Telestich¶
telestich · letter · validated
A text whose final letters, read down the lines, spell out a target word or phrase.
Provenance¶
- Source: George Puttenham, The Arte of English Poesie (1589)
- Attribution:
traditional— classical or folk; no single origin to name - Checkability:
self— decidable from the text and its parameters alone - Attested:
codified— formulated as a rule by a tradition rather than declared by an author
Details¶
- Kind: restrictive
- Languages: en, de
- Requires:
tokens,fold_diacritics - Deterministic: yes
- Also known as: telestic
- In other languages: Telestichon (de), Télestiche (fr)
Prompt hint¶
Write a poem whose lines end with the letters of the target word, in order.
Parameters¶
| Name | Type | Default | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
fold_diacritics |
boolean | True |
Treat accented letters as their base letter, and ß as ss. |
target |
string | — |
The word or phrase the unit letters must spell. |
unit |
string | line |
What carries a letter. |
Examples¶
final-letters-spell-aon¶
en — this text satisfies the procedure.
beta
zero
omen
Parameters: target='aon'
Source: constructed example; the form is described in Puttenham (1589)
wrong-finals¶
en — this text does not satisfy the procedure.
beta
zero
Parameters: target='ab'
Source: constructed counterexample
ast¶
de — this text satisfies the procedure.
Es war einmal da
Der Wind war leis
Nun ist es Nacht
Parameters: target='ast'
Source: constructed example; the form is described in Puttenham (1589)
falsche-endbuchstaben¶
de — this text does not satisfy the procedure.
Es war einmal da
Der Wind war kalt
Parameters: target='as'
Source: constructed counterexample