence

If this theory were true, the third and fourth forms should always be preceded by a cretic: which happens often, but not always. Sometimes, especially in the first form, a long is resolved into two shorts; more rarely the cretic is replaced by the molossus and the dichoree by the dispondee.

The harmonious and architectonic Ciceronian period, with its ample developments and sonorous cadences, did not immediately enjoy much fortune. The declaimers, Seneca, Tacitus, Fronto, Apuleius love brief and concise expression. Then came into fashion acute and witty conceits, short and incisive sentences, poetic and glittering phrases, piquant and sparkling sayings. But followers and praisers of Cicero were not lacking, such as Quintilian and Pliny. In the 3rd century there was a kind of compromise between the two opposing literary currents: to a phrasing rich in incisa, with assonances and subtleties, strongly expressive, there was joined a rhythmic period with parallel or antithetical members, ending with harmonious clausulae. Indeed, in place of the beautiful Ciceronian variety, there was substituted a monotonous singsong of a few cadences, chosen from among the most sonorous. Such a period was adopted, from the 3rd century onward, by almost all prose writers, both pagan and Christian.

In fact, when the Christian doctors did not address only the humble plebs, but sought to win over to the new religion the cultured classes as well, they were compelled to make use of the literary language that was taught in the schools. The Church, in the prayers of her liturgy, in the homilies of her bishops and in the works of her best champions, employed, with wise adaptation to changed circumstances, the rhythmic period with its harmonious cadences.

The first work in which the clausulae are found applied with scrupulous exactness is the Octavius of Minucius. It has only the appearance of a dialogue; but a free and occasional conversation is immediately transformed into two harangues; the one against, the other in defense of the new religion. The refined harmony of the periods of St. Cyprian was recognized both by pagans and by Christians. The same clausulae that he employs in writing from Carthage to the Roman clergy, Novatian too employs in replying to him from Rome. Arnobius, rhetorician and African, is one of the writers who pays most attention to the clausulae; his disciple Lactantius is less enslaved to them: even in this the influence of Ciceronian imitation reveals itself.

The great Christian polygraphs Tertullian, St. Jerome, St. Ambrose, St. Augustine, are freer and more varied in their use of the clausulae. Although they know the scholastic rules concerning prose rhythm, they are not slaves to them. St. Augustine, in the works he addresses to the learned, such as the De civitate Dei, employs the literary-rhythmic language; in the sermons and in other works of a popular character, more than the clausulae he makes use of rhymes and assonances to give sonority and harmony to his discourse. In the fragments of certain works of the Manicheans preserved for us by Augustine, in the opuscules of Celestius and of Pelagius, in the treatises of Julian of Eclanum, in the letters of the principal correspondents of the bishop of Hippo, one notes the same application, more or less rigid, of the rules on the clausulae.

The Panegyrics and Symmachus may be taken as models of the declamatory language of beautiful cadences. Firmicus Maternus, both in the astrological work written as a pagan and in the opuscule De errore profanarum religionum, dictated after his conversion to Christianity, employs the oratorical period. In the Iberian peninsula the rules on the clausulae are found applied in the letters of Potamius, bishop of Barcelona, in the treatises of Pacian, in those attributed to the heretic Priscillian, in the works of Paul Orosius and in those of Gregory of Elvira, in what remains to us of the monk Bachiarius, of the bishop of Majorca, Severus, and of the bishop of Bracara, Martin.

Where the clausulae became best acclimatized was in Gaul, especially through the work of the flourishing schools of rhetoric. Ausonius is as perfect as one could wish; he is followed by Cassian, Hilary of Arles, Vincent of Lérins, Faustus of Riez, Prosper of Aquitaine, Valerian, Salvian, Sidonius Apollinaris, Gennadius of Marseilles, Caesarius of Arles. Less careful are Paulinus, bishop of Nola, Hilary of Poitiers, Victricius of Rouen, Phoebadius of Agen. Sulpicius Severus, while in his other works he submits to the rules of the clausulae, in the Chronica abandons them, because he is inspired by a different literary ideal; this holds also for other historians: Aurelius Victor, Eutropius, etc.; but the best historian of the 4th century, Ammianus Marcellinus, is a careful observer of them. If the works of Eusebius, bishop of Vercelli, of Philastrius, bishop of Brescia, and of Victor, bishop of Capua, are not very careful as regards the clausulae, good are the treatises and sermons of Zeno, bishop of Verona, of Peter Chrysologus, bishop of Ravenna, of Gaudentius, bishop of Brescia, and of Maximus, bishop of Turin. Among the minor writers clausulae are found in the works of Arnobius the Younger, of the African bishops Aurelius, Quodvultdeus, Deogratias, Eugenius; in the writings of Optatus, of Vigilius of Thapsus, of Eustathius Africanus, of Victor of Vita, of Fulgentius of Ruspe, of Ferrandus; in the biographies of St. Cyprian, of St. Ambrose, of St. Augustine, written by the deacons Pontius, Paulinus and Possidius. Worthy of note is that in the works of an Easterner, but one who lived in Italy, Dionysius Exiguus, the clausulae are used both in the original works and in the translations from Greek.

The writings of Cassiodorus, of Ennodius and of Boethius show with how much care Roman men of letters, despite the fact that the times were so sad, cultivated eloquence and beautiful cadences. The clausulae triumph even in the imperial chancery, appearing not only in the rescripts handed down to us by the Gregorian and Theodosian codes, but also in the edicts and laws of Diocletian, of Galerius, of Constantine and of his successors.

The effective work of the Roman schools of rhetoric continued even after the Western Empire had fallen. The acts and laws of the Ostrogoth kings in Italy, of the Burgundians and the Merovingians in the Gauls, of the Visigoths in Spain and of the Vandals in Africa are always composed in clausulated prose.

From the imperial chancery the use of oratorical prose with its harmonious cadences passed to the papal chancery. In the letters of the pontiffs Liberius and Siricius, in the letters and decrees of Innocent I, of Zosimus, of Boniface I, of Sixtus III, as in those of Hilary, of Simplicius, of Felix III, of Gelasius I, of Symmachus, of Hormisdas the clausulae are almost always regular. The same result is obtained by examining the collection of pontifical decretals from Siricius to Anastasius, gathered by Dionysius Exiguus, and the decrees of the Roman synods, of the African, Spanish and Gallic councils.

The most important result arising from the study of the clausulae in the ancient Christian writers has been that of having brought to light that the Latin used by them is not an incorrect, popular and vulgar Latin, but is a literary language formed especially in the schools of rhetoric and of law, and used in writings, in correspondence and in conversation among cultured persons. Such language is not only a literary language, but is also a strongly expressive and concise language. It is affected, naturally, by linguistic evolution and by changed political and cultural conditions, but these writers are not to be blamed if they employed lexical, morphological and syntactic forms in use in their time, although no longer conforming to the Ciceronian ones. Linguistic evolution led to the prevalence of accent over syllabic quantity.

The Ciceronian clausulae are based on quantity: even if accent exercised a certain influence on them, this was entirely secondary. Later linguistic evolution brought it about that the parts were reversed: accent prevailed and quantity weakened. In the rapid phonetic and linguistic development that Latin underwent in the centuries of the Empire, when from a dialect of Latium it became the spoken language of millions of persons, different in race, customs, civilization and language, the sense of quantity weakened, while accent gained the upper hand and became, as the grammarians say, the soul of the word and of music. School teaching and literary tradition tended to put a brake on this decline; but, by now, especially in Africa, the ears of speakers no longer distinguished long syllables from short ones. Among the various types of clausulae, people began by preferring those in which the metrical ictus coincided with the accent.

The Christian writers from the 3rd to the 6th century take into account, in the great majority, both quantity and accent. If one pays attention only to accent, the clausulae preferred in these centuries can be reduced to four principal types which, following the terminology of the medieval dictatores, have been called:

1. C. planus, accent on the second and fifth syllable counting from the end: régna caelorum, spiritus vénit

2. C. tardus, accent on the third and sixth syllable: esse cognócimus, differunt génere

3. C. velox, accent on the second and seventh syllable: Dóminum confitémur. - 4. C. trispondaicus, accent on the second and sixth syllable: térra venerátur.

These c. derive from the quantitative clausulae. The c. planus derives from the classical clausula, a cretic followed by a trochee or spondee. It was used especially in the two types, either with the caesura after the first short: régua caelórum, or with the diaeresis after the cretic: spíritus vénit. In these two types, by the law of Latin accentuation, the metrical ictus coincides with the accent. In the c. tardus two quantitative clausulae came to be fused, the double cretic and the cretic followed by a tribrach. Here too the preferred types were those that had the caesura after the first short: ésse cognócinus, or the diaeresis after the cretic: differunt génere.

The c. velox derives principally from the most harmonious of the quantitative clausulae, the dichoree preceded by a cretic: apóstolis conferátur; but, with the prevalence of accent, instead of the dichoree, the dispondee and the first epitrite were also used, and the cretic was replaced by any proparoxytone word. In the Christian authors the accentual c. velox can be given by the following quantitative clausulae: begin{array}{c} --- \ --- \ --- end{array}

The c. trispondaicus derives from the quantitative clausula, first paeon plus trochee: ésse videátur.

The Christian writer in whom the rhythm of the period reaches the greatest perfection is St. Leo the Great, who, for his concinuitas and for his sonorous clausulae, can be considered the Cicero of Christian times. The works of this great pontiff are distinguished by a greater classicism and correctness in the use of the literary language, by a finer good taste in the handling of rhetorical and expressive means and by a harmonious fluency in rhythmic periodizing. His periodizing unfolds through parallel or antithetical members, closed by a clausula that respects both the norms of accent and those of quantity. St. Leo, with great stylistic skill, succeeds in giving a rhythmically perfect form to his letters and his sermons. In him rhythm and clausulae are not something mechanical and external, but spring forth spontaneously in intimate union with the thought.

To give an idea of the use of the Leonine clausulae, the results of the examination of the clausulae in the periods of the sermons and of the epistles are reported. If one considers the accent, one has the following clausulae:

Of these clausulae the great majority is also regular as regards quantity. In fact they present the following quantitative forms:

In Western Europe culture and the literary-rhythmic language suffered a grave blow because of the barbarian invasions, the fall of North Africa and of Spain under Arab rule, and the raids of the Saracens.

The last writers who in Spain show that they knew the rules on clausulae, applying them with greater or lesser regularity, are Isidore of Seville and his disciple Braulio, Bishop Eugenius III and the learned Archbishop Julian. Their contemporaries St. Fructuosus and the abbots Euantius and Valerius also use the literary-rhythmic language.

In France, in the 6th and 7th centuries, culture suffered a strong stagnation; yet the documents issued from the chancery of the Merovingian kings and the so-called "formulae of Marculf" show that the sense of rhythmic writing had not been entirely lost.

The letters of the popes, among which those of Gregory the Great, of Honorius I and of Adeodatus are worthy of mention, reveal how in Italy, despite so many bereavements and ruins, the tradition of rhythmic periodizing had not been entirely lost. The rules of the c. are found applied in the formulae of the Liber Diurnus, in the letter that the Milanese priest Damian addressed to the Fathers gathered in the Synod of 679, in the prose prologue to his treatise on medicine in verse by Benedict Crispus, bishop of Milan, and in the prologue that Felix, bishop of Ravenna, placed before a collection of sermons of St. Peter Chrysologus.

The Irish writers were a kind of humanists ahead of their time. They did not continue the tradition of the Roman schools of rhetoric. The literary-rhythmic Latin, despite everything, was a living language, which had acquired characteristics of its own. The Irish are classicists, but they replace a living language with a dead one. Through the influence of Irish and English writers the c. loses ground; only some writer, like Lupus, abbot of Ferrières, seems not to have forgotten the traditional rules concerning the rhythmic arrangement of words in the clausulae. In general the writers of the Carolingian renaissance do not follow the laws of the c.. These linger on in the schools of the Benedictine monasteries of southern and central Italy and especially of Montecassino. When, in the 9th century, Rome and Naples had a little breathing space, then the c. also flourishes again, because here the tradition of literary-rhythmic Latin had not been entirely extinguished. Two good writers, John, Neapolitan deacon, and John, Roman deacon, write in prose that, rhythmically, is almost perfect. Around them are grouped other minor prose writers, who often ornately rework passions of martyrs and legends of saints. The c. is present in the Micrologus of Guido of Arezzo, in the works of Peter Damian and in the epistles of Gregory VII. Pope Urban II brought with him from Montecassino the young John Gaetano so that he might ever more improve the chancery Latin of the Roman curia by applying to it the rules of the Leonine c.. Another pope, Gregory VIII, set out, in a Summa dictaminis, the most ancient rules that previously were transmitted orally. Once the rules for rhythmizing phrases were fixed, and the cadences to be used at the end of them in the three c. planus, tardus, velox were determined, the prose thus elaborated and cadenced took the name of the style of the Roman curia. Under the protection of the sacred name of Rome, this style spread first in Italy, then in France, in Germany, in England and in Spain. The rules on the c. were taught in the university schools of ars dictaminis and in the schools of the new religious Orders, the Franciscan and the Dominican. It would be too long to cite all the writers of the 12th-13th-14th centuries who follow the rules of the c.; we shall limit ourselves to recalling the papal letters and bulls, especially those of Alexander III and of Innocent III, the epistles of Dante and of Cola di Rienzo, the documents of the Avignon and Angevin chancery, many Franciscan and Dominican legends.

The humanists despised medieval Latin and sought to revive Ciceronian Latin; therefore, to the rules on the c. of the artes dictandi they sought to substitute those on the numerus given by Cicero and by Quintilian. The last great writer who applies the c. with a certain regularity is Baronio, who shows a great predilection for the cadence of the c. velox.

The literary-rhythmic language with the many cadences of the c. does not always prove suitable in ample doctrinal treatises, where one would desire a simpler progression, a more discursive and didactic tone; it proves better in small compositions: sermons, imperial constitutions, papal epistles. But where it reveals itself effectively suited is in liturgical prose, especially in that destined for singing and declaimed recitation. The concinnitas of the period, which takes on the movement of a free lyric strophe with members and clauses ending with the beautiful cadences, which now symmetrically interweave, now harmoniously correspond, seems created precisely for them. The form adapts itself to the content, and what in other compositions may seem pure literary exercise, here becomes art. In the liturgy of the first Christian centuries, often the lyric element joins with the oratorical: prayer is wedded to song, praise to exhortation and to the moral maxim. The Christian soul, before the marvels of creation and the infinite majesty of the heavenly Father, contemplating the immense love of the Son in his redemptive work, admiring the heroic virtue of the martyrs, cannot help but pour out lyrically its own emotion. Yet, at the same time, it wants all to participate in its own feelings, and thus to the lyric is joined the oratorical. Rhythmic prose and the c., more than verse and the poetic numerus, adapt themselves to the lyric-oratorical expression of the liturgy. The liturgical compositions where the union between lyric effusion and eloquent exhortation is best revealed are the oremus and the prefaces of the ancient sacramentaries. The strophic periodizing, the cadences of the c. and the singing give them a form that is, at the same time, artistic and popular. Here, thought, rhythm and song fuse into a homogeneous and harmonious whole.

The most ancient and venerable collection of liturgical prayers and of prefaces, that is, of that part of the Mass that the priest recited by himself, is contained in the so-called Leonine Sacramentary. It is of Roman origin. The affinities of thought, language and style between some of these prayers and the sermons of St. Leo are evident, and some of them may well be the work of this pontiff or of his chancery; others are later, but several, rhythmically perfect, may go back even to the 3rd and 4th centuries.

At the end of the liturgical formulae of the Leonine Sacramentary are found the following rhythmic clausulae:

Considering the quantity of these endings, we have these metrical clausulae:

The great majority of the clausulae, that is 96 percent, respect both the rules of quantity and those of accent; the few exceptions find their explanation in the linguistic evolution of those centuries.

Some orations from the Leonine passed into the other sacramentaries, and a few also passed, with additions and reworkings, into the present Roman Missal: the preface of the Ascension results from the union of two prefaces of the Leonine; but, most of the time, the adaptations were not improvements, and often they deformed the text, destroying its c. and disfiguring its primitive simplicity and beauty. The artistic composition of the prayers of the Leonine Sacramentary is given, besides by the c., by the concinnitas of the period, which is revealed especially in the balance of the various members that correspond to one another symmetrically in thought, in form and in cadence. The period unfolds organically and harmoniously yet without falling into a monotonous uniformity. Unity and simplicity are characteristic of many Leonine orations. Discord among the faithful is always deplorable: one may now see with what effectiveness and brevity the spirit of charity and pious concord among those who have fed on the same eucharistic bread is invoked from the Lord, in the following oration:

« Spiritum nobis, Domine, tuae caritatis infundē, — et quos uno caelesti pāne satiasti, — una facias pietate concōrdes ».

It is a small strophe of three stichs, with a trispondaicus c. between two planus c.

More complicated and elaborate are the prefaces; but they too are molded on a simple and unified scheme. The eucharistic Sacrifice is a sacrifice of thanksgiving; in the preface or anaphora the sacrificer invites the faithful to thank the Lord (Gratias agamus Domino Deo nostro), the people reply that this is a worthy and just thing (Dignum et iustum est). After this dialogue between the people and the celebrant, the latter suggests to the faithful the reasons for which they must thank the Lord. Such reasons are expressed with a relative or causal clause, or else with a participle or infinitive, and are taken either from the solemnity being celebrated or from the saint being honored and also from particular civil and ecclesiastical circumstances. We give two examples, choosing them from among the shortest. « Qui non solum peccata dimittis, — sed ipsos etiam iustificas peccatores, — et reis non tantum poenas relaxas, — sed dōnas et praēmia ».

It is a strophe of four stichs ending with two planus c., one velox and one tardus.

The following preface was certainly composed when the disputes with the Pelagians concerning Grace were raging: « Maientatem tuam suppliciter implorantes, — ut sicut ex Te habemus esse quod sūmus, — sic per gratiam tuam et bene velle sumamus, — et bonum posse quod volēmus ».

It is a strophe of four stichs: two planus c. between one velox and one trispondaicus. Moreover, liturgical prose as well, as in the first part of the Te Deum, in the Quicunque and in the Exultet, applies the rules of the c. with great art. The Exultet is perhaps the liturgical composition in which the union between lyrical effusion and eloquent exhortation, between prayer and mystical inspiration, between sonorous cadence and song, is best achieved.

In the prayers of the Gelasian and Gregorian Sacramentaries, accentual clauses begin to prevail, which are the only ones used by the liturgical composers of the medieval centuries. In some medieval liturgical writers, especially French, German and Irish, rhyme and assonance replace the cadences of the c. This use then gave rise to prayers and offices composed of rhymed stichs. In some prayers of the Carolingian age the commatic style prevails: the period is divided into many small members and the prayer then assumes an almost litanic form. The rules of the c. were no longer observed by the humanists. Nevertheless, in the seventeenth century, good oremus were composed by scholars who, through long familiarity with the ancient ecclesiastical writers, had preserved preserved a certain feeling for rhythmic period structure. Unhappy, on the other hand, are many oremus composed in the nineteenth century.

In recent years, in the composition of liturgical prose, an attempt has been made to take into account the ancient rules on the c. This is absolutely necessary if they are to flow harmoniously and the singing of them is to be easy and pleasing. Indeed, it is impossible to apply the ancient melodies of Gregorian chant to a modern liturgical composition if it is not rhythmically constructed. In every discourse spoken aloud, as in every well-executed reading, there is a latent song: cantus obscurior, says Cicero. In the first centuries of Christianity the reading of the Pauline epistles and of the Gospels, the recitation of the prayer of the Pater, of the orations, of the prefaces was a kind of declaimed discourse, which took the form of a very simple melody. The prayers that the bishop recited during the Eucharistic Sacrifice were pronounced in a loud and solemn voice, with a well-accentuated melodic tone, yet without losing the recitative character, because they had to be understood by the faithful. Among the Jews too, the readings made during the divine service had something of a sung quality. The rhythm of ancient Gregorian chant arises and is modeled on oratorical rhythm. Gregorian chant is a kind of recitation with determined melodic cadences. The melody and rhythm of these cadences reveals the ancient metrical clauses on which they were molded. Just as in the declamation of an oratorical period the rhetoricians distinguished the initial rhythm, the median one and the clause; so in the recitation of the psalmody there was the initium, the tenor and the final cadence. Most of the chants of the Sacramentary, the Gradual, the Responsorial unfold on melodic cadences which respect both the accent of the words and the cadences of the c. Especially the c. planae and the velox exercised a great influence in the formation of these melodies. In some liturgical compositions, as in the Exultet, this emerges with great clarity. This is the reason why, while the ancient liturgical prose is so easy to sing, the modern often turns out not to be singable. Among the ancients, whoever composed an oration destined for singing composed it by singing, even when adapting to it a melody already in use; therefore thought and word, rhythm and song flow in harmonious union. Modern composers have too many times sought to stuff their compositions with theological formulas, with more or less historical reminiscences, with linguistic flourishes, but have paid little attention to the rhythmic flow destined to facilitate their melodic recitation. For this reason, while the chanting of the deprecations of the so-called Litany of the Saints turns out smooth, solemn and moving, that of the Litany of the Heart of Jesus, composed coldly, turns out difficult and harsh. What offends and disturbs in certain modern oremus is not only the absence of rhythmic clauses, producing broken cadences and sobbings, but the lack of balance among the various stichs, whereby very short members, sometimes composed of a single word, alternate with very long members that proceed panting.

Furthermore, the discovery of the laws of the c. has greatly benefited the criticism of ancient texts, because they help to distinguish, among the different variants of the manuscripts, the one that is authentic. They have also led to the discovery of glosses and later additions, and have brought useful contributions for deciding on the authenticity or otherwise of an ancient writing.

Of the very numerous studies on the clauses and on the c., the principal ones are indicated here, in which further bibliographical indications may be found: L. Havet, La prose métrique de Symmaque et les origines du c., Paris 1892; A. Mocquereau, Le c. et la psalmodie, in Paléographie musicale, Solesmes 1895; W. Meyer, Gesammelte Abhandlungen zur mittelalterischen Rhythmik, Berlin 1902; A. De Santi, Il c. nella storia letteraria e nella liturgia, Rome 1903; Th. Zielinski, Das Clauselgesetz in Ciceros Reden, Leipzig 1904; F. Vacandard, Le c., son origine, son histoire, son emploi dans la liturgie, in Revue des questions historiques, 78 (1904), pp. 59-102; F. Blass, Die Rhythmen der asiatischen und römischen Kunstprosa, Leipzig 1905; L. Ceci, Il ritmo delle orazioni di Cicerone. La prima Cutilinaria, Turin 1906; F. Norden, Die antike Kunstprosa, Leipzig 1909; C. Zander, Eurythmia vel compositio rythmica prosae antiquae, I, Leipzig 1910; II, ibid. 1913; III, ibid. 1914; F. Di Capua, De numero in vetustis sacramentariis, in Ephemerides liturgicae, 26 (1912), p. 459 ff., 591 ff.; P. Ferretti, Il c. metrico e il ritmo delle melodie gregoriane, Parma 1913; Th. Zielinski, Der constructive Rhythmus in Ciceros Reden, Leipzig 1914; F. Di Capua, Il c. nel «De consolatione philosophiae» e nei trattati teologici di Sev. Boezio, in Didashaleion, 3 (1914), pp. 269-303; A. W. De Groot, A handbook of antique Prose-Rhythm, Groningen 1918; A. Copelli, Il c. nelle prefazioni della Messa ambrosiana, in Athenaeum, 10 (1922), pp. 126-35; G. Rejnold, The clausulae in the «De civitate Dei» of s. Augustine, Washington 1924; L. Laurand, Etudes sur le style des discours de Cicéron, Paris 1927; F. Di Capua, Il ritmo nella prosa liturgica e il Praeconium paschale, in Didashaleion, new series, 2 (1927), pp. 1-21; id., Il ritmo prosaico in s. Agostino, in Miscellanea agostiniana, Rome 1931, pp. 607-64; H. Hagendahl, La prose métrique d'Arnobe, Göteborg 1937; F. Di Capua, Il ritmo prosaico nelle lettere dei papi e nei documenti della cancelleria pontificia, I, Rome 1937; II, ibid. 1939; III, ibid. 1946; M. G. Nicolau, L'origine du c. rythmique et les débuts de l'accent d'intensité en latin, Paris 1938. The Catholic University of Washington is publishing a series of studies on the clauses in the Fathers of the Church.

Francesco Di Capua