dactyl

• dactyle, dactile

Learned borrowing from Latin dactylus, from Ancient Greek δάκτυλος (dáktulos, “finger”), three bones of the finger corresponding to three syllables. Doublet of dactylus and date.

• (Received Pronunciation, General American) IPA^(key): /ˈdæktɪl/

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• Hyphenation: dact‧yl

dactyl (plural dactyls)

1. A metrical foot of three syllables (— ⏑ ⏑), one long followed by two short, or one accented followed by two unaccented.
   • 1822 October 15, Quevedo Redivivus [pseudonym; Lord Byron], “The Vision of Judgment”, in The Liberal. Verse and Prose from the South, 2nd edition, volume I, number I, London: […] John Hunt, […], published 1823, →OCLC, stanzas XC–XCI, page 33:

     Now the Bard, glad to get an audience, […] / stuck fast with his first hexameter, / Not one of all whose gouty feet would stir. // But ere the spavin'd dactyls could be spurr'd / Into recitative, in great dismay / Both cherubim and seraphim were heard / To murmur loudly through their long array; […]

   • 1922 February, James Joyce, “[Episode 1: Telemachus]”, in Ulysses, Paris: Shakespeare and Company, […], →OCLC, part I [Telemachia], page 4:

     —My name is absurd too: Malachi Mulligan, two dactyls. But it has a Hellenic ring, hasn't it?

• dactylic
• polydactyl

• anapest
• spondee
• finger