u; f. [Germ. weise; Dan. vise], a strophe, stanza; kveða vísu, Nj. 12; hann orti kvæði ok eru þessar vísur í, Fms. v. 108; vísu lengd, the length of a stanza, Edda (Ht.) i. 606, 656: referring to the repetition of verses as a means of measuring time (minutes), Fs. (Vd. ch. 26); lausa-vísa, a ditty; níð-vísa, söng-visa; höldar danza harla snart, þá heyrist vísan min, a ditty: as the names of shorter poems, as, Nesja-vísur, Austrfarar-vísur, by Sighvat; Vísna-bók, a book of lays. Unlike the old Greek epics, as well as the poems of the Saxon Beowulf, all ancient Northern poetry is in strophic lays. Four sets of alliteration make a verse (vísa), two a half strophe, vísu-helmingr, Edda (Ht.) i. 610, or half vísa, Grág. ii. 148; one set a quarter of a vísa (vísu-fjórðungr); each alliterative set being again divided into two halves, called vísu-orð, a word or sentence, Edda (Ht.) i. 596, cp. Hallfr. S. ch. 6 (Fs. 96, 97); thus ‘fastorðr skyli fyrða | fengsæll vera þengill’ is an alliterative set. ☞ The vellums give verses in unbroken lines, but in modern print each alliterative set is divided into two lines: this may do for metres of the drótt-kvæð kind, with two rhyming syllables in each vísu-orð; but in the brief kviðu-háttr (the metre of the Vsp.) each alliterative set should, for the sake of the flow of the verse, be printed in one line, thus, Hljóðs bið ek allar helgar kindir | meiri ok minni mögu Heimdalar; for a pause only follows between each pair of sets, but none between the sub-staves and the head-stave. This plan is that advocated by Jacob Grimm: the other, commonly followed in the Editions, chops the verse into—hljóðs bið ek allar | helgar kindir | meiri ok minni | mögu Heimdalar.