Development of Diphthongs

§ 378. One of the roost important sound changes of the Early ME period was the loss of OE diph­thongs and the growth of new diphthongs, with new qualitative and quantitative distinctions.

OE possessed a well de­veloped system of diph­thongs: falling diphthongs with a closer nucleus and more open glide arranged in two symmetrical sets — long and short: [ea:, eo:, ieuand [ea, eo, ie] (see § 133). Towards the end of the OE period some of the diphthongs merged with monophthongs: all diph­thongs were monophthon­gised before [xt, x't] and after fsk'J; the diphthongs [ie:, ie] in Late WS fused with ly:, y] or ti:, i]. Their further development does not differ from the development of corresponding monophthongs.

§ 379. In Early ME the remaining diphthongs were also contracted to monophthongs: the long [ea: ] coalesced with the reflex of OE [ae: 1 — ME [c: J; the short [ea] ceased to be distinguished from OE [se] and became la) in ME, the diphthongs [eo:, eo] — as well as their dialectal variants [io:. io] —fell together with the monophthongs [e:, e, i:, i]. Later they shared in the development of respective monophthongs. The changes of OE diphthongs are shown in Table 2 together with the changes of corresponding monophthongs.

§ 380. As a result of these changes the vowel system lost two sets of diphthongs, long and short. In the meantime a new set of diphthongs developed from some sequences of vowels and consonants due to the vocalisation of OE [j ] and ly], that is to their change into vowels.

Development of Old English [a] in Middle English dialects

In Early ME the sounds [j i and (y i between and after vowels changed into [i 1 and [u 1 and formed diphthongs together with the preceding vowels, e.g. OE dasз> МЕ day [dail. These changes gave rise to two sets of diphthongs: with i-glides and u-glides. The same types of diph­thongs appeared also from other sources: the glide -u developed from OE [w] as in OE maw, which became ME snow [snou], and before [x! and [1] as in Late ME smaul (alongside smal) and taughte (NE small, taught). In the two latter cases the consonants were not vocalised and the glide arose between the back consonant and the pre­ceding vowel. See more examples in Table 3. (If the preceding vowels were [i 1 or [u ] the results of the vocalisation were long monophthongs^

_eg OE я*зол> МЕ пупе 1ш: п(э) I, OE fa$ol> №E fowl (fu: l I {NE

In addition to the diphthongs which developed from native sources, similar diphthongs — with i* and u-glides — are found in some ME loan-words, e.g. foil in ME boy, joy, Taul in ME pause, cause I'pauzs, 'kauzal. {The diphthong [au] occurred also in French borrowings be­fore a nasal, in imitation of Anglo-Norman pronunciation, e.g. ME straunge.)

§381. The formation of new diphthongs in ME was an important event in the history of the language. By that time the OE diphthongs had been contracted into monophthongs; the newly formed ME diph­thongs differed from the OE in structure: they had an open nucleus and a closer glide; they were arranged in a system consisting of two sets (with i-glirtes and и-glides) but were not contrasted through quantity as long to short.

System of Vowels In Late) Middle English

§ 382- To sum up the results of Early ME vowel changes the system of vowels in Late ME is given in Table 4.

As seen from the table, the system of vowels in Late ME was no longer symmetrical. The OE balance of long and short vowels had been disrupted and was never restored again. Correlation through quantity can no more be regarded as the basis of phonemic oppositions in the vowel system. Moreover, the very character of quantitative differences between the vowels is believed to have been considerably altered. Some phoneticians define the new differences between the former long and short vowels as " lax" versus " tense", others interpret their correlations as oppositions of " contact", in which the short vowels are " checked" and the long vowels are " free". (In these new relationships the long vowels constituted the " unmarked member" of the opposition, which favoured the growth of new " free" members — long monophthongs and diphthongs (V. Plotkin).

The Great Vowel Shift

§ 383. Early NE witnessed the greatest event in the history of Eng­lish vowels — the Great Vowel Shift, — which involved the change of all ME long monophthongs, and probably some of the diphthongs.

The Great Vowel Shift is the name given to a series of changes of long vowels between the Hth and the 16th c. During this period all the long vowels became closer or were diphthongised. The changes can be defined _as " independent", as they were not caused by any apparent phonetic conditions in the syllable or in the word, but affected regularly every stressed long vowel in any position.

The changes included in the Great Vowel Shift are shown in Table 5 with some intermediate stages and examples. (It seems reasonable to add to this list the development of the ME diphthong laul which was narrowed and contracted to Io: ] during the same period, though it is not usually included in the Shift.)

Table 5

The Great Vowel Shift

As seen from the table all the vowels became closer and some ol the vowels occupied the place of the next vowel in the column: thus le: ]> [i; l, while the more open [s: ] took the place of [e: ], and later moved one step further in the same direction and merged with the former [e: 1 in [i: ]. Likewise, the long [o: ] was shifted one step, to become Iu: l, while ME [u: ] changed to fau). Some long vowels — fu: J, Ei: ] and [a: ] — broke into diphthongs, the first element being contrasted to the second as a more open sound: (aul, [ai] and [ei], respectively, § 384. It must be noted that some of the diphthongs which arose during the Great Vowel Shift could also appear from other sources. The diphthong {oul was preserved from ME without modification; tei] could descend from ME lei] and {ail which had merged into one diphthong. Those were the diphthongs with i- and -u glides going back to Early ME vowel and consonant changes (see § 380 for explanation and examples).

§ 385. The following graphic presentation of the Great Vowel Shift shows the consistent character of the changes; it includes also the ME diphthongs [ou, ei, ai] as additional sources of the diphthongs which developed in the Shift.

Note: repetition ol the symbols {[e: ], [i: ] and others) means that the sound which altered in the Shift was not the one that resulted from it: arrows indicate discrete steps and not a continuous process (except in the case of |e: e: i: ]]. t ai, c i

It should be obvious from the chart and the table that the Great Vowel Shift did not add any new sounds to the vowel system; in fact, every vowel which developed under the Shift can be found in Late ME' •(see the table in § 382). And nevertheless the Great Vowel Shift was the most profound and comprehensive change in the history of English vowels: every long vowel, as well as some diphthongs, were " shifted", and the pronunciation of all the words with these sounds was altered.

§ 386. It is important to note that the Great Vowel Shift (unlike most of the earlier phonetic changes) was not followed by any regular spelling changes: as seen from the examples the modification in the pro­nunciation of words was not reflected in their written forms. (The few graphic replacements made in the 16th c. failed to reflect the changes: the digraphs ie, ее, and the single e were kept for the close [e: ], while the digraph ea was introduced to show the more open le: 1 as in steal-, the further merging oft le: 1 and [e: 1 in [i: ] made the graphic distinction unnecessary — cf. NE steal, steel. A similar distinction between the close lo: ], shown as oo, and the more open b: ], shown as oa since the 16th c. proved to be more useful, as these digraphs indicate different sounds (although the gap between the spelling and the pronunciation is greater than it was: oo stands for [u: j while oa stands for [ou], cf. NE room, roam.)

During the shift even the names of some English letters were changed, for they contained long vowels. Cf. the names of some pnglish letters before and after the shift:

ME: A la: ], E Ie: 1, О lo: 1, / [i: l, В Ibe: 1, К [ka: } NE: A let 1, E [i; ], 0 loul, / tail, В Ibi: 1, К [кет]. (By comparing the names of Mod E letters А, О, E, and I with the familiar Latin names of the same letters one can easily form an idea of the shift (only three more changes [u: ]> (au; ], [о: ]> [u: 1 and [aul> 1 have to be added). It is also easy to deduce the changes from com­paring the written and spoken forms of many modern words, e.g. time ['ti: ma] becomes [taim], make ['та: кэ! becomes [meik].)

Some Interpretations of the Great Vowel Shift

§ Зв7. The Great Vowel Shift has attracted the attention of many linguists (K. Luick. O. Jespersen, F. Mosse, A. Martinet, B. Trnka, V. Plotkin and others).

There are certainly many remarkable aspects in the shift. As we have seen it left no long vowel unaltered. All the vowels were changed in a single direction. The changes formed a sort of series or chain, as many vowels took the place of the adjoining closer vowels. The distances between the vowels were on the whole carefully preserved, the only exception being the merging of [rj and [e: | into (i: } In the 18th c.

The changes have been interpreted as starting at one end of each set of vow­els—front and back, —the initial change stimulating the movement of the other sounds. If the changes started at the more open vowels, [a: ] and [o: |, every step " pushed" the adjoining vowel away to avoid coincidence, so that finally the closest vowels, which could not possibly become narrower were " pushed" out of the set of monophthongs into diphthongs: [i: ] > [ai) and [u: ] > Jau}. This interpretation of the shift is known as the " push-chain" (K. Luick).

The opposite view is held by the exponents of the theory of " drag-chain" (O. Jespersen); according to this theory the changes started at the two closest vow­els, [i: j and [u: j; these close vowels became diphthongs, " dragging" after them­selves their neighbours, [e: j and [o: j, which occupied the vacant positions; every vowel made one step in this direction, except [e: ] which made two: [e: ] became (e: ] and then [i: j.

§ 388. It springs to the eye that all these changes went on in conformity with the general tendency of long vowels to become closer and to diphthongise, which was determined by their physical properties: the relatively high pitch and tension. This tendency, as well as the necessity of filling all empty boxes in the vowel system, may account for the general direction of the shift and for the unin­terrupted chain of changes. However, it fails to explain why at that particular period of history — Early NE — the changes became particularly intensive, and what was the initial impetus that started the process.

In some recently advanced theories the beginning of the Great Vowel Shift is tied up with some properties of the ME phonological system. As was shown in the preceding paragraphs the Early ME redistribution of vowel quantity according to position restricted the use of vowel quantity as a phonological distinctive fea­ture, differentiating between morphemes and words. It has been suggested that the Great Vowel Shift was an aftereffect of these restrictions: it introduced new qual­itative differences between vowels formerly distinguished through length alone. Thus the short [э] and the long (э:). which, prior to the shift, differed mainly in quantity, began to be contrasted primarily through quality, as [j| and {ou]. Simi­larly the difference between [aj and [a:) was emphasised when [a: ] was narrowed and was followed by a diphthongal giide.

Cf. ME fat [a] and fate [a: ] which became [faet] and (feitl rod (aj and rood [э) which became [rodj and (rouaj.

The new qualitative differences between the vowel phonemes In a way made up for the loss of differences in quantity which had been largely de-phonologised.

Proceeding from these general considerations some authors point out the more immediate causes of the shift within or outside the phonological system. It has been suggested (A. Martinet, B. Trnka) that the Great Vowel Shift began as early as the 12th or 13th c., when two short vowels |i| and [u] became more open and began to be contrasted to the Jong [e: J and {o: J, thus leaving their former counterparts Ji: l and [u: ] isolated in the system of phonemes. The isolation of li: ] and [u: j in the otherwise balanced system of correlated pairs may have stimulated their modi­fication into diphthongs, — which was the initial impetus that started the shift. The drawback of this theory is the assumption that every system of phonemes in the anguage must be absolutely symmetrical.)

S 389. Another theory attributes the intensification of changes in Late ME not only to phonological but also to morphological factors (V. Plotkin), The shift may have been stimulated by the loss of the final (э] in the 15th c., which trans­formed disyllabic words into monosyllables. The difference between such monosyl- labic words as ME fat {latl and fate [4a: ta, 'fa: t) or ME bit and bite [bit, 'bi: ta, bi: tl was not sufficient. The Great Vowel Shift emphasised this difference by changing the quality of the long vowels and by adding new distinctive features in order to maintain the essential contrasts.

§ 390. It must be concluded that the problem of the Great Vowel Shift remains unresolved. If we take into account not only the development of vowels in Standard English, but also the vowel changes -in the local British dialects, it will appear that the consistency ol the changes has been somewhat exaggerated. In many dialects some vowels were not subjected to the Great Vowel Shift or were modi­fied differently. Since the system of Standard English has absorbed various dialec­tal features at all levels, we may surmise that the Great Vowel Shift, which chronologically coincides with the formation of the nation-wide Standard, was to a certain extent merely a final choice from dialectal variants in pronunciation accepted in literary English and recognised as correct by grammarians and phone, ticians. This choice was conditioned not only by intralinguistic systemic factors but also by the linguistic situation, especially the relationship between the co­existing varieties of the language, which they represented.

Changes of Short Vowels in Early New English

§391. As compared to the Great Vowel Shift other vowel changes of the NE period seem few and insignificant. Yet, like all the sound changes of that time, they account for the modern system of vowels and clarify certain points in modern spelling.

The short vowels in Early NE were on the whole more stable than the long vowels: only two short vowels out of five underwent certain alterations: (a) and lul.

§ 392. ME ta} is reflected as [ae] in NE, e.g. ME that [Oat)> NE thai; ME man [man]> NE man. It has been suggested, however, that in ME the sound [ж 1 existed as well; it was an allophone, or variant of la]; both allophones [al and [ae] were indicated by the letter a'in ME. In that case the development of ME la] in Early NE was merely a replacement of one dominant allophone by another, and the difference between ME man and NE man was very slight (see Note 2 to §377).

The more obvious change of the ME [a] came about when it was preceded by the semivowel lw}; probably under the influence of this labialised sound the vowel developed an allophone which finally merged with the phoneme b]:

OE шагзоМЕ was (wasfc> NE was OE wxter> ME water ['waterl> NE water

§ 393. The other change in the set of short vowels was a case of de- labialisation: ME short [u] lost its labial character and became Ы, except in some dialectal forms or when preceded by some labials, e.g.

me hut [hutb> NE hut, ME cotnen ['kuman]> NE come, but ME put ten i'putan]> NE put-, ME pulten ['pubn]> NE pull.

This development may have been tied up with the loss o! ME [a] described above, as the new Ц] in a way filled the position of ME [a], which had shifted to 1зе]. The variant spellings of the vowel [л], as in NE son and sun were explained in § 359.

Growth of Long Monophthongs and Diphthongs in Early _LNew English due to Vocalisation of Consonants

§ 394. The history of English vowels would be incomplete if we did not mention the development of new long monophthongs and diphthongs, resulting from the vocalisation of some consonants, though these changes pertain to the history of consonants no less than to that of vowels. We may recall that vocalisation of some fricative consonants led to the appearance of long monophthongs and of new diphthongs — with i- and «-glides during the Early ME period (see §380). Similar processes continued in later ages.

§395. Two voiceless fricatives, [x| and Ix'li were vocalised to­wards the end of the ME period. The glide lu] had probably developed before the velar consonant [x] even before its vocalisation; it is regu­larly shown in ME spellings, e.g. ME taughte, braughte ['tauxta, ['braux- td]. Later [au] was contracted to b: ] in accordance with regular vowel changes (see § 383), and lx ] was lost, which transformed the words into NE taught, brought.

The palatal fricative [x'l changed to [j] some time during the 15th c.; it changed into the vowel [i] and together with the preceding [i ] yielded a long monophthong [i: ], which participated in the Great Vow­el Shift. " Thus, words like night, since the age of Chaucer have passed through the following stages: [nix'tl> [nijt]> {ni: t]> [nait].

§ 396. The most important instance of vocalisation is the develop­ment of [r], which accounts for the appearance of many new long mon­ophthongs and diphthongs.

The sonorant [r] began to produce a certain influence upon the preceding vowels in Late ME, long before it showed any signs of vo­calisation. Ir] made the preceding vowel more open and retracted: the cluster [er] changed to Ear], e.g. OE deorc became Early ME derk [derk] due to the contraction of the OE diphthong [eol to [e], and changed to dark [dark] in Late ME (NE dark); likewise OE clerec, which after the loss of the unstressed vowel became ME clerk [klerk], changed to Iklark] (NE clerk); OE heorte developed into ME herle I'hertaJ, and Late ME [hart) (NE heart). The three examples are also interesting > n that they show different reflections of one and the same change in the written form of the word: in dark the change of [er ] to [arj was shown in the spelling; in clerk the spelling points to the preceding stage, when the sequence sounded as (er 1; the spelling of heart seems to bear traces of both stages or perhaps shows another attempt to record the transition of [el into [a] with the help of the digraph ea. Although the change of [er] to far] was fairly common, it did not affect all the words with the given sounds: cf. ME serven I'servan], person ['persanl.

§ 397. The vocalisation ol [r] took place in the 16th or 17th c. i_n ME [r ] was a rolled or trilled sound more like the Russian [r] than its Mod E descendant. The modification of [r] in the early 17th c. was noticed and commented upon by the contemporaries: Ben Jonson re­marked that Irl began to sound " firm in the beginning of words and more liquid in the middle and ends". The new variants of pronunciation gradually displaced the older ones.

In Early NE Irl was vocalised when it stood after vowels, either finally or followed by another consonant. Losing its consonantal charac­ter fr 3 changed into the neutral sound bJ, which was added to the preceding vowel as a glide thus forming a diphthong; e.g. ME there ['0c: rel> NE there. Sometimes the only trace left by the loss of Гг 1 wes the compensatory lengthening of the preceding vowel, e.g. ME arm farm J> NE arm, ME for 1Ъг]> [Ьэ]> [Ь: ] (NE for). If [r] stood in the final unstressed syllable after [э], the vocalisation of Irl to b) resulted in the survival of the ending, e.g. ME rider(e) ['гЫэгэ ]> I'ri: dart> NE rider. If the neutral [э] produced by the vocalisation of frl was preceded by a diphthong, it was added to the diphthong to form a sequence of sounds named " triphthong", e.g. ME shour Ци: г J, NE shower 1'£ аиэ). ([r] was not vocalised when doubled after consonants and initially, NE errand, dry, read.)

The formation of monophthongs, diphthongs and triphthongs in the course of the vocalisation of [r] was a very complicated process, for r_r] could occur practically after any vowel, and in the meantime the vowels underwent different alterations. The influence of fr] could sometimes slow down or prevent the changes of long vowels under the Great Vowel Shift, for (r 1 tended to make the vowel more open, while the shift made it closer; sometimes the vowel changed into the nucleus of a diphthong with the э-glide from fr] at an intermediate stage of the shift. Various results of the changes are exemplified in Table 6.

§ 398. It is apparent that the vocalisation of IH had a profound effect on the vowel system: there developed a new set of diphthongs, and also triphthongs, with э-glides: Ьэ, еэ, иэ, etc.l; there arose a new central long monophthong [э: ]; the new long [a: 1 filled a vacant posi­tion in the system, since ME Га: 1 had been diphthongised under the Great Vowel Shift, and the new b: ] merged with fa: 1 resulting from the contraction of ME lau 1 (e.g. drauen l'drausn]> NE draw).

QUANTITATIVE VOWEL CHANCES IN EARLY NEW ENGLISH

§ 399. In addition to the main sources of long monophthongs and diphthongs in Early NE, such as the Great Vowel Shift and the vocali­sation of the sonorant (r ], there were a few other instances of the growth of long vowels from short ones in some phonetic conditions. These length­enings resemble Early ME quantitative vowel changes before con­sonant groups; only this time the consonant sequences which brought about Ihe lengthening were different: Issl, [ft] and (ntl; the sequences mainly affected the vowel [al, e.g. ME plant lplant]> NE plant, ME after I'aftsrl> NE after, ME mass [massl> NE mass.

§ 400. The reverse quantitative change — shortening of vowels — occurred in Early NE before single dental and velar consonants [0,

d, 1, к ]. The long vowels subjected to this shortening — ie: l and lu: ] — were changing, or had already changed under the Great Vowel Shift,

e. g. ME truth with an open Is: ] became [bre: 6] and was shortened to NE breath Ibre0]; likewise, ME deed lde: d I> lde: d ]> [ded 1, NE dead. The digraph ea was introduced to show the open quality of the long [e: ] prior to the changes (see §386).

The long lu: l, which became short before Ik], and sometimes also before [t], was a product of the shift; this is evidenced by the spelling of such words as book, fool, where long ME [о: 1 was shown with the help of double o; in these words lo: ] became [и: 1 and was shortened to lu f.

Principal Changes of Vowels in Middle English and Early New English (Tables)

§401. The main qualitative and quantitative changes of vowels between the 11th and 18th c. are summarised in Tables 7 and 8. (The
tables da not show the changes of vowels caused by the vocalisation of consonants, that is the growth of new diphthongs and long mono­phthongs due to the loss of Ij, x, x'l and [rl; for these changes see relevant paragraphs.)

ok me nt

1 OE diphthongs are placed close to monophthongs so as to show their further development. The columns of ME and NE vowels do not contain complete lists; they include only those vowels which took part in the qualitative changes in the interven­ing period.

Table 7

Principal Qualitative Vowel Changes¹

EVOLUTION OF CONSONANTS IN MIDDLE ENGLISH AND EARLY NEW ENGLISH

§ 402. English consonants were on the whole far more stable than _vowe! S' A large number ol consonants have probably remained unchanged through all historical periods. Thus we can assume that the sono­rants Jm, n, 1 ], the plosives [p, b, t, d 1 and also Ik, g 1 in most positions have not been subjected to any noticeable changes. They are found in many words descending from OE though their correlations in the system of phonemes have altered to a varying degree.

The most important developments in the history of English conso­nants were the growth of new sets of sounds, — affricates and sibilants, — and the new phonological treatment of fricatives. Both changes added a number of consonant phonemes to the system. On the other hand, some consonants were lost or vocalised, which affected both the consonant and the vowel system. Like vowel changes, consonant changes can be shown as occurring in the transition period from Written OE to Late ME that is in Early ME, and in the transition from ME to the lan­guage of the 18th c., that is in the Early NE period.

Growth of Sibilants and Affricates

§ 403. In OE there were no affricates and no sibilants, except Is, z].

The earliest distinct sets of these sounds appeared towards the end of OE or during the Early ME period. The new type of consonants de­veloped from OE palatal plosives [k', g'] (which had split from the corresponding velar plosives Ik] and [g] in Early OE (see § 141), and also from the consonant cluster Isk*]. The three new phonemes which arose from these sources were [tjf]. Ld3] and [fl. In Early ME they began to be indicated by special letters and digraphs, which came into use mainly under the influence of the French scribal tradition — ch, tch, g, dg, sh, ssh, sch (see § 357, 358).

The sound changes and examples are shown in Table 9.

It must be added that the affricates [tfl and [dj] could also сощ_е from a different source: they entered the English language in loan- words from French, e.g. ME charme I'tjarmal, gentil [dgen'til) f_rotn О Fr charme, gentil (ItJ 1 and №31 in the Anglo-Norman pronunciation) As a result of these changes — and also as a result of the vocalisa­tion of [7] (§360) — the consonant system in Late ME was in some respects different from the OE system. The opposition of velar conso­nants to palatal — [к, к'; y, j]—had disappeared; instead, plosive consonants were contrasted to the new affricates and in the set of affri­cates ItJ] was opposed to U3] through sonority.

§ 404. Another development accounting for the appearance of sib­ilants and affricates in the English language is dated in Early NE and is connected with the phonetic assimilation of lexical borrowings.

In the numerous loan-words of Romance origin adopted in ME and Early NE the stress fell on the ultimate or penultimate syllable, e.g. ME na'cioun, plea'saunce (NE nation, pleasance). In accordance with the phonetic tendencies the stress was moved closer to the beginning of the word (see § 363). The final syllables which thus became unstressed, or weakly stressed, underwent phonetic alterations: the vowels were reduced and sometimes dropped; the sounds making up the syllable became less distinct. As a result some sequences of consonants fused into single consonants.

In Early NE the clusters [sj, zj, tj, dj ] —through reciprocal as­similation in unstressed position—regularly changed into [J, 5, tj, dj ]. Three of these sounds, IJ, tj", djl, merged with the phonemes already existing in the language, while the fourth, [3З, made a new phoneme. Now the four sounds formed a well-balanced system of two correlated pairs: (J, 3], ttj, d3); see Table 10 for examples.

Compare these words to NE suit, mature, duty, where the same consonant clusters were preserved in stressed syllables. (In some Mod E words, however, we still find the sequences} with [j] in unstressed position as well, usually they are secondary variants in Br E, or Amer­ican variants ol pronunciation, e.g. Br E issue I'ijju: ] despite the change of Is I to Ц1 has preserved Tj); in the American variant ['isju: ] _nD assimilative changes have taken place. Among variants of British pronunciation there are such pairs as NE associate ta'joujieit] and [a'sousieit], NE verdure t've: d33] and l'va: dja]; they may be due to Early NE dialectal differences or else to the fact that the assimila­tion has not been completed and is still going on in Mod E.)¹

Treatment of Fricative Consonants in Middle English and Early New English

§ 405. In order to understand the nature of the changes which af­fected the fricative consonants in ME and in Early NE we must recall some facts from their earlier history, in OE the pairs of fricative con­sonants — If] and [v], [81 and [6], [s] and fz] —were treated as positional variants or allophones; sonority depended on phonetic con­ditions: in intervocal position they appeared as voiced, otherwise — as voiceless. In ME and in Early NE these allophones became independent phonemes.

Phonologisation of voiced and voiceless fricatives was a slow pro­cess which lasted several hundred years. The first pair of consonants to become phonemes were [f] and Ev ]. In Late ME texts they occurred in identical phonetic environment and could be used for differentiation between words, which means that they had turned into phonemes. Cf., e.g. ME veyrte and feine ['veins, 'feina] (NE vein, feign). The two other pairs, 19, 6] and [s, z], so far functioned as allophones.

§406. A new, decisive alteration took place in the 16th c. The fric­atives were once again subjected to voicing under certain phonetic conditions. Henceforth they were pronounced as voiced if they were preceded by an unstressed vowel and followed by a stressed one, e.g. Early NE possess [po'zes] — the first voiceless [s], which stood be­tween an unstressed and a stressed vowel, had become voiced, while the second Is), which was preceded by an accented vowel, remained voice­less (ME possessen [po'sesan ]> NE possess). In the same way ME fishes, doores, takes J'fijas, 'do: rss, 'ta: kasj acquired a voiced [z] in the end­ing. The last three examples show that one phonetic condition — an unaccented prr-eding vowel—was sufficient to transform a voiceless sibilant into a voiced one; the second condition — a succeeding stressed vowel — was less important: Es ] is the last sound of the word. Probably the effect of stress extended beyond the boundaries of the word: the endings took no accent but could be followed by other words beginning with an accented syllable. This supposition is confirmed by the voicing °f consonants 'in many form-words: articles, pronouns, auxiliaries,

^] See V.A. Vassilyeo, ENGLISH PHONETICS, L., 1962, p. 98.

prepositions; they receive no stress in speech but may be surrounded by notional words which are logically accented. For instance, in the following quotation from a Late ME text (Capgrave's CHRONICLE OF ENGLAND, c. 1463), there are several unstressed form-words with voiceless fricatives and sibilants " In this yere, in the XXI day of April_ei was that frere bore whech mad these Annotaciones" ('in this year, on the twenty-first day of April, was born the friar who made these notes') [0is, Qe:, of, was, Gat, 0e: za] and the ending [as] in annotaciones. In Early NE the consonants in all these unstressed words became voiced, even initially [9is]> [5ts], l8e:)> l< 3i: ], etc. (the initial fricative in notional, stressed, words remained voiceless, cf. ME thin, thorn loin, eorn], NE thin, thorn).¹

Sometimes a similar voicing occurred in consonant clusters contain- ing sibilants, fricatives and affricates (see Table 11).

Table U

Voicing of Consonants In Early New English

s 407. On the whole the Early NE voicing of fricatives was rather -^consistent and irregular. Though it was a positional change occurring L certain phonetic conditions, these conditions were often contradictory. The voicing had many exceptions; for instance, in assemble, assess we fj_nd a medial voiceless Is] in precisely the same environment as the voiced of resemble and possess. Therefore after these changes voiced and voiceless fricatives could appear in similar phonetic conditions _and could be used for phonological purposes to distinguish between morphemes; in other words, they had turned into phonemes, cf., e.g. NE thy 16a j J and thigh l6a> ], ice lais) and eyes Ian],

Loss of Consonants

§ 4C8. As shown in the preceding paragraphs, the system of conso­nants underwent important changes in ME and Early NE. It acquired new phonemes and new phonemic distinctions, namely a distinction between plosives, sibilants and affricates, a phonemic distinction through sonority in the sets of fricatives, sibilants and affricates. On the other hand, some changes led to the reduction of the consonant system and also kTceriain reslriclions in the use of consonants.

As was mentioned in the description of vowel changes, particularly the growth of new diphthongs and long monophthongs, a number of consonants disappeared: they were vocalised and gave rise to diphthong­al glides'or made the preceding short vowels long. The vocalisation of [y] in Early ME and of |x] in Late ME eliminated the back lingual fricative consonants.

With the disappearance of lx'] the system tost one more opposition — through palatalisation, as " hard" to " soft". (The soft Ik'] and fg'] turned into affricates some time earlier, see §403).

§ 409. Another important event was the loss of quantitative distinc­tions in the consonant system.

It should be recalled that in OE long consonants were opposed to short at the phonological level. This is confirmed by their occurrence in identical conditions, their phonological application and the consistent writing of double letters, especially in intervocal position (see § 147). In Late ME long consonants were shortened and the phonemic opposi­tion through quantity was lost.

The loss of long consonant phonemes has been attributed to a va­riety of reasons. Long consonants disappeared firstly because their functional load was very low (the opposition was neutralised everywhere except intervocally), and secondly, because length was becoming a pros- °dic feature, that is a property of the syllable rather than of the sound. In ME the length of the syllable was regulated by the lengthening and shortening of vowels; therefore the quantitative differences of the con­sonants became irrelevant.

§410. In addition to all these changes, which directly affected the ^s> 'slem of phonemes, some consonants underwent positional changes Wiich restricted {heir use in the language. The consonants lj 3 and Trl were vocalised under certain phonetic conditions — finally and before consonants — during the ME and Early NE periods, though they con- tinued to be used in other environments, e. g. initially: ME recheti NE reach; ME yeer, NE year. Some consonants were lost in consonant clusters, which became simpler and easier to pronounce, e.g. the initial |x) survived in ME as an aspirate (hi, when followed by a vowel, Ьщ was lost when followed by a sonorant; cf. OE he, hurt£ > ME he ihe: l_f hound lhu: nd) (NE he, hound) and OE hlsne which became ME leene Пе: пэ1 (NE lean)\ OE hlystan and ME listen ['listen] (with further simplification of the medial cluster in NE listen, as [tl was dropped between [si and In]).

In Early NE the aspirate [h 3 was lost initially before vowels — though not in all the words, e.g. ME honour [ho'nu: r]> NE honour, ME hit or if> NE it, but ME hope l'ho: pal> NE hope.

In Early NE the initial consonant sequences [knJ and [gnl were simplified to In I, as in ME knowen I'knowan], gnat [gnat], NE know, gnat. Simplification of final clusters produced words like NE dumb, climb, in which [mbi lost the final lb J.

Historical Foundations of Modern English Spelling

§411. The alphabetic way of writing (unlike hieroglyphic, picto- graphic and syllabic writing) was originally based on a phonetic prin­ciple: it was designed to give an accurate graphic representation of pronunciation by using letters to indicate'sounds. Mod E spelling dis­plays many deviations from this principle. The differences between the pronunciation and the spelling of words are obvious, especially to those who are familiar with the employment of Latin letters in other languages. The reasons for these discrepancies and for the peculiarities of English spelling are to be found in the history of English sounds.

§412. OE spelling was phonetic: OE notaries employed Latin char­acters in accord with the Latin written convention, to put down English words as best they could. They attempted to use a separate letter for each distinct sound; the sound values of the letters were for the most part the same as in Latin. Their spellings, however, were not absolutely consistent, for some letters — as far as we can judge today — indicat­ed two or more sounds: the letter 3 stood for four different phonemes, с — for two; f, б, p and s indicated two allophones each (which developed into phonemes later). On the whole, OE spellings were fairly good tran­scriptions of words, made with the help of Latin characters.

§413. ME spelling innovations incorporated many sound changes which had taken place since the 9th—10th c., and yet spelling had gen­erally become more ambiguous and conventional. In many instances the one-to-one correspondence of letter and sound had been lost. More letters than before had two sound values: 0 stood for Ы, [ul, long b: l and lo: ]; с — for [s] and Ik); g — for lg] and W3 J, etc.; и could even indicate three sounds — the vowels [u] and ly] and the consonant [vl. One and the same sound was commonly shown by different means: [d51 could be indicated by g, j or dg, [k] — by k, t and q, etc. (see §360). The digraphs introduced in ME look familiar to the modern _яЛег, since many of them are still in use, but their application in was rather contradictory: so that they did not make spelling either ore precise or more phonetic. For instance, both ou and ow were used f_r [u: ] arid [ou ]; double о stood for the open and close long b: 1 and fp-] alongside o; long le: ] and le: ] were shown indiscriminately by \ double e and the single letter e. The use of digraphs was a digression from the phonetic principle, for it was based on conventional association _between sounds and their graphic representation (e.g. th or dg did not indicate sequences of sounds, but were used as symbols of single sounds, [_0i 3] and M3I). The conventional principle of spelling was later reinforced by the fixation of the written form of the word in printing and by extensive sound changes.

§414. The introduction of printing and the spread of printed books perpetuated the written forms of the words reproduced from the manu­scripts • They reflected the pronunciation of the age and the accepted devices of spelling; numerous variant spellings characteristic of the manuscripts were employed unrestrictedly in the printed books of the late 15th and the 16th c.

The phoneticians and spelling reformers of the 16th c. strove to restrict the freedom of variation and to improve English orthography by a more consistent use of letters and digraphs, and by the introduction of new symbols.

They insisted upon a strict distinction between и and v when used to indicate a vowel and a consonant: [u] and [v], e.g. Early NE loue, selues, vnripe, unshaken later spelt as love, selves, unripe, unshaken; upon the regular use of the final mute e to show the length of the vowel in the preceding syllable, e.g., rode, rose, and even beene, moone (though in the two latter words length was shown by double letters). They in­troduced new digraphs to show the difference between some open and close vowels, namely the digraph ea for [e: J as distinguished from e, ее, and ie used for the closed Ie: ], and the digraph oa alongside 0 in open syllables for [э:), as contrasted to 00 showing a long closed (0: ]. Cf. ME eech, seke with [e: ] and te: ] and Early NE each, seek-, ME hooly, boot b:, o] and Early NE holy, boat, boot. The use of double consonants became less frequent, except in traditional spellings like kiss, sell, but double letters were sometimes employed to show that the preceding vowel was short: Early NE sitten, shott, dipped (later sit, shot, dipped).

However, most of the recommendations made by Early NE scholars ^were never accepted; for instance, it was proposed that 10] and [6] should be indicated by an overturned letter t — f, or that the number of letters should be increased to thirty-four (Th. Smith, 1568) or else that all long sounds in all the words should be consistently shown by double letters (J. Hart, 1569).

§ 415. The activities of the scholars in the period of normalisation — 'ate 17th and the 18th c. — had a stabilising effect on the development English spelling. The dictionaries and grammars fixed the written 'Orms of the words as obligatory standards; numerous variant spellings ⁰ the Early NE period went out of use. Apart from the standardisation spelling — which was certainly a great achievement ol that age — only a few innovations were made: a few new digraphs were adopts with borrowed words, such as ph, ps — NE photograph, psychology ch — NE chemistry, scheme and machine, g — genre.

In the 16th c. the sound changes slowed down. Standard pronuncia­tion (later known as RP — Received Pronunciation) and standard spel[, ing were firmly established, and the gap between the spoken and written form of the word was perpetuated. The conventional use of letters had prevailed over their original, " phonetic" use.

§416. Spelling always lagged behind the changing pronunciation but this discrepancy grew in the NE period. In Early NE vowels and consonants were subjected to extensive changes, while spelling changes were few and inadequate. Mod E spelling shows the pronunciation oi words in the late 14th and in the 15th c., that is before the Early Nt^: sound changes. That is why modern spelling is largely conventional and conservative, but seldom phonetic.

Those are the main historical reasons for the gap between Mod E spelling and pronunciation and for the specifically English use of Latin lellers. In order to explain modern spellings one must trace the history of the sounds and their graphic representation, especially in ME and Early NE. The following table contains a list of modern sounds and their most common spelling; it supplies information about the origin and history of sounds, which account for the spellings (it does not include the most obvious phonetic spellings of the type not, it, bed, — which do not require any special historical explanation).

Table 12

§ 417. Main Historical Sources of Modern Spellings

Vowels

Monoph­thongs Short a? D

e u л

a

a after w ea before d, th oo before t, k о, и

oo before d -er, -re, -or

cat, man was, want head, death foot, book come, nut

flood

reader, centre, tutor

ME NE

a > ж

wa > wo e: > e; > e o: > u: ]> u u > л

о: > u: > u > л r

эг

§ 392 § 392 § 383, 400 § 383, 400 In ME both и and о could stand for [uj. § 359, 393 § 383, 393, 400

§ 397

QUESTIONS AND ASSIGNMENTS

1. Prove, by instances of phonetic changes, that ME was divided into a number of dialects.

2. Point out some changes preceding the Great Vowel Shift which display the same directions of evolution.

3. Cf. the system of vowels in OE with that in Late ME and say in which respects it has become less symmetrical.

4. How could the vowels in OE talu, findan, Нора, prote, stolen ultimately develop into diphthongs, though originally they were short monophthongs (NE tale, find, hope, throat, stolen)?

5. What are.the causes of vowel interchanges in NE keep, kept; feel, felt-, wise, wisdom; leave, left; five, fifth? Originally, in OE the words in each pair contained the same long vowels.

6. Account for the interchange of vowels in NE child — children, witd — wilderness, bewilder (ME bewildren), behind — hindrance; in OE the root vowel in these words was Li J.

7. Give a historical explanation of different spellings of the follow­ing homophones: NE son, sun; meet, meat; see, sea; rein, rain; vein, vain; soul, sole; main, mane; cease, sieze; flour, flower; so, sow; law, lore; bare, bear; root, route; or, oar; rode, road. Were all these pairs ho­mophones in ME?

g. Why does the letter e stand for [ej in bed, for [i: ] in he, for the nuclei t¹1 and le] of diphthongs in here and there?

9. Why does the letter о stand for Ы in not, for lou] in bone, [л] in front and some, and for [a: ] when followed by r: more, port?

10. Why does the letter * stand for (ks] and [gz] in the following words: oxen — axes — example-, execute — executor — executive; exer- ctse -- examine — exact — exist?

11.Account for the sound values of the letter с in the following words: (s] in NE mercy, centre-, [k] in copper, class; Ц] in special, sufficient?

12. Explain from a historical viewpoint the pronunciation of the following words with the letter g: good, again, general, change, regime.

13. Account for the difference in the sound values of s, th, f in the following words: son, busy, wisdom, mouse, east, deserve (ME deserven Ida'servanl), observe, resemble (ME resembten [ra'sembbn ]), books (ME bookes fbo'.kss]), robes (ME robes l'ro: basl), dresses, thousand, threat, thou, the, mouth, mouths (ME mouthes ['mu: ctas ]), they, of, fair, fence.

14. What is meant by " discrepancy" between pronunciation and spelling in Mod E? Give examples of phonetic and conventional spell­ings, Prove that the written form of the word usually lags behind its spoken form and indicates its earlier pronunciation.

15. Explain the origin of different sound values of the following digraphs: ea in seat, dead; ie in chief, lie; ou in pound, soup, soul, rough; ow in sow and how. Why do they indicate other sounds before r, e.g. dear, pear; pier, bier; pour, sour; lower, power.

16. Recall the development of OE [у, y: ] and explain the differences in the pronunciation and spelling of merry, hill, busy, buy, evil, bury (all descending from OE words with short ly]) and sleeve, fist, mice, sundry (descending from OE words with long ly: ])-

17. Show how modern spelling can help to reconstruct the phonetic history of the words; use the following words as examples: NE drive, might, keen, mete, lead, lake, loaf, boot, about, low, draw, applaud, cast, cart, cord, ant, warn, bird, beard, burn, certain, first, nun, none, bloody, bony, knee, gnat, often, limb.

16. Give the modern descendants of the following words, which developed in accordance with regular phonetic and spelling changes: OE hind, spedis, dust, sceaft, scinan, snawan, r sedan, he arm, sceal, wearm, сёар Ik* ], butere, boc, bat, metan, metan, hund, hundred, hwset, tun, steer fan, prSd, smoca, drifan, bona, deop, a< 5.

19. Reconstruct the phonetic changes so as to prove that the words have descended from a single root: NE listen and loud; merry and mirth; deep and depth; foul and filth; husband and house; long and length; sheep and shepherd; tell, tale and talk; thief and theft; gold, gild and yellow; person and parson.

20. Account for the mute letters in late, sight, wrong, often, bomb, autumn, course, knowledge, honour, what, whole, guest, pneumonia, psalm.

21. Try to account for the appearance of mute letters in the following ^ords: NE thumb (OEpuma); NE house (OE hus); NE delight (ME delite); NE horse (OE tors); NE limb (OE lim); NE whole (OE hal).

Chapter XV

EVOLUTION OF THE GRAMMATICAL SYSTEM FROM THE 11TH TO 18TH C.

Preliminary Remarks: Parts of Speech, Means of Form-building, Main Trends of Development

§418. In the course of ME and Early NE the grammatical system of the language underwent profound alteration. Since the OE period the very grammatical type of the language has changed; from what can be defined as a synthetic or inflected language, with a well developed morphology English has been transformed into a language of the " ana­lytical type", with analytical forms and ways of word connection pre­vailing over synthetic ones. This does not mean, however, that the grammatical changes were rapid or sudden; nor does it imply that all grammatical features were in a state of perpetual change. Like the devel­opment of other linguistic levels, the history of English grammar was a complex evolutionary process made up of stable and changeable con­stituents. Some grammatical characteristics remained absolutely or re­latively stable; others were subjected to more or less extensive modifi­cation.

§419. The division of words into parts of speech has proved to be one of the most permanent characteristics of the language. Through alt the periods of history English preserved the distinctions between the following parts of speech: the noun, the adjective, the pronoun, the nu­meral, the verb, the adverb, the preposition, the conjunction, and the interjection. The only new part of speech was the article which split from the pro