Quantitative vowel changes in Early ME

At the end of OE vowels underwent a number of quantitative changes:

1. Short vowels were lengthened before a sonorant + plosive (ld, nd, mb):

OE wild ME wild [wi:ld] wild

2. All other groups of 2 or more consonants made the preceding long vowels short:

OE cepte ME kepte [‘keptə] kept

3. Short vowels became long in open syllables

OE open ME open [‘o:pen] open

In open syllables vowels [ o: ], [a:], [ε:] were always long

affected several monophthongs and displayed considerable dialectal diversity.

1) The OE close labialised vowels [y] and [y:] disappeared in Early ME and developed into [e], [e:] or [i], [i:] or merged with [u], [u:] (depended on the areas)

2) The long OE [a:] was narrowed to [o: ] except for the Nothern group of dialects

OE stān ME stone stone

hām hōm home

bān bōn bone

3}The short OE [æ] was replaced in ME by the back vowel [a]

OE glæd ME glad glad

æpel appel apple

wæs was was

One of the most important sound changes of the Early ME period was the loss of OE diphthongs ea, ,eo, ea:, eo: and the growth of new diphthongs.

1) OE ea changed into a

OE eald ME ald old

healf half half

earm arm poor

2) OE ea: changed into ə:

OE ēast ME ēst east

dēad dēd dead

3) OE eo changed into ö and then into e

heorte → hörte→ herte heart

steorra→ större→ sterre star

steorfan → störven → sterven to die

4) OE eo: changed into e:

dēop dēp deep

dēor dēr deer

sēoc sēk seek

OE ME OE ME NE