common meter

English

Alternative forms

  • common metre

Noun

common meter (uncountable)

  1. (hymnody) A hymn metre characterized by a quatrain of alternating lines of iambic tetrameter and iambic trimeter.
    The hymn “Amazing Grace” is in common meter.
    • 2008 January 13, Ben Ratliff, “Easy Slogans, Twinkly Funk and One Busy String”, in New York Times[1]:
      The English band Crass sounded like a bag of rocks: scrabbly drum rolls, clanky guitars, no bass end, the words a jabbery Cockney caterwaul through endless stanzas of common meter.

Synonyms

  • common measure

See also