Choriamb
Quick answer: A choriamb is a four syllable metrical foot: stressed, two unstressed, stressed, DUM-da-da-DUM. Learn how this classical unit shapes English lines.
A choriamb is a metrical foot of four syllables arranged stress, unstress, unstress, stress: DUM-da-da-DUM, as in the phrases OUT of the DARK, HARD as a STONE or LOST in the CROWD. The name fuses choree, an old word for trochee, with iamb, and that is literally what it is: a trochee bolted to an iamb, falling then rising, so the foot begins and ends on a blow with a light dip between.
In ancient Greek lyric the choriamb was a cornerstone: Sappho and Alcaeus built famous stanza shapes around it, and choriambic runs powered choral song. English poets inherited it mainly as an opening gesture, the most elegant way to vary an iambic line, and as the engine of deliberate classical imitations. Its shape is so satisfying that everyday English idiom produces it constantly.
How It Works
The choriamb frames two light syllables with two strong ones, giving a swing out and back, like a door pushed open and caught. Set a few in sequence, in a line invented here: DOWN by the SHORE, SALT on the WIND, GULLS in the GREY. Each unit lands, lifts, and lands again, and the line moves in braced arcs rather than a steady pulse.
Inside iambic verse the choriamb has a famous disguise. When a poet opens an iambic line with a trochaic substitution, the first four syllables, DUM-da-da-DUM, form a choriamb before the meter settles. Some metrists prefer to describe such openings as choriambic rather than as trochee plus iamb; both descriptions map the same sound.
Where You Will See It
The Sapphic stanza, imitated in English by poets from Sidney to Swinburne and beyond, carries a choriamb at the heart of each line. Swinburne wrote a poem titled 'Choriambics' to show the rhythm off at length, and Horace's odes, much translated into English, lean on choriambic frames. Closer to home, scan the openings of iambic pentameter poems you love and count how many first lines begin DUM-da-da-DUM; the figure is startling once you start looking, because the shape gives a line an arresting start without breaking its contract.
How to Use It in Your Own Poems
The easiest use is the classic one: open an otherwise iambic line with a choriamb to seize attention, then let the iambs resume. For whole poems, try short lines of one or two choriambs each, which produce a chiselled, epigraphic sound well suited to inscriptions, epitaphs and addresses to the reader. The foot rewards strong monosyllables at its ends and genuinely light syllables in its middle; if the middle pair takes weight, the arc collapses into lumps.
What poets can take from this
- Open iambic lines with a choriamb when you want an arresting first beat.
- Anchor both ends of the foot on strong monosyllables or stressed roots.
- Keep the two middle syllables genuinely light, or the swing disappears.
- Try two choriamb lines for epitaphs and mottoes; the shape sounds carved.
- Listen for natural choriambs in idiom, such as time and again or head over heels.
Try it yourself
Write a poem of eight short lines, each exactly one choriamb, DUM-da-da-DUM, describing a coastline feature by feature, then read it aloud and feel the waves in the meter.
Questions
What is the difference between a choriamb and an antispast?
They are mirror arrangements. A choriamb runs stress, unstress, unstress, stress, a trochee then an iamb. An antispast reverses the halves: iamb then trochee, da-DUM-DUM-da. The choriamb is far more common in both classical and English practice.
Is a trochee plus an iamb the same as a choriamb?
Rhythmically yes: DUM-da followed by da-DUM produces DUM-da-da-DUM. Whether you count one four syllable foot or two feet of two is a choice of descriptive convenience, and metrists genuinely differ.
Where does the choriamb come from?
From ancient Greek lyric, where it structured Sapphic and other song stanzas. English poets imported it through classical imitation and through the natural habit of opening iambic lines with a trochaic substitution.
By the Writory editorial team, reviewed by working poets. Updated July 2026.
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