versification, than the hexameter was to the poetry of Greece and Rome. It has even become the prevailing measure of dramatic poetry. The period of the invention of the redondillas was also nearly that of the dactylic stanzas, called _versos de arte mayor_, because their composition was considered an art of a superior order. They had their origin, according to some authorities, in Galicia and Portugal.[23] This metrical form is, however, found in several of the most ancient Castilian poems. As the inventors of these stanzas were ignorant of the true principles of prosody, the attention paid to purity in the rhythm of the dactyles was even less than in the rhymes of the redondillas. They contented themselves with dealing out eleven or twelve syllables, and left the dactylic measure to accident. This may account for these verses falling into disuse, as the progressive improvement of taste, which allowed the redondillas to maintain their original consideration, was not reconcilable with the half dancing, half hobbling rhymed lines of the _versos de arte mayor_.[24] Besides the above national modes of rhythm and rhyme, common to Castilians, Galicians, and Portuguese, the form of the sonnet was also known in the west of Spain and Portugal long before the imitation of Italian poetry was thought of in those parts of the Peninsula. It had doubtless been acquired through the intervention of Provençal and Limosin poets. But the character of the sonnet was not sufficiently popular for the old Spaniards and Portuguese, and they were never fond of that kind of poetic composition. Not less adverse to the taste of the country was the long protracted alexandrine. Monkish rhymesters, who forced their imitations of latin doggrels on the nation, introduced this kind of verse into the Spanish language, in the thirteenth or perhaps even in the twelfth century, but certainly at a period anterior to its appearance in any other modern tongue. It soon, however, sunk into disesteem, and was neglected. Thus, during the progress of their civilization, the Spaniards and the Portuguese co-operated in cultivating the same spirit and form of poetry. What is, notwithstanding, dissimilar in the polite literature of the two countries, and what is peculiar to each, will, with other subjects, become matter for consideration in the following sheets. HISTORY OF SPANISH LITERATURE. BOOK I. FROM THE END OF THE THIRTEENTH TO THE COMMENCEMENT OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY. PROBABLE PERIOD OF THE FIRST ROMANCES.