12. Consonant changes in me and ne (growth of affricates, loss of certain consonants).

A large number of consonants have probably remained unchanged through all historical periods. The most important development in the history of new sets of sounds, - affricates and sibilants, - and the new phonological treatment of fricatives.

Growth of affricates: The new type of consonants developed from OE palatal plosives [k’, g’] and also from the consonant cluster [sk’]. The 3 new phonemes which arose from these sources were [t∫], [dʒ], [∫]. In Early ME they began to be indicated by special letters and digraphs, which came into use under the influence of the French scribal tradition – ch, tch, g, dg, sh, ssh, sch. The sound changes: k’ > t∫; g’ > dʒ; sk’ > ∫.

In ME the opposition of velar consonants to palatal – [k,k’,g,j] – had disappeared, instead, plosive consonants were contrasted to the new affricates and in the set of affricates [t∫] was opposed to [dʒ] through sonority.

In the numerous loan-words of Romance origin adopted in ME and Early NE the stress fell on the ultimate or penultimate syllable: the stress was moved closer to the beginning of the word.

In Early NE the clusters [sj, zj,tj,dj] - through reciprocal assimilation in unstressed position – regularly changed into [∫,ʒ, t∫, dʒ]: [sj]> [∫], [zj]>[ ʒ], [tj]> [t∫]; [dj]> [dʒ].

Loss of certain consonants: In Late ME long consonants were shortened and the phonetic opposition through quantity was lost. long consonants disappeared firstly because their functional load was very low, and secondly, because length was becoming a prosodic feature, that is a property of the syllable rather than of the sound. In ME the length of the syllable was regulated by the lengthening and shortening of vowels.

In Early NE the aspirate [h] was lost initially before vowels – though not in all the words. In Early NE the initial consonant sequences [kn] and [gn] were simplified to [n], as in ME. Simplification of final clusters produced words like NE dumb, climb, in which [mb] lost the final [b].

5. The formation of the English language from Old English dialects. The formation of the National Literary English language from the Middle English dialects and changes in Modern.

Old English initially was a diverse group of dialects, reflecting the varied origins of the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of Britain. The Late West Saxon dialect eventually became dominant. Written Old English of 1000 AD was similar to other Germanic languages such as Old High German and Old Norse in terms of vocabulary and grammar. Written Old English is relatively unintelligible today, in contrast to written Modern English and written Middle English. Close contact with the Scandinavians resulted in much grammatical simplification and lexical enrichment of the English language, which had been based on Anglo-Frisian. These changes did not reach South West England until the Norman invasion in 1066. Old English developed into a full-fledged literary language, based on the most common manner of speaking in London during the 13th century.

Old English should not be regarded as a single monolithic entity just as Modern English is also not monolithic. It emerged over time out of the many dialects and languages of the colonising tribes, and it was not until the later Anglo-Saxon period that they fused together into Old English.^[4] Even then, it continued to exhibit local language variation, remnants of which remain in Modern English dialects.^[5]

Thus it is misleading, for example, to consider Old English as having a single sound system. Rather, there were multiple Old English sound systems. Old English has variation along regional lines as well as variation across different times.

For example, the language attested in Wessex during the time of Æthelwold of Winchester, which is named Late West Saxon (or Æthelwoldian Saxon), is considerably different from the language attested in Wessex during the time of Alfred the Great's court, which is named Early West Saxon (or Classical West Saxon or Alfredian Saxon). Furthermore, the difference between Early West Saxon and Late West Saxon is of such a nature that Late West Saxon is not directly descended from Early West Saxon (despite what the similarity in name implies).

The four main dialectal forms of Old English were Mercian, Northumbrian, Kentish, and West Saxon.^[6] Each of those dialects was associated with an independent kingdom on the island. Of these, Northumbria south of the Tyne and most of Mercia were overrun by the Vikings during the 9th century. The portion of Mercia that was successfully defended and all of Kent were then integrated into Wessex.

After the process of unification of the diverse Anglo-Saxon kingdoms in 878 by Alfred the Great, there is a marked decline in the importance of regional dialects. This is not because they stopped existing, as evidenced both by the existence of Middle and later Modern English dialects.

However, the bulk of the surviving documents from the Anglo-Saxon period are written in the dialect of Wessex, Alfred's kingdom. It seems likely that with consolidation of power, it became necessary to standardise the language of government to reduce the difficulty of administering the more remote areas of the kingdom. As a result, documents were written in the West Saxon dialect. Not only this, but Alfred was passionate about the spread of the vernacular, and brought many scribes to his region from Mercia to record previously unwritten texts.^[7]

The Church was affected likewise, especially since Alfred initiated an ambitious programme to translate religious materials into English. To retain his patronage and ensure the widest circulation of the translated materials, the monks and priests engaged in the programme worked in his dialect. Alfred himself seems to have translated books out of Latin and into English, notably Pope Gregory I's treatise on administration, Pastoral Care.

Because of the centralisation of power and the Viking invasions, there is little or no written evidence for the development of non-Wessex dialects after Alfred's unification.

Thomas Spencer Baynes claimed in 1856 that, owing to its position at the heart of the Kingdom of Wessex, the relics of Anglo-Saxon accent, idiom and vocabulary were best preserved in the Somerset dialect.^[8]

Even after the maximum Anglo-Saxon expansion, Old English was never spoken all over the Kingdom of England; not only was Medieval Cornish spoken all over Cornwall, it was also spoken in adjacent parts of Devon into the age of the Plantagenets, long after the Norman Conquest. Cumbric may have survived into the 12th century in parts of Cumbria and Welsh may have been spoken on the English side of the Anglo-Welsh border. In addition to the Celtic languages, Norse was spoken in some areas under Danish law.