| See under alliteration (def. 1). |
[uh-lit-uh-rey-shuh
n] 
| 1. | the commencement of two or more stressed syllables of a word group either with the same consonant sound or sound group (consonantal alliteration), as in from stem to stern, or with a vowel sound that may differ from syllable to syllable (vocalic alliteration), as in each to all. Compare consonance (def. 4a). |
| 2. | the commencement of two or more words of a word group with the same letter, as in apt alliteration's artful aid. |
The repetition of the beginning sounds of words, as in “Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers,” “long-lived,” “short shrift,” and “the fickle finger of fate.”