Get EDSITEment The Bob and Wheel

As an interruption of the usual rhythm, the bob and wheel has been compared to a cadenza in music. It is a way of adding recurring, abrupt and forceful variety to a song or verse for a short passage. It is notably used by the poet known as the Pearl Poet in the ballad Sir Gawain and the Green Knight.

This essay takes up the case of the “bob and wheel,” a rhyming flourish best known from Sir Gawain and the Green Knight and Chaucer's Tale of Sir Thopas. This form, which has no given name or firmly set shape in the manuscripts in which it is found, was codified by the philologist Edwin Guest in 1838.

The bob-and-wheel is a structural device common in the Pearl Poet's poetry. The example below comes from the first stanza of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. The bob appears in red, and the wheel appears in blue. Alliterative components are in bold print, and rhyming components are in italic print.

The “bob” is the first line in the group and is shorter than the rest; the “wheel” is the quatrain that follows.

The bob-and-wheel is a structural device common in the Pearl Poet's poetry. The example below comes from the first stanza of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. The bob appears in red, and the wheel appears in blue. Alliterative components are in bold print, and rhyming components are in italic print.

This essay takes up the case of the “bob and wheel,” a rhyming flourish best known from Sir Gawain and the Green Knight and Chaucer's Tale of Sir Thopas. This form, which has no given name or firmly set shape in the manuscripts in which it is found, was codified by the philologist Edwin Guest in 1838.

A striking example of alliteration in the text, the initial “S” sound is repeated in eight words in the sentence: “spurred,” “steed,” “spurs,” “sprang,” “so,” “swiftly,” “stone,” and “struck.” The rapid, repetitive alliteration drives the sentence, suggesting Gawain's great speed in departing.

quatrain, a piece of verse complete in four rhymed lines. The word is derived from the French quatre, meaning “four.” This form has always been popular for use in the composition of epigrams and may be considered as a modification of the Greek or Latin epigram.