Trochee

In phonology and in poetics, an trochee is a prosodic foot consisting of a strong syllable followed by a weak syllable.

Term properties

• Pronunciation: /ˈtɹoʊki/
• Adjectival form: trochaic

Comments

In metrical phonology and prosodic phonology, the strong-weak pattern of a trochee is often contrasted with the weak-strong pattern of an iamb.

Polysemy

In some typologies of foot structure, a trochee is any foot consisting of up to two units (which may or may not be syllables) where the first unit is the head. In this classification, the subtypes of trochee are:

• syllabic trochee, where the two units are necessarily syllables (the definition above).
• moraic trochee, where the two units are moras, which may belong to the same or to different syllables.