Early Modern English

===Vowels===
{| class="wikitable"
|+Early modern English vowels
! colspan="2" rowspan="2" |
! colspan="2" |[[Monophthong|Monophthongs]]
! colspan="2" |[[Diphthongs]]
|-
!Short
!Long
!+{{IPA|/j/}}
!+{{IPA|/w/}}
|-
! rowspan="2" |[[Close vowel|Close]]
![[Front vowel|Front]]
|{{IPA|ɪ}}
|{{IPA|iː}}
|
|{{IPA|ɪw}}
|-
![[Back vowel|Back]]
|{{IPA|ʊ}}
|{{IPA|uː}}
|
|
|-
! rowspan="2" |[[Close-mid vowel|Close-mid]]
![[Front vowel|Front]]
|
|{{IPA|eː}}
|
|
|-
![[Back vowel|Back]]
|
|{{IPA|oː}}
|
|
|-
! colspan="2" |[[Mid vowel|Mid]]
|{{IPA|ə}}
|
|{{IPA|əj}}
|{{IPA|əw}}
|-
! rowspan="2" |[[Open-mid vowel|Open-mid]]
![[Front vowel|Front]]
|{{IPA|ɛ}}
|
|{{IPA|ɛj}}
|
|-
![[Back vowel|Back]]
|{{IPA|ɤ}}
|{{IPA|ɔː}}
|{{IPA|ɔj}}
|{{IPA|ɔw}}
|-
! rowspan="2" |[[Near-open vowel|Near-open]]
![[Front vowel|Front]]
|
|
|
|
|-
![[Back vowel|Back]]
|{{IPA|ɒ}}
|
|
|
|-
! colspan="2" |[[Open vowel|Open]]
|{{IPA|a}}
|{{IPA|aː}}
|
|
|}
The following information primarily comes from studies of the [[Great Vowel Shift]];<ref>Stemmler, Theo. ''Die Entwicklung der englischen Haupttonvokale: eine Übersicht in Tabellenform'' [Trans: The development of the English primary-stressed-vowels: an overview in table form] (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1965).</ref><ref>{{cite web|first=William Elford|last=Rogers|publisher=[[Furman University]]|title=Early Modern English vowels|url=http://facweb.furman.edu/~wrogers/phonemes/phone/eme/evowel.htm|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150113011226/http://facweb.furman.edu/~wrogers/phonemes/phone/eme/evowel.htm|archive-date=13 January 2015|url-status=dead|access-date=5 December 2014}}</ref> see the related chart.
*The modern English [[phoneme]] {{IPAc-en|audio=En-us-I.ogg|aɪ}}, as in ''glide'', ''rhyme'' and ''eye'', was {{IPA-all|əi|}}, and was reduced word-finally. Early Modern rhymes indicate that {{IPA-all|əi|}} was similar to the vowel that was used at the end of words like ''happy'', ''melody'' and ''busy''.
*{{IPAc-en|audio=En-us-ow.ogg|aʊ}}, as in ''now'', ''out'' and ''ploughed'', was {{IPA-all|əu||en-uk-oh.ogg}}.
*{{IPAc-en|audio=Open-mid front unrounded vowel.ogg|ɛ}}, as in ''fed'', ''elm'' and ''hen'', was more or less the same as the phoneme represents today, sometimes approaching {{IPAblink|ɪ|audio=y}} (which is still in the word ''pretty'').<ref name="Hark"/>
* {{IPAc-en|audio=en-uk-a.ogg|eɪ}}, as in ''name'', ''case'' and ''sake'', was a long [[monophthong]]. It shifted from {{IPAblink|æː|audio=y}} to {{IPAblink|ɛː|audio=y}} and finally to {{IPAblink|eː|audio=y}}. Earlier in Early Modern English, ''mat'' and ''mate'' were near-homophones, with a longer vowel in the second word. Thus, [[Shakespeare]] rhymed words like ''haste'', ''taste'' and ''waste'' with ''last'' and ''shade'' with ''sad''.<ref name="Sonnet"/> The more open pronunciation remains in some [[Northern England English]] and rarely in Irish English. During the 17th century, the phoneme variably [[Phonological change|merged]] with the phoneme {{IPA-all|ɛi||Nl-ei.ogg}} as in ''day'', ''weigh'', and the merger survived into standard forms of Modern English, though a few dialects kept these vowels distinct at least to the 20th century (see [[Pane–pain merger|''pane''–''pain'' merger]]).
*{{IPAc-en|audio=Close front unrounded vowel.ogg|iː}} (typically spelled {{angbr|ee}} or {{angbr|ie}}) as in ''see'', ''bee'' and ''meet'', was more or less the same as the phoneme represents today, but it had not yet [[fleece merger|merged]] with the phoneme represented by the spellings {{angbr|ea}} or {{angbr|ei}} (and perhaps {{angbr|ie}}, particularly with ''fiend'', ''field'' and ''friend''), as in ''east'', ''meal'' and ''feat'', which were pronounced with {{IPAblink|eː|audio=y}} or {{IPAblink|ɛ̝ː}}.<ref>Cercignani, Fausto (1981), ''Shakespeare's Works and Elizabethan Pronunciation'', Oxford: Clarendon Press.</ref><ref name="Sonnet"/> However, words like ''breath'', ''dead'' and ''head'' may have already split off towards {{IPAc-en|audio=Open-mid front unrounded vowel.ogg|ɛ}}).
*{{IPAc-en|audio=Near-close_near-front_unrounded_vowel.ogg|ɪ}}, as in ''bib'', ''pin'' and ''thick'', was more or less the same as the phoneme represents today.
*{{IPAc-en|audio=en-us-o.ogg|oʊ}}, as in ''stone'', ''bode'' and ''yolk'', was {{IPAblink|oː|audio=y}} or {{IPAblink|o̞ː|audio=y}}. The phoneme was probably just beginning the process of merging with the phoneme {{IPA-all|ow|}}, as in ''grow'', ''know'' and ''mow'', without yet achieving today's [[toe–tow merger|complete merger]]. The old pronunciation remains in some dialects, such as in [[Yorkshire dialect|Yorkshire]], [[East Anglia]], and [[Scottish English|Scotland]].
*{{IPAc-en|audio=En-us-awe.ogg|ɒ}}, as in ''rod'', ''top'' and ''pot'', was {{IPAblink|ɒ}} or {{IPAblink|ɔ|audio=y}}, much like the corresponding RP sound.
*{{IPAc-en|audio=Open-mid back rounded vowel.ogg|ɔː}}, as in ''taut'', ''taught'' and ''law'' was more open than in contemporary RP, being {{IPAblink|ɔː}} or {{IPAblink|ɑː|audio=y}} (and thus being closer to Welsh and General American {{IPA|/ɔː/}})
*{{IPAc-en|audio=en-uk-oi.ogg|ɔɪ}}, as in ''boy'', ''choice'' and ''toy'', is even less clear than other vowels. In the late 16th century, the similar but distinct phonemes {{IPA|/ɔi/}}, {{IPA|/ʊi/}} and {{IPA|/əi/}} all existed. By the late 17th century, they all merged.<ref>{{cite book|title=Early modern English|first=Charles Laurence|last=Barber|edition=second|publisher=Edinburgh University Press|year=1997|isbn=0-7486-0835-4|pages=108–116|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Iat4Bk_YeR4C|location=Edinburgh|access-date=31 August 2020|archive-date=9 November 2023|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231109181145/https://books.google.com/books?id=Iat4Bk_YeR4C|url-status=live}}</ref> Because those phonemes were in such a state of flux during the whole Early Modern period (with evidence of rhyming occurring among them as well as with the precursor to {{IPA|/aɪ/}}), scholars<ref name="OP">See [http://www.thehistoryofenglish.com/history_early_modern.html The History of English (online)] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141209013306/http://www.thehistoryofenglish.com/history_early_modern.html |date=9 December 2014 }} as well as [[David Crystal]]'s [http://originalpronunciation.com/ Original Pronunciation (online).] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141209064651/http://originalpronunciation.com/ |date=9 December 2014 }}</ref> often assume only the most neutral possibility for the pronunciation of {{IPA|/ɔɪ/}} as well as its similar phonemes in Early Modern English: {{IPA|[əɪ]}} (which, if accurate, would constitute an early instance of the [[line–loin merger]] since {{IPA|/aɪ/}} had not yet fully developed in English).
*{{IPAc-en|audio=en-us-uh.ogg|ʌ}} (as in ''drum'', ''enough'' and ''love'') and {{IPAc-en|audio=Near-close near-back rounded vowel.ogg|ʊ}} (as in ''could'', ''full'', ''put'') had not yet [[foot–strut split|split]] and so were both pronounced in the vicinity of {{IPAblink|ɤ|audio=y}}.
*{{IPAc-en|audio=En-us-ooh.ogg|uː}} occurred not only in words like ''food'', ''moon'' and ''stool'', but also all other words spelled with {{angbr|oo}} like ''blood'', ''cook'' and ''foot''. The nature of the vowel sound in the latter group of words, however, is further complicated by the fact that the vowel for some of those words was shortened: either beginning or already in the process of approximating the Early Modern English {{IPAblink|ʊ|audio=y}} and later {{IPAblink|ɤ|audio=y}}. For instance, at certain stages of the Early Modern period or in certain dialects (or both), ''doom'' and ''come'' rhymed; this is certainly true in Shakespeare's writing. That phonological split among the {{angbr|oo}} words was a catalyst for the later [[foot–strut split]] and is called "early shortening" by [[John C. Wells]].<ref>{{cite book | author=Wells, John C. | author-link=John C. Wells | title=Accents of English | location=[[Cambridge]] | publisher=[[Cambridge University Press]] | year=1982 | isbn=0-521-22919-7 | id=(vol. 1). (vol. 2)., (vol. 3)| page=199}}</ref> The {{angbr|oo}} words that were pronounced as something like {{IPAblink|ɤ|audio=y}} seem to have included ''blood'', ''brood'', ''doom'', ''good'' and ''noon''.<ref>Crystal, David. "Sounding Out Shakespeare: Sonnet Rhymes in Original Pronunciation". In Vera Vasic (ed.), Jezik u upotrebi: primenjena lingvistikja u cast Ranku Bugarskom [Language in use: applied linguistics in honour of Ranko Bugarski] (Novi Sad and Belgrade: Philosophy Faculties, 2011), 295-306300. p. 300.</ref>
*{{IPA|/ɪw/}} or {{IPA|/iw/}}<ref>E. J. Dobson (English pronunciation, 1500–1700, Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1968, passim) and other scholars before him postulated the existence of a vowel /y/ beside /iu̯/ in early Modern English. But see [[Fausto Cercignani]], ''On the alleged existence of a vowel /y:/ in early Modern English'', in “English Language and Linguistics”, 26/2, 2022, pp. 263–277 [https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/english-language-and-linguistics/article/on-the-alleged-existence-of-a-vowel-y-in-early-modern-english/AC739707E998A98AFFD515678D9B1E14] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231109181252/https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/english-language-and-linguistics/article/abs/on-the-alleged-existence-of-a-vowel-y-in-early-modern-english/AC739707E998A98AFFD515678D9B1E14 |date=9 November 2023 }}.</ref> occurred in words spelled with ''ew'' or ''ue'' such as ''due'' and ''dew''. In most dialects of Modern English, it became {{IPA|/juː/}} and {{IPA|/uː/}} by [[yod-dropping]] and so ''do'', ''dew'' and ''due'' are now perfect homophones in most American pronunciations, but a distinction between the two phonemes remains in other versions of English. There is, however, an additional complication in dialects with [[yod-coalescence]] (such as [[Australian English]] and younger RP), in which ''dew'' and ''due'' {{IPA|/dʒuː/}} (homophonous with ''jew'') are distinguished from ''do'' {{IPA|/duː/}} purely by the initial consonant, without any vowel distinction.

The difference between the transcription of the EME diphthong offsets with {{angbr IPA|j w}}, as opposed to the usual modern English transcription with {{angbr IPA|ɪ̯ ʊ̯}} is not meaningful in any way. The precise EME realizations are not known, and they vary even in modern English.