John Larrysson's Column: W and Vowels
文章日期：2022年3月18日
Except for WR- and WH-, the letter W is followed by a vowel at the start of a word. Examples include: water, web, wick and work. Double letter vowels are included as well, such as: waist, week, wield and wool. All of these examples are from Old English. WU- is less common except for borrowed words such as Wuhan and wurst. That would make sense since W started its life as UU and WU or UW suggests a ridiculous UUU spelling.
When W is the second letter after a consonant, the most common combinations are DW, SW and TW. Earlier I covered those other combinations. (link.mingpao.com/72699.htm) Today I will focus on vowel-W at the end of a word.
W after a vowel is found at the end of a word in both Old and Modern English. The word feawe (spelt with wynn as feaǷe) became the Modern English few, as niwe (niǷe) became new, as mædwe (mædǷe) became meadow and flowan (floǷan) became flow. There are a few awfully awkward exceptions such as owl, award and own. However they were not exceptions in their original forms. The word award is from the French aguarder. The Old English and Middle English spellings for owl and own didn't have a W. Our Modern English vowel + W spelling patterns are consistent going back to their Old English roots.
The OW ending can be a long O as in snow or the OW /aʊ/ diphthong as in cow. This OW spelling results in four words with two different pronunciations all being spelled b – o - w: (noun 1) a knot with loops, tied with a ribbon, (noun 2) a device for shooting arrows, (verb) to lower one's head respectfully and (noun 3) the front end of a ship.
The EW ending can be a long O as in sew, a long OO as screw or even a long U sound as in few or ewe. The AW ending is very variable with different native speakers using different pronunciations varying from short O (in parts of the US) to an AW diphthong as in saw. (In non-rhotic British accents, aw and or sounds the same, so saw sounds like sore or flaw like floor etc.)
As I covered in the earlier W articles, there are exceptions to these patterns. Most W words are from Old English, since historic Latin and Old French did not have a W. The word vowel, as used in this article, is one of those exceptions. It came into Middle English in the 1300s from Old French word voieul (Modern French voyelle).
The letter W, when paired with a vowel, is usually found at the front of a word before the vowel or at the end of a word after the vowel.
Related Articles:
‧AW
‧B
‧CK
‧CC
‧SC
‧Silent D Is Not Always Silent
‧D
‧Hard And Soft G Spelling Patterns
‧No English words end with the letter i?
‧Old English Spelling Patterns with K
‧Foreign spelling patterns with K
‧NG
‧When is Initial U Short and when is it Long?
‧X
‧Pronouncing The Letter Y At The Front Of A Word
‧Pronouncing The Letter Y In The Middle Of A Word
‧Pronouncing The letter Y At The End Of A Word
‧The letter Y & The Double Vowel Rule
‧The Last Letter is a Foreigner
‧Silent letters and why English spelling is such a mess (1): Old English
‧Silent letters and why English spelling is such a mess (2): Fake Latin
‧I Both Love and Hate Spell-Checkers
‧The Rule: I before E, except after C
by John Larrysson [email protected]
A native English speaker who has been teaching practical English in Hong Kong for over two decades.
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