Note 425 — Chapter V · THE DIFFERENCING ELEMENTS OF COMMUNAL POETRY

The general testimony for all ballads. For example, Fauriel, Chants Populaires de la Grèce Moderne, I. cxxix; these, he says, are full of commonplaces and recurrent phrases; the diction is “simple, nervous, and direct, that is, it has few figures, almost no inversions, and progresses in short periodic and nearly equal passages.” Remains of oldest Greek folk song show the same traits: Usener, Altgriech. Versbau, p. 45.