psychology. Thus the ode approached the age of revolution
and romanticism with the aura of liberty and enthusiasm about
it, with the result that some of the greatest poetic works of the
nineteenth century were written in the ode form.

The story of the ode begins with Renaissance humanism and
its adoption of the learned Greek word,"ᾠδή," ode, from
"ἀείδειν," to sing, itself not a technical term, to supersede the
more familiar Latin word carmen. Like carmen from canere it
meant no more than song, but in the use of the Renaissance
humanists it meant a song in the antique manner as distin-
guished from one in the medieval tradition. It meant a lyric
poem written in the newly found classical tradition, under the
influence of Horace, later of Pindar, and finally of Anacreon.
Thus the humanists invented a new poetic genre, a poem cele-
brating contemporary experience in the ancient taste. The ode,
then, became a poem of greater dignity than the canzone or
chanson. At the same time it was trimmer in shape. In place of
the long, sprawling strophes of the medieval poets there were
the brief, agile stanzas that the ancients had used which were
found to be well adapted to the quickening pace of mind
and emotion. The ode was concentrated and packed with
allusion to all branches of human experience. It was the poem
that glorified man, his experience, and his works. It was learned,
formal, and public, rather than private or personal. With its
constant allusion in metre and turn of phrase to the glorious
past which was now set up as the classic or norm, the ode
became a completely new type of poem.

The ode invented by the humanists was adopted by vernacu-
lar poets when the necessity for writing in the language of the
people again made itself felt. The vernacular ode was naturally
several removes farther from the classical models; there were
always strong native traditions to contend with and quite
different demands of rhythm and expression. Thus the ancient
poems and their neolatin progeny served more as sources of
inspiration, as pointers to a new way to be found, rather than
as patterns to be copied by Renaissance Italian, French, and
English poets. This accounts for the great vitality and variety
of the vernacular ode. The new genre, with its new form, its
new outlook on life, its new themes, and its new attitudes
towards them, was able to liberate French and Italian poets from

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