CHRIS GOLSTON and TOMAS RIAD and having trouble understanding it, particularly the discussion of stress clash. In the middle of the paper, pages 32ff in the pdf, pages 130ff in the journal, there is a discussion of stress clash in Dactylic hexameter. My basic problem with this is I don't understand how stress works with meter in Ancient Greek. Could someone give a very simple example of a stress clash in Dactylic hexameter and explain it in plain English?
We show that some Greek meters are rhythmic while others are not.
Specifically, Greek anapestic meter is rhythmic because it manifests a
perfect succession of trochaically grouped moras. This means that meters
that are not anapestic must be arrhythmic one way or another. We show
that dactylic meter is marked by constant stress clash and that iambic
meter is marked by constant stress lapse; these meters, then, are rhythmically
marked, not rhythmically perfect like the anapest.
One rhythmic regularity stands out very clearly: EVERY VERSE FOOT CONTAINS
A STRESS CLASH. This is the clearest surface difference between dactylic and
anapestic meter. While anapests lack a specific and predictable rhythm,
dactyls have a stable, recurring, ARRHYTHMIC property. Stress clash occurs
in every verse foot, six times per line in every one of the 28,000-some lines
of the Iliad and Odyssey. This simple observation belies the arrhythmic
nature of dactylic hexameter.Relentless stress clash follows necessarily from
the nature of the meter (HLL or HH) and the phonological foot of the
language (the moraic trochee). This could not have escaped the Greek ear,
and we therefore propose that stress clash is not an unintended byproduct
of the meter but its defining rhythmic characteristic.