Spanish metre game: syllables, synalepha, rhyme and stanzas
A Spanish-language game for learning to measure verse with real poems: Garcilaso, Góngora, Quevedo, Lope de Vega, Sor Juana, Espronceda, Zorrilla, Bécquer, Rubén Darío, Antonio Machado and Lorca, all in the public domain. Each round shows an excerpt with one or more lines marked. On easy, eight-syllable lines: count the metrical syllables, see whether the last word is stressed on the last, second-to-last or third-to-last syllable, and say whether two lines have full rhyme or assonance. On medium, seven-, nine- and eleven-syllable lines appear and you name them. On hard, alexandrines with a caesura and stanzas: redondilla, cuarteta, cuarteto and romance.
Language · Upper primary, Secondary, Sixth Form
When the answer is shown, the line appears split into syllables, with synalephas joined (da‿ha) and the final adjustment: "un-ve-le-ro-ber-gan-tín → 7 + 1 (stressed last) = 8". The mistake is rarely not knowing the rule but applying it wrongly in a particular syllable, and this shows which one.
The game works out the answers itself with the textbook rules: diphthongs and hiatus, synalepha, the final-stress rule and the caesura. Before a line goes in, it is checked against the known metre of its poem; lines that need an unusual licence are left out, so the game never contradicts the textbook.
The excerpts are well known: "Verde que te quiero verde", "Volverán las oscuras golondrinas", "Caminante, no hay camino". Measuring something that already sounds familiar helps students hear the rhythm of the octosyllable or the hendecasyllable, which is the real goal.
""Un soneto me manda hacer Violante" appears. Split up: un-so-ne-to-me-man-da-ha-cer-Vio-lan-te, twelve syllables. But "manda" ends in a vowel and "hacer" starts with one (the h is silent): synalepha, da‿ha, leaving eleven. "Violante" is stressed on the second-to-last syllable, so nothing is added or taken away: a hendecasyllable, like the whole sonnet."
Prefer to learn without screens? Try this analogue version:
Choose the lyrics of a Spanish song or a saying you know by heart.
Write each line and split it into syllables with hyphens.
Mark the synalephas with an arc and look at the last word of each line.
Count and check whether all the lines have the same length: many folk songs are in eight-syllable lines.
If you like Measure the Verse, these activities work similar skills:
For recognising metaphors, anaphora or hyperbaton in lines and sentences.
To reinforce stress patterns (aguda, llana, esdrújula), the basis of the final-stress rule.
Multiple choice on genres, periods and authors of Spanish literature.
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