The measure or beat of movement, as in dancing or marching.
A falling inflection of the voice, as at the end of a sentence.
General inflection or modulation of the voice.
Music A progression of chords moving to a harmonic close, point of rest, or sense of resolution.
[Middle English, from Old French *cadence, from Old Italian cadenza, from Vulgar Latin *cadentia, a falling, from Latin cadēns, cadent-, present participle of cadere, to fall; see kad- in Indo-European roots.]
c.1384, "flow of rhythm in verse or music," from M.Fr. cadence, O.It. cadenza "conclusion of a movement in music," lit. "a falling," from V.L. *cadentia, from L. cadens prp. of cadere "to fall" (see case (1)). In 16c., sometimes used literally for "an act of falling." The It. form cadenza was borrowed 1836 as a musical term for "ornamental passage near the close of a song or solo."
Ac"ci*dent\, n. [F. accident, fr. L. accidens, -dentis, p. pr. of accidere to happen; ad + cadere to fall. See Cadence, Case.]1. Literally, a befalling; an event that takes place without one's foresight or expectation; an undesigned, sudden, and unexpected event; chance; contingency; often, an undesigned and unforeseen occurrence of an afflictive or unfortunate character; a casualty; a mishap; as, to die by an accident. Of moving accidents by flood and field. --Shak. Thou cam'st not to thy place by accident: It is the very place God meant for thee. --Trench. 2. (Gram.) A property attached to a word, but not essential to it, as gender, number, case. 3. (Her.) A point or mark which may be retained or omitted in a coat of arms. 4. (Log.) (a) A property or quality of a thing which is not essential to it, as whiteness in paper; an attribute. (b) A quality or attribute in distinction from the substance, as sweetness, softness. 5. Any accidental property, fact, or relation; an accidental or nonessential; as, beauty is an accident. This accident, as I call it, of Athens being situated some miles from the sea. --J. P. Mahaffy. 6. Unusual appearance or effect. [Obs.] --Chaucer. Note: Accident, in Law, is equivalent to casus, or such unforeseen, extraordinary, extraneous interference as is out of the range of ordinary calculation.
Ca"dence\, n. [OE. cadence, cadens, LL. cadentia a falling, fr. L. cadere to fall; cf. F. cadence, It. cadenza. See Chance.]1. The act or state of declining or sinking. [Obs.] Now was the sun in western cadence low. --Milton. 2. A fall of the voice in reading or speaking, especially at the end of a sentence. 3. A rhythmical modulation of the voice or of any sound; as, music of bells in cadence sweet. Blustering winds, which all night long Had roused the sea, now with hoarse cadence lull Seafaring men o'erwatched. --Milton. The accents . . . were in passion's tenderest cadence. --Sir W. Scott. 4. Rhythmical flow of language, in prose or verse. Golden cadence of poesy. --Shak. If in any composition much attention was paid to the flow of the rhythm, it was said (at least in the 14th and 15th centuries) to be "prosed in faire cadence." --Dr. Guest. 5. (Her.) See Cadency. 6. (Man.) Harmony and proportion in motions, as of a well-managed horse. 7. (Mil.) A uniform time and place in marching. 8. (Mus.) (a) The close or fall of a strain; the point of rest, commonly reached by the immediate succession of the tonic to the dominant chord. (b) A cadenza, or closing embellishment; a pause before the end of a strain, which the performer may fill with a flight of fancy. Imperfect cadence. (Mus.) See under Imperfect.
![[P]](http://cache.lexico.com/g/d/premium_mh.gif){kind=small}
Audio Help [keyd-ns] Pronunciation Key noun, verb, -denced, -denc·ing. 
