As part of what will become the The Medieval Poetic Forms Project, I’m digging into Irish Medieval Poetry Forms. There are many; a lot of the surviving texts are poetry, or at least poetic. I’ve poked triads before, too.

The form I’m currently looking at is called deibhidhe, which I’d pronounce as “JAY-vid-the”, approximately (or “JAY-vee”, if you’re going for a more Western sound).

It’s a quatrain form, with seven syllables per line. The last word of the 1st and 3rd lines must rhyme with the unstressed syllable of the last word of the 2nd and 4th lines. There must be two internal rhymes between lines 3 and 4. Two words in each line must alliterate, and the final word in line 4 must alliterate with the preceding stressed word.

“Rhyme” here is not just sound; there are consonant groups which go with each other:

• Group 1: b, g, d
• Group 2: c, p, t
• Group 3: ch, ph, th
• Group 4: bh, gh, dh, l, mh, n, r
• Group 5: ll, mm, nn, rr
• Group 6: s

These groups rhyme (I think) if the vowel after them is the same, or if there is no vowel.

These are for Irish, of course, and do not take account of the extra letters in English: j, k, q, v, w, x, y and z. For purposes of writing in English, I’m assigning j to Group 1 (an English j sounds like an Irish d at the beginning of many words, and very few words in English end with j anyway). K and q can go in Group 2; v and w in Group 4, and x and z can join s in Group 6. Y is a vowel for this purpose.

Once I actually hammer together something that fits this form, I’ll post it – the stresses and rhyme groups make it somewhat challenging. I might also try to make sure that the lines actually rhyme; I think the verses will seem very odd if they don’t.

UPDATE: An actual deibhidhe, correct in the technical sense.