Editing Alliterative verse (section)

==== Rules for alliteration ====
In the Middle-English 'a'-verse, the two main stresses alliterate with one another and with the first stressed syllable in the 'b'-verse. There are thus a minimum of three alliterations in the Middle English long line,<ref name="Cable"/> a fact that is implicitly recognized by the comment made by the parson in the [[Parson's Prologue]] in the [[The Canterbury Tales|Canterbury Tales]] that he did not know how to "rum, ram, ruf, by letter".<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Sutherland |first1=A. |title=Review: Alliterative Revivals |journal=The Review of English Studies |date=November 2004 |volume=55 |issue=222 |pages=787–788 |doi=10.1093/res/55.222.787 }}</ref> In the 'a'-verse, additional, secondary stresses can also alliterate, as seen in the line quoted above from [[Piers Plowman]] ('a fair field full of folk', with four alliterations in the 'a'-verse), or in ''[[Sir Gawain and the Green Knight|Sir Gawain]]'' l.2, "the borgh brittened and brent" with three alliterations in the 'a'-verse). Only the first stress in the 'b'-verse normally alliterates,in line with the general Germanic rule that the last stress in the line does not alliterate. However, in Middle English alliterative poems, the final stress occasionally alliterates with other strong stresses in the line (as in the first line of [[Piers Plowman]]: "In a somer seson, whan softe was þe sonne,").<ref name="Duggan 1977 223–247"/>