Words & WritingGreek → English
Strophe
/ˈstroʊfi/noun
The first part of a choral ode in Greek drama, or loosely any stanza of a poem.
The Greek roots
στροφή
strophḗ
a turning, twist
Literally: “a turning”
Follow a root:στροφή4 words
The story of the word
The chorus sang the strophe while moving one way across the orchestra and the antistrophe while moving back, so the word records a movement of feet, not of metre. Στρέφειν is to twist or turn, and the same verb gives catastrophe, a down-turn, and apostrophe, a turning aside to address someone who is not there. English poetry now uses strophe as a loose synonym for stanza, which throws away the turn.
- How it travelled
- Ancient Greek → Latin → English
- First recorded
- 17th century
The same roots elsewhere
Other languages reached for exactly the same Greek pieces.
Same family
catastropheapostropheantistropheboustrophedon
In a sentence
Each strophe of the ode is answered by an antistrophe of identical shape.
He read the long strophes slowly, as if walking them.