The Great Vowel Shift

The Great Vowel Shift was a major change in the pronunciation of the English language, generally accomplished in the fifteenth century, although evidence suggests it began as early as the fourteenth century. The shift continued for some time into the sixteenth century, spreading toward the non-metropolitan and non-port areas. It represented a change in the long vowels. The essence of the shift was the narrowing of all MidE long vowels, and diphongization of the narrowest long ones, for example: [i:] [ai].

The shift can be represented in the following diagram:

ai		i:	i:	ɪ:			u:	u:		au
			e:	e:	ei	ou	o:
				ε:	a:	ɔ:

In the 16^thcentury the vowel [e:] from MidE [ε:] differed from the vowel [i:] from MidE [e:], an the wordsspeak, beat, mean did not rhyme with the wordsmeek, meet, keen. In the late 17^thcentury [e:] changed into [i:] and the difference between the two vowels disappeared.

The separate items of the shift may be represented in the following way:

• [a:]  [ei]: Middle English [a:] (ā) fronted to [æ:] and then raised to [ε:], and generally diphthongized in Modern English to [eɪ] (as in make).

• [ε:]  [e:]  [i:]: Middle English [ε:] raised to [e:] and then to modern English [i:] (as in beak). In a few words beginning with consonant clusters, however, the vowel remained below [i:] as Modern English [eɪ] (as in break).

• [e:]  [i:]: Middle English [e:] raised to Modern English [i:] (as in feet).

• [i:]  [ai]: Middle English [i:] diphthongised to [ɪi], which was most likely followed by [əɪ] and finally Modern English [ai] (as in mice).

• [ɔ:]  [ou]: Middle English [ɔ:] raised to [o:], and in the eighteenth century this became Modern English [ou] or [əu] (as in boat).

• [o:]  [u:]: Middle English [o:] raised to Modern English [u:] (as in boot).

• [u:]  [au]: Middle English [u:] was diphthongised in most environments to [uʊ], and this was followed by [əʊ], and then Modern English [au] (as in mouse) in the eighteenth century. Before labial consonants, this shift did not occur, and [u:] remains as in room and droop).

The Great Vowel Shift occurred when the spelling was already fixed. Therefore there were no changes in spelling of long vowels; they were presented graphically as they were pronounced earlier. One may say that the Modern English spelling reflects to a great extent the Old and Middle English pronunciation.

Examples:

Spelling	Middle English pronunciation	Modern English pronunciation
name	[‘na:mə]	[neim]
clean	[klε:n]	[kle:n]  [kli:n]
see	[se:]	[si:]
time	[‘ti:mə]	[taim]
go	[gɔ:]	[gou]
food	[fo:d]	[fu:d]
house	[hu:s]	[haus]

Evidence for the Great Vowel Shift comes from a variety of sources:

• Modern English spelling and pronunciation, cf. crime and criminal, please and pleasant;

• Middle English spelling;

• Rhyme words. When we look at Chaucer’s texts, we can see that he uses rhyming words which do not rhyme in Modern English. The following examples are typical; all are drawn from the Canterbury Tales

  Chaucer’s rhymes	Modern Words	ModE Vowels
  heeth, breeth	heath, breath	[i]/[e]
  ye, melodye	eye, melody	[ai]/[i]
  two, so	two, so	[u]/[o]
  wyn, Latyn	wine, Latin	[aj]/[i]

• Indications of vowel length (doubled vowels in spelling);

• Comparisons with spellings from French and Latin, especially in borrowed words.

The causes of the GVS are subject to as much debate as the nature of the shift itself.

Diensberg proposes that the GVS was prompted by the “massive intake of Romance loanwords in Middle English and Early Modern English”.

Others connect the shift with the loss of unstressed [ə]. They note that as a result of theis loss there arose a great number of monosyllabic words which differed from each other by length/shortness of the vowel alone. As a result there came a change in the quality of long vowels.

The values of the long vowels form the main difference between the pronunciation of Middle English and Modern English, and the Great Vowel Shift is one of the historical events marking the separation of Middle and Modern English.

Learn more about the Great Vowel Shift at: http://asstudents.unco.edu/faculty/tbredehoft/UNCclasses/ENG419/GVS.html http://web.cn.edu/kwheeler/great_vowel_shift.html