# Another Accent Question **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [July 27, 2011, 4:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-accent-question/590500 "2011-07-27T16:27:25Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![YourAdHere](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/65b543/32.png) [@YourAdHere](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/YourAdHere)\ **Post date:** [July 27, 2011, 4:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-accent-question/590500/1 "2011-07-27T16:27:25Z")
I seem to recall once hearing that the closest we can come to hearing how Elizabethan English / English in the time of Shakespeare was pronounced is something similar to the New England accent of today. The theory was that the settlers of New England in the 17th century continued to more or less talk the same way, but the people in “Olde England” diverged to their current way or speaking. I am somewhat doubtful, but still curious. Does this claim have any validity whatsoever, or is it complete bs? Thanks in advance. ---
**Author:** ![Shot\_From\_Guns](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ccd318/32.png) [@Shot\_From\_Guns](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shot_From_Guns)\ **Post date:** [July 27, 2011, 4:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-accent-question/590500/2 "2011-07-27T16:43:01Z")
ISTR from my linguistics courses that British English’s shift to being mostly non-rhotic (r-less, e.g., you don’t pronounce the \*r \*in _card_) happened after the American colonies’ split to form a separate country, which is why U.S. English is mostly rhotic (r-full). However, as I’m at work, I can’t pull out a textbook to give you an exact cite, nor can I comment specifically on Shakespeare-era English. If no one else has a better answer by the time I get home, I’ll try to remember to dig something up. ETA: [Here’s a Wikipedia article on rhotic and non-rhotic dialects.](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rhotic_and_non-rhotic_accents) ---
**Author:** ![BDoors](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/e95f7d/32.png) [@BDoors](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BDoors)\ **Post date:** [July 27, 2011, 4:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-accent-question/590500/3 "2011-07-27T16:53:52Z")
There is a bit of a myth about the dialect of Ocracoke Island, North Carolina, having preserved the characteristics of Shakesperian English, but I don’t think it stands up to scrutiny. ---
**Author:** ![bordelond](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bordelond/32/150_2.png) [@bordelond](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bordelond)\ **Post date:** [July 27, 2011, 5:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-accent-question/590500/4 "2011-07-27T17:02:49Z")
> [@YourAdHere](#): > > **The theory was that the settlers of New England in the 17th century continued to more or less talk the same way** , but the people in “Olde England” diverged to their current way or speaking. I am somewhat doubtful, but still curious. Does this claim have any validity whatsoever, or is it complete bs? It is complete BS. The speech of New Englanders has changed considerably over 300 years, as it did in England itself. What has happened instead is that one particular sound change (generally) occured in England that (generally) didn’t occur in America. ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [July 27, 2011, 5:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-accent-question/590500/5 "2011-07-27T17:09:55Z")
The _usual_ pet theory is that it is the Appalachian accent (not New England) that is closest to Shakespearean English. All such theories are nonsense. ---
**Author:** ![YourAdHere](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/65b543/32.png) [@YourAdHere](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/YourAdHere)\ **Post date:** [July 27, 2011, 5:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-accent-question/590500/6 "2011-07-27T17:15:32Z")
Yeah, I was kind of skeptical, bc I had always thought that ALL accents change, so the idea that one (New England) stayed the same, while the other (‘Classic’ England) changed significantly had holes in it. Especially since New Englanders don’t all have one accent, and that New England is hardly an isolated place, it has seen a lot of immigration waves. ---
**Author:** ![YourAdHere](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/65b543/32.png) [@YourAdHere](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/YourAdHere)\ **Post date:** [July 27, 2011, 5:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-accent-question/590500/7 "2011-07-27T17:19:03Z")
Does anyone know where and how this theory might have come about? Is it because of the rhotic / non rhotic split mentioned earlier? Many New England accents also do not pronounce their Rs (“I pahked the cah”…“Ya can’t get theya from heeya”), although in a different way from the many English accents. ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [July 27, 2011, 5:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-accent-question/590500/8 "2011-07-27T17:21:55Z")
There is a long history of people wanting to give their favourite accents some kind of special status. But, this New England thing is not very widespread. As I said before, usually when you hear this theory, it’s about Appalachian mountain accents. ---
**Author:** ![YourAdHere](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/65b543/32.png) [@YourAdHere](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/YourAdHere)\ **Post date:** [July 27, 2011, 5:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-accent-question/590500/9 "2011-07-27T17:22:40Z")
Actually, come to think of it…I have a vague notion of some sort of Shakespearean lines only rhyming if they were pronounced that way or something. But, I mean, who ever said that they ever rhymed perfectly in the first place or were even intended to for that matter? ---
**Author:** ![YourAdHere](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/65b543/32.png) [@YourAdHere](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/YourAdHere)\ **Post date:** [July 27, 2011, 5:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-accent-question/590500/10 "2011-07-27T17:25:53Z")
Ahh interesting, I had not heard it about the Appalachian accents, thank you. Do you know where I could find a good example of one being spoken? I love that speech accent archive site, [http://accent.gmu.edu/](http://accent.gmu.edu/) , and often browse around it. Do you know of any areas off the top of your head that I might listen to to get an idea? ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [July 27, 2011, 5:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-accent-question/590500/11 "2011-07-27T17:27:00Z")
> [@YourAdHere](#): > > Actually, come to think of it…I have a vague notion of some sort of Shakespearean lines only rhyming if they were pronounced that way or something. But, I mean, who ever said that they ever rhymed perfectly in the first place or were even intended to for that matter? There are scholars who have done serious study about what Shakespeare’s accent probably sounded like and you can, I believe, hear people who are trained in using such accents. The same has been done with even older accents, such as Chaucerian English. I’m not an expert in these issues, but these scholars have good reasons to come to the conclusions they have. They don’t claim that their conclusions are inerrant. In the end, like any kind of linguistic reconstruction for language that was not recorded, there will always be uncertainties. ---
**Author:** ![BDoors](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/e95f7d/32.png) [@BDoors](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BDoors)\ **Post date:** [July 27, 2011, 6:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-accent-question/590500/12 "2011-07-27T18:47:38Z")
A couple of plays have been staged in an attempt at the original pronunciation, such as A Midsummer Night’s Dream: [Professor's research allows audience to hear Shakespeare's words in his own accent](http://www.physorg.com/news/2010-10-professor-audience-shakespeare-words-accent.html) . They also did Troilus and Cressida a while back at the Globe in London. Rhymes that no longer work in modern English are big clues, yes. ---
**Author:** ![Shot\_From\_Guns](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ccd318/32.png) [@Shot\_From\_Guns](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shot_From_Guns)\ **Post date:** [July 27, 2011, 6:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-accent-question/590500/13 "2011-07-27T18:51:52Z")
> [@Acsenray](#): > > The same has been done with even older accents, such as Chaucerian English. In my Chaucer class, we each had to choose and memorize a short passage (about a half-dozen lines) from The Canterbury Tales, which we then spoke aloud in class, using the historically correct pronunciations (or as close as we poor undergrads could mangle them to be). Mine included the word “nightingale,” which IIRC ended up as something like “neecht-een-gahl-uh.” ---
**Author:** ![WotNot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/e19b73/32.png) [@WotNot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WotNot)\ **Post date:** [July 27, 2011, 8:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-accent-question/590500/14 "2011-07-27T20:43:34Z")
> [@YourAdHere](#): > > Does anyone know where and how this theory might have come about? I think that what’s happened is that one or more linguists has observed something along the lines of “Accent/dialect X has retained features Y and Z which were common in the English of Shakespeare’s time, but which have since fallen from use in modern British English,” and this has been misinterpreted or misremembered as “accent/dialect X is more like Shakespearean English than any modern British English accent”. ---
**Author:** ![YourAdHere](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/65b543/32.png) [@YourAdHere](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/YourAdHere)\ **Post date:** [July 27, 2011, 9:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-accent-question/590500/15 "2011-07-27T21:10:47Z")
Does the usage of phonetic / non standardized English spelling until the 19th century give us many clues as to how it was pronounced? Or were there similar quirks about spelling such that words weren’t necessarily pronounced the way they were spelled even back then? ---
**Author:** ![medicated](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/7ab992/32.png) [@medicated](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/medicated)\ **Post date:** [July 28, 2011, 2:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-accent-question/590500/16 "2011-07-28T02:51:11Z")
> [@YourAdHere](#): > > Does the usage of phonetic / non standardized English spelling until the 19th century give us many clues as to how it was pronounced? Or were there similar quirks about spelling such that words weren’t necessarily pronounced the way they were spelled even back then? It’s complicated. Remember that the UK is today a place where accents can differ greatly over 20 km, and also that this effect was much more pronounced back then. In the 18th century, for example, the word ‘great’ was pronounced by the Earl of Chesterfield as we do today, and by Sir William Yonge as ‘greet’. Apparently, Yonge’s view was that only the Irish would pronounce the word as ‘grate’. Not sure if anyone can help here, but I also recall (probably in either ‘_The Story of English_’ by McCrum and MacNeil or ‘_The Mother Tongue_’ by Bryson) that during the Elizabethan period, the pronunciation of various word endings was starting to shift, but that the spellling had not yet caught up. There was mention of a book of English pronunciations, wherein the words ‘rose’, ‘roweth’, and ‘rows’ were all identical when spoken. Anyone else familiar with this? ---
**Author:** ![ruadh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/d2c977/32.png) [@ruadh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ruadh)\ **Post date:** [July 28, 2011, 7:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-accent-question/590500/17 "2011-07-28T07:38:20Z")
> [@medicated](#): > > Not sure if anyone can help here, but I also recall (probably in either ‘_The Story of English_’ by McCrum and MacNeil or ‘_The Mother Tongue_’ by Bryson) that during the Elizabethan period, the pronunciation of various word endings was starting to shift, but that the spellling had not yet caught up. There was mention of a book of English pronunciations, wherein the words ‘rose’, ‘roweth’, and ‘rows’ were all identical when spoken. Anyone else familiar with this? No, but neither of those books is a reliable source for linguistic history. On the Elizabethan myth bear in mind that the only British settlement of the US during Elizabethan times was the Lost Colony of Roanoke. The “lost” part of their name might give some indication as to the likelihood of their accents being preserved among any American communities. ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [July 28, 2011, 7:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-accent-question/590500/18 "2011-07-28T07:51:05Z")
> [@YourAdHere](#): > > Actually, come to think of it…I have a vague notion of some sort of Shakespearean lines only rhyming if they were pronounced that way or something. But, I mean, who ever said that they ever rhymed perfectly in the first place or were even intended to for that matter? The trouble with inference based on rhyme is that sometimes, it’s contrived anyway (for example the ‘ripped’ will be pronounced ‘ripd’ or ‘ripp-ed’ depending on the requirement), and sometimes, words are paired that only rhyme on paper (for example ‘food’ and ‘blood’) ---
**Author:** ![Zoe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/a4c791/32.png) [@Zoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zoe)\ **Post date:** [July 28, 2011, 8:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-accent-question/590500/19 "2011-07-28T08:04:35Z")
This paper on the dialect of the Appalachian mountain people rings true to me: [http://www.wvculture.org/history/journal\_wvh/wvh30-2.html](http://www.wvculture.org/history/journal_wvh/wvh30-2.html) The people who lived (and still do in some cases) in the Appalachian mountains have a dialect that combines Elizabethan English with a little bit of border Scottish dialect and a little bit of Ulster Irish. There is even a tad of German. The language of the early settlers to these areas didn’t change much because the mountains kept them from moving on and kept others from moving in much. Of course that couldn’t last forever. I was just amazed at how many of the words and phrases were things that I grew up hearing or still use even though I grew up in West Tennessee which is not in the Appalachian Mountains. But my ancestors came from there. That is not unusual for Middle Tennesseans or West Tennesseans. I was laughing at my own childhood dialect so much that I forgot to notice at first why the Elizabethan was preserved. Apparently James I, following on the heels of Elizabeth I, decided to send a lot of Scots and Englishmen to Ulster Ireland to establish new settlements. Eventually the off-spring of these settlers moved on to the Colonies and down into the Southern mountains. They took their language (a nice mixture by now) with them. Our “errors” were not so erroneous after all, but I’m pleased that mother taught me a current dialect. I didn’t, however, play the “pianna” the way that she did. “But hit don’t make me no never mind. What you 'low?” **Zeldar** , I think you will find this article interesting. We both know a certain Southern lady that sometimes dropped her “r’s.” I loved to hear her pronounce “water” as _wawh-tah_ – with the last syllable expressed softly in the back of the throat. It made me even thirstier. There were and are a lot of pure Anglo-Saxon usages too. It’s in the article. ---
**Author:** ![Zoe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/a4c791/32.png) [@Zoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zoe)\ **Post date:** [July 28, 2011, 8:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-accent-question/590500/20 "2011-07-28T08:23:26Z")
Please excuse the double post. This paper approaches the notion of the preservation of any Elizabethan English as being a myth: [http://www.cas.sc.edu/engl/dictionary/articles/speaklikeshakespeare.pdf](http://www.cas.sc.edu/engl/dictionary/articles/speaklikeshakespeare.pdf) This is a more recent paper. In fairness though, the writer seems to confuse the idea of speaking a mixture of Elizabethan English (with other influences) with speaking like Shakespeare! There is a great difference in the two claims. No one else spoke like Shakespeare! And no one is claiming that these settlers came directly from England at the time of Elizabeth I with the language perfectly in tact – having it remain so until this day.