Phonetic structure of Old English and its development in Middle English

AND NEW ENGLISH

OUTLINE

1. Old English Phonetic System

1.1. Old English Word Stress

1.2. Phonetic Changes of the Old English Period

2. Evolution of Phonetic System in Middle English

2.1. Development of Vowel System in Middle English

2.2. Development of Consonant System in Middle English

3. Phonetic Changes in New English

3.1. Changes in the System of Vowels

3.2. Changes in the System of Consonants

 

 

OLD ENGLISH PHONETIC SYSTEM

The Old English vowels differed from each other not only by quality achieved by articulation), but also by quantity achieved by length). The length of vowels is denoted by a macron (a line above the corresponding letter), e.g.: ā. In New English it is also important to distinguish long and short vowels, but such a sound as, for instance, [æ] has no long correspondence in today’s English, like there is no corresponding short vowel to [a:]. The situation in Old English was different: all vowels existed in pairs, i.e. alongside with every short vowel there was a long one having the same articulation. That is why the Old English system of vowels is spoken of as symmetric. As a whole the system of monophthongs in Old English looks like this:

[a] [æ] [e] [i] [o] [u] [y] [a/o]

[a:] [æ:] [e:] [i:] [o:] [u:] [y:]

A positional variant of the short [a] was pronounced before the consonants [n] and [m]. The vowel [a/o] was articulated as a sound intermediate between [a] and [o]. That is why in the Old English texts we can see the same words spelt in different variants: land vs. lond, man vs. mon, and vs. ond, etc.

Besides the monophthongs, there were four pairs of diphthongs in the vowel system of Old English:

[ea] [eo] [ie] [io]

[ea:] [eo:] [ie:] [io:]

The Old English diphthongs were descending, i.e. the first element was the strong, accented one. The peculiarity of the Old English diphthongs was also in the following: their second element was wider than the first.

The system of consonants included the following sounds:

labial [p], [b], [m], [f], [v]

front-lingual [t], ]d], [þ], [n], [s], [r], [l]

velar [k], [g], [h], [ γ ], [ γ ’], [ х ]

The signs þ (thorn) and ð (eth) denoted the voiceless or voiced interdental sound (like in New English ‘ thing’ or ‘ this’). The letter ӡ (yogh) had several meanings; it denoted the hard [g] (like in Modern English ‘ good’, the palatalized [g’] (like in Russian гиря), the velar fricative [gh] (like the Ukrainian [ г ]), and finally [j] (like in New English ‘ yes’).

OLD ENGLISH WORD STRESS

The survey of OE phonetics deals with word accentuation, the systems of vowels and consonants and their origins. The OE sound system developed from the PG system. It underwent multiple changes in the pre-written periods of history, especially in Early OE.

The system of word accentuation inherited from PG underwent no changes in Early OE. In OE a syllable was made prominent by an increase in the force of articulation; in other words, a dynamic or a force stress was employed. In disyllabic and polysyllabic words the accent fell on the root-morpheme or on the first syllable. Word stress was fixed; it remained on the same syllable in different grammatical forms of the word and, as a rule, did not shift in word-building either. Cf. the forms of the Dat. case of the nouns hlāforde ['xla:vorde], cyninӡe ['kyniŋge] and the Nom. Case of the same nouns: hlāford ['xla:vord], cyninӡ ['kyniŋg]. Polysyllabic words, especially compounds, may have had two stresses, chief and secondary, the chief stress being fixed on the first root-morpheme, e.g. the compound noun received the chief stress upon its first component and the secondary stress on the second component; the grammatical ending -a (Gen.pl.) was unaccented. In words with prefixes the position of the stress varied: verb prefixes were unaccented, while in nouns and adjectives the stress was commonly thrown on to the prefix. Cf.:

ā-'risan, mis-'faran – v. (NE arise, ‘go astray‘);

tō-weard, 'or-eald  – adj. (NE toward, ‘very old‘);

'mis-dæd, 'uð- ӡ en ӡ – n. (NE misdeed, ‘escape‘).

If the words were derived from the same root, word stress, together with other means, served to distinguish the noun from the verb, cf.:

'and-swaru n. – and-'swarian     v. (NE answer, answer)

'on-ӡin n. – on-'ӡinnan v. (NE beginning, begin)

'forwyrd n. – for-'weorÞan     v. (‘destruction‘, ‘perish‘)

The system is well preserved in New English) – ' present – pre ' sent.