The English Dialect Grammar: Comprising the Dialects of England, of the Shetland and Orkney Islands, and of Those Parts of Scotland, Ireland and Wales Where English Is Habitually Spoken (Classic Reprint)

Excerpt from The English Dialect Grammar: Comprising the Dialects of England, of the Shetland and Orkney Islands, and of Those Parts of Scotland, Ireland and Wales Where English Is Habitually Spoken

In the treatment of the native element contained in the grammar, I have generally started out from Old English, which in the present state of Middle English scholarship is the only satisfactory plan. The dialects prove conclusively that many vowel sounds, which are generally supposed to have fallen together in Middle English, were in reality kept apart, and have remained so in some dialects to the present day. In the treatment of the French element I have in most cases started out from the present pronunciation of literary English, because the French words have come into the dialects at various periodsand through various channels. When'the vowels in the French words have had the same develop ment in the dialects as those in the native words, a cross-reference is given to the paragraph where the corresponding development is treated in detail.

I have not here attempted to trace the various stages of development of the consonant and vowel sounds in passing from Old English to the modern dialects, as it is my intention to treat the subject fully in an entirely different book bearing upon the philology of the English tongue, in which I shall also endeavour to show the light thrown by the dialects on the historical development of literary English.

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