noun Prosody.
- a foot of two syllables, a short followed by a long in quantitative meter, or an unstressed followed by a stressed in accentual meter, as in Come live / with me / and be / my love.
noun plural iambs, iambi (aɪˈæmbaɪ) or iambuses prosody
- a metrical foot consisting of two syllables, a short one followed by a long one (◡ –)
- a line of verse of such feet
1842, from French iambe (16c.), from Latin iambus, from Greek iambos (see iambic). Iambus itself was used in English in this sense in 1580s.