Re: [tied] Re: Laryngeals revisited

At 2:23:11 PM on Thursday, June 30, 2005, Rob wrote:

> English back vowels retain their quality both before and
> after labial glides, e.g.:

> 'water' (otherwise would be pronounced as 'waiter'),

Or to rhyme with <hatter>: spellings like <wat(t)re> suggest
ME /wAt&r/, not /wA:t&r/, in at least some dialects.
(Doesn't Scots mostly have [a], from a short vowel?)

> 'wolf' (otherwise as with the /O/ ~ /A/ in 'pot')
> 'draw' (otherwise as with the /au/ in 'drought'),

Not really an example of retention: /drAGAn/ > /drAU&(n)/ >
/drAU/ > /drO:/. <Drought> is completely different, being
from OE <drúgað>: the vowel is OE /u:/ > ME /u:/ > PDE /AU/.

> English /l/ also preserves back vowels -- compare 'talk'
> and 'walk' vs. 'tack' and 'whack'.

Again, it isn't a matter of preservation: ME /tAlk&(n)/ >
EME /tAU(l)k/ > PDE /tO:k/.

Brian