Preface viii

List of abbreviations xi

1 Introduction 1

2 Orthography and phonology 10

3 The vowels in Germanic 52

I Primitive Germanic (§§1-4) 52

II Vowel harmony (§§5-12) 53

III Loss of nasals and compensatory lengthening (§§13-15) 55

IV Diphthongization (§§16-19) 56

V Influence of */z/ (§§20-1) 59

VI Long vowels (§§22-6) 59

VII Unstressed vowels (§§27-33) 62

VIII Raising of back vowels (§34) 64

4 The consonants in Germanic 66

I Primitive Germanic (§§1-3) 66

II Verner's Law (§§4-5) 67

III Germanic approximants (§§6-9) 68

IV Consonant loss (§10) 70

V West Germanic gemination (§§11-14) 71

VI Miscellanea (§§15-19) 72

5 Old English vowels 74

I First fronting and associated changes (§§3-15) 75

II Breaking (§§16-34) 82

III Restoration of A (§§35-40) 93

IV Lowering of second elements of diphthongs (§§41-6) 99

V Palatal diphthongization (§§47-73) 104

VI I-umlaut (§§74-86) 118

VII Second fronting (§§87-92) 135

VIII Anglian smoothing (§§93-102) 139

IX Back umlaut (§§103-12) 149

X Palatal umlaut (§§113-18) 163

XI Palatal monophthongization (§§119-23) 166

XII Compensatory lengthening (§§124-30) 169

XIII Hiatus (§§131-54) 172

XIV Merger of /io/ and /eo/ (§§155-62) 185

XV West Saxon developments of high front vowels and diphthongs (§§163-75) 190

XVI The influence of /w/ (§§176-87) 198

XVII The development of Kentish front vowels (§§188-96) 203

XVIII Changes in quantity (§§197-205) 206

XIX Monophthongization of diphthongs (§§206-14) 210

XX Merger of /æ/ and /w/ (§§215-16) 213

6 Unstressed vowels 214

I First fronting and associated changes (§§2-6) 214

II Breaking, palatal diphthongization, i-umlaut, and back umlaut (§§7-12) 217

III Syncope and apocope (§§13-25) 220

IV Shortening (§§26-33) 227

V Epenthesis and syllabification (§§34-45) 230

VI Mergers of unstressed vowels (§§46-62) 235

VII Unstressed medial vowels (§§63-71) 242

7 Old English consonants 246

I Dissimilation (§§4-14) 247

II Palatalization and assibilation (§§15-43) 252

III Development of fricatives (i): lenition (§§44-53) 270

IV Development of fricatives (ii): voicing and devoicing (§§54-68) 276

V Post-vocalic approximants (§§69-76) 283

VI Consonant clusters (§§77-97) 287

VII Loss of final nasals (§§98-100) 298

VIII Late Old English changes (§§101-3) 299

References 301

Word index 315