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There was also a pair of back vowels of mid-height, /o/ and /oː/, both of which were written o (the longer vowel is often ō in modern editions). The same four vowels existed in the Middle English system. The short vowels were still written u and o , but long /uː/ came to be spelt as ou , and /oː/ as oo .
The Great Vowel Shift was a series of chain shifts that affected historical long vowels but left short vowels largely alone. It is one of the primary causes of the idiosyncrasies in English spelling. The shortening of ante-penultimate syllables in Middle English created many long–short pairs. The result can be seen in such words as,
Long vowels and diphthongs were affected only later, probably analogically, and not in all areas. Notably, they were not mutated in most (western) Dutch dialects, whereas short vowels were. a-mutation: /u/ is lowered to /o/ when a non-high vowel follows in the next syllable.
The close back rounded vowel, or high back rounded vowel, [1] is a type of vowel sound used in many spoken languages. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents this sound is u , and the equivalent X-SAMPA symbol is u. In most languages, this rounded vowel is pronounced with protruded lips ('endolabial'). However, in a ...
Umlaut (/ ˈ ʊ m l aʊ t /) is a name for the two dots diacritical mark ( ̈) as used to indicate in writing (as part of the letters ä , ö , and ü ) the result of the historical sound shift due to which former back vowels are now pronounced as front vowels (for example , , and as , , and ).
In the case of /u/, the quality u was normally preserved in the endings -um, -ung, -uc or after an accented syllable containing the /u/ sound (as in duguþ); in other contexts (e.g. hēafod, heofon), u was variably interchanged with o depending on dialect and time period, with the use of o generally increasing over time, although there was a ...
An intermediate vowel sound (likely a close central vowel or possibly its rounded counterpart ), called sonus medius, can be reconstructed for the classical period. [41] Such a vowel is found in doc u mentum , opt i mus , lacr i ma (also spelled doc i mentum , opt u mus , lacr u ma ) and other words.
In some modern English accents, significant pre-L breaking occurs when /l/ follows certain vowels (/iː/, /uː/, and diphthongs ending [ɪ] or [ʊ]). Here the vowel develops a centering offglide (an additional schwa) before the /l/. This may cause reel to be pronounced like real, and tile, boil and fowl to rhyme with dial, royal and vowel.