caesura (redirected from caesurae)

cae·su·ra also ce·su·ra  (s-zhr, -zr)

n. pl. cae·su·ras also ce·su·ras or cae·su·rae also ce·su·rae (-zhr, -zr)

1. A pause in a line of verse dictated by sense or natural speech rhythm rather than by metrics.

2. A pause or interruption, as in conversation: After another weighty caesura the senator resumed speaking.

3. In Latin and Greek prosody, a break in a line caused by the ending of a word within a foot, especially when this coincides with a sense division.

4. Music A pause or breathing at a point of rhythmic division in a melody.

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[Latin caesra, a cutting, from caesus, past participle of caedere, to cut off; see ka-id- in Indo-European roots.]

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cae·sural, cae·suric adj.

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caesura [siz-your-ra, -ree]

Noun

pl -ras or -rae a pause in a line of verse [Latin: a cutting]

Thesaurus

Noun	1.	caesura - a pause or interruption (as in a conversation); "after an ominous caesura the preacher continued" pause, suspension, intermission, interruption, break - a time interval during which there is a temporary cessation of something
	2.	caesura - a break or pause (usually for sense) in the middle of a verse line prosody, inflection - the patterns of stress and intonation in a language