old english

Old English was at first written in runes (futhorc), but shifted to the Latin alphabet, with some additions, after the Anglo-Saxons' conversion to Christianity. The letter yogh, for example, was adopted from Irish; the letter eth was an alteration of Latin "d", and the runic letters thorn and wynn are borrowings from futhorc. Also used was a symbol for the conjunction 'and', a character similar to the number seven (⁊, called a Tironian note), and a symbol for the relative pronoun 'þæt', a thorn with a crossbar through the ascender (''). Also used occasionally were macrons over vowels, abbreviations for following 'm's or 'n's. All of the sound descriptions below are given using IPA symbols.

The alphabet

• a: /ɑ/ (spelling variations like land/lond "land" suggest it may have had a rounded allophone [ɒ] before [n] in some cases)
• ā: /ɑː/
• æ: /æ/
• ǣ: /æː/
• b: /b/
• c (except in the digraphs sc and cg): either /tʃ/ or /k/. The /tʃ/ pronunciation is sometimes written with a diacritic by modern editors: most commonly ċ, sometimes č or ç. Before a consonant letter the pronunciation is always /k/; word-finally after i it is always /tʃ/. Otherwise a knowledge of the historical linguistics of the word in question is needed to predict which pronunciation is needed. (See The distribution of velars and palatals in Old English for details.)
• cg: [ddʒ] (the surface pronunciation of geminate /jj/); occasionally also for /gg/
• d: /d/
• ð/þ: /θ/ and its allophone [ð]. Both symbols were used more or less interchangeably (to the extent that if there was a rule, it was to avoid using ð word-initially, but this was by no means universally followed). Many modern editions preserve the use of these two symbols as found in the original manuscripts, but some attempt to regularise them in some fashion, for example using only the þ. See also Pronunciation of English th.
• e: /e/
• ē: /eː/
• ea: /æɑ/; after ċ and ġ, sometimes /æ/ or /ɑ/
• ēa: /æːɑ/; after ċ and ġ, sometimes /æː/
• eo: /eo/; after ċ and ġ, sometimes /o/
• ēo: /eːo/
• f: /f/ and its allophone [v]
• g: /g/ and its allophone [ɣ]; /j/ and its allophone [dʒ] (when after n). The /j/ and [dʒ] pronunciations are sometimes written ġ or ȝ by modern editors. Before a consonant letter the pronunciation is always [g] (word-initially) or [ɣ] (after a vowel). Word-finally after i it is always /j/. Otherwise a knowledge of the historical linguistics of the word in question is needed to predict which pronunciation is needed. (See The distribution of velars and palatals in Old English for details.)
• h: /h/ and its allophones [ç, x]. In the combinations hl, hr, hn and hw, the second consonant was certainly voiceless.
• i: /i/
• ī: /iː/
• ie: /iy/; after ċ and ġ, sometimes /e/
• īe: /iːy/; after ċ and ġ, sometimes /eː/
• k: /k/ (rarely used)
• l: /l/; probably velarised (as in Modern English) when in coda position.
• m: /m/
• n: /n/ and its allophone [ŋ]
• o: /o/
• ō: /oː/
• oe: /ø/ (in dialects with this sound)
• ōe: /øː/ (in dialects with this sound)
• p: /p/
• q: /k/ – Used before u representing the consonant /w/, but rarely used, being rather a feature of Middle English. Old English preferred cƿ or in modern print cw.
• r: /r/; the exact nature of r is not known. It may have been an alveolar approximant [ɹ], as in most Modern English accents, an alveolar flap [ɾ], or an alveolar trill [r].
• s: /s/ and its allophone [z]
• sc: /ʃ/ or occasionally /sk/
• t: /t/
• u: /u/
• ū: /uː/
• ƿ (wynn): /w/, replaced in modern print by w to prevent confusion with p.
• x: /ks/ (but according to some authors, [xs ~ çs])
• y: /y/
• ȳ: /yː/
• z: /ts/. Rarely used as ts was usually used instead, for example bezt vs betst "best", pronounced /betst/.

Doubled consonants are geminated; the geminate fricatives ðð/þþ, ff and ss cannot be voiced.

Labels: Old english