Sonnet studies

A sonnet is a fixed poetic form with a structure traditionally consisting of fourteen lines adhering to a set rhyming scheme. The term derives from the Italian word sonetto (, from the Latin word sonus, ). Originating in 13th-century Sicily, the sonnet was in time taken up in many European-language areas, mainly to express romantic love at first, although eventually any subject was considered acceptable. Many formal variations were also introduced, including abandonment of the quatorzain limit – and even of rhyme altogether in modern times.

poetry anthology by Petrarch

autobiographical work by Dante Alighieri

Italian poet

community of Sicilian poets

sequence of linked sonnets

line consisting of five iambic feet

In poetry, a hendecasyllable (as an adjective, hendecasyllabic) is a line of eleven syllables. The term may refer to several different poetic meters, the older of which are quantitative and used chiefly in classical (Ancient Greek and Latin) poetry, and the newer of which are syllabic or accentual-syllabic and used in medieval and modern poetry.

sonnet sequence by Philip Sidney

poetic verse form consisting of eight lines

fourteen-line poem with a pattern of rhyming schemes

thumb|The title page from the first edition of Amoretti and Epithalamion, printed by William Ponsonby in 1595.