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Moving forward in time, the two Middle English vowels /a/ and /aː/ correspond directly to the two vowels /a/ and /ɛː/, respectively, in the Early Modern English of c. 1600 AD (the time of Shakespeare). However, each vowel has split into a number of different pronunciations in Modern English, depending on the phonological context.
The bad–lad split is a phonological split of the Early Modern English short vowel phoneme /æ/ into a short /æ/ and a long /æː/. This split is found in some varieties of English in England and Australia. In Modern English, a new phoneme, /ɑː/, developed that did not exist in Middle English.
In Early Middle English, partly by borrowings from French, they split into separate phonemes: /f, v, θ, ð, s, z/. See Middle English phonology – Voiced fricatives. Also in the Middle English period, the voiced affricate /dʒ/ took on phonemic status. (In Old English, it is considered to have been an allophone of /j/).
The phonological system of the Old English language underwent many changes during the period of its existence. These included a number of vowel shifts, and the palatalisation of velar consonants in many positions. For historical developments prior to the Old English period, see Proto-Germanic language.
Early Modern English and Late Modern English, also called Present-Day English (PDE), differ essentially in vocabulary. Late Modern English has many more words, arising from the Industrial Revolution and technologies that created a need for new words, as well as international development of the language.
The variable outcome, along with other variable changes and the ambiguity of the Middle English spelling ou (either /ou̯/ or /uː/ in Early Middle English, accounts for the numerous pronunciations of Modern English words in -ough-(e.g. though, through, bough, rough, trough, thought, with -ough-pronounced /ou/, /uː/, /au/, /ʌf/, /ɒf/, /ɔː ...
The toe–tow merger is a merger of the Early Modern English vowels /oː/ (as in toe) and /ou/ (as in tow) that occurs in most dialects of English. (The vowels in Middle English and at the beginning of the Early Modern English period were /ɔː/ and /ɔw/ respectively, and they shifted in the second phase of the Great Vowel Shift.)
This occurred with the word how in the Old English period, and with who, whom and whose in Middle English (the latter words having had an unrounded vowel in Old English). Reduction to /w/ , a development that has affected the speech of the great majority of English speakers, causing them to pronounce wh- the same as w- (sometimes called the ...