19th century accounts of local English in the Teme [Chamberlain] and
Avon [Salusbury] Valleys in Herefordshire (Teme only) and
Worcestershire report 'Ooster' for 'Worcester', 'Ood' for 'would',
'Ooman' for 'woman', where 'Oo' represents probably the short
equivalent of the vowel in 'ooze'. I have heard some of these in
speech, but that would have been in the 1950s to 1970s and from very
old speakers (born before 1890). But never afaicr for words such as
'word' or 'work'.
Best wishes,
Gordon
<
gordonselway@...>
At 12:58 UT on Thursday, July 15th 2004, Brian M. Scott wrote:
>At 7:00:29 AM on Thursday, July 15, 2004, tgpedersen wrote:
>
>> *va- > *vo- > *o- is common in Danish. Besides (w)ooze, do
>> you know of other similar examples in English (esp. the
>> *wo- > *o- part)?
>
>Only in dialect. I don't know the geographical details, but
>Scots had <oo>, <oull> 'wool' in the 16th century.
>
>Brian