Early Scots - Orthography

Orthography

The language first appeared in written form in the mid-14th century, when its written form differed little from that of northern English dialects, and so Scots shared many Northumbrian borrowings from Old Norse and Anglo-Norman French. The reduced set of verb agreement endings in particular give the language an uncannily modern appearance when compared to the writing of English contemporaries such as Geoffrey Chaucer. Some orthographic features distinguishing Northern Middle English and Early Scots from other regional variants of written Middle English are:

The notable use of the Northern subject rule, which according to one hypothesis, is thought to have arisen through contact with the Celtic languages of Britain during the early medieval period. Another hypothesis proposes a possible path of developments from the reduction of verbal affixes followed by originally enclitic postverbal pronouns.

The forms of the third person plural pronoun they/their/them (derived from Old Norse) which later moved southwards to replace the older Southern he/here/hem forms (derived from Old English). One reason why the Northern forms were ultimately successful is that they got rid of the ambiguity of early Southern Middle English he (which could mean 'he', 'they', or even in some dialects 'she') and hir(e), her(e) (which could mean either 'her' or 'their').

The reduced set of verb agreement endings originating in the 9th or 10th centuries. In Northern Middle English, in the present tense, in all persons and numbers but the first singular, which had –e, the ending was –(e)s; and in Scotland even the first person singular was occasionally –s. Whereas the Old English and Southern and Midlands Middle English pattern had –e, -(e)s(t), -(e)th in the three persons of the singular and –(a)th (-(e)n in the Midlands) in all persons of the plural.

Loss of the Old English prefix ge-, often y- or i- further south.

The single syllable northern infinitive (sing rather than the Old English singan), whereas the past participle -en inflection was used in the South. The final e was silent in the North but still pronounced further south.

The northern present participle –and, whereas –inge(e), -ynge(e) was used in the South, and the northern past participle of strong verbs, in for example, drive(n) and southern ydrive.

The Scottish -yt/-it for the past tense, the northern form was usually -yd/-id where further south -ed was used.

In the North and in the Northeast Midlands evidence from poetry indicates a pattern unlike that of Old English reflecting contact with a Scandinavian-influenced one. Whereas in the West Midlands and Southern dialects of early Middle English the verb-second (V2) pattern of Old English is largely maintained.

Other differences between Northern and Southern Middle English were the adoption of function words of Norse origin, but also phonological effects such as the replacement of Old English /ʃ/ sh by /sk/ sk, sc and /k/ and /ɡ/ for the palatalized /tʃ/ and /dʒ/. Other phonological differences included the simplification in the initial sc/sh- /ʃ/ fricative to /s/ (suld, should; sall, shall). The retention of Old English long a in where, further south, this long a had "rounded" to an open o: (hayly holy, ane one, wald would awne own, hald hold). The practice of indicating a long vowel by means of a following –y or –i: (boite boot, doyne done, soyne soon, boythe both). The spelling quh for wh, ch for gh or 3, 3 for /j/, y for th, double ff to indicate unvoiced final consonants (haiff have, gyff give) and, of course, the use of words, or forms of words, that were common only in the northern dialects.

By the end of the period when Middle Scots began to emerge, orthography and phonology had diverged significantly from that of Northern Middle English.