As with other languages, you need to have the nerve to make mistakes in order to progress in oral reading. While I encourage you to use the other resources listed here to learn to pronounce Middle English more precisely, what I’m most interested in is that you should get some sense of how a poem like Sir Gawain and the Green Knight or the Alliterative Morte Arthur works through its sounds. Ou, ow, ough – rather like know: use this sound when the modern word has a similar sound, or, before -ght, a sound as in law Faking It Ou, ow, ough – as in moon: use this sound when the modern word is like house, course, or through There are exceptions to these notes about long vowels: these include the fact that a and o are usually short when followed by f, s, th, and r.Īi, ay, ei, ey – aim for something between the sounds in lake and likeĮu, ew – rather like few while there is another, somewhat different sound also corresponding to this spelling, this sound should get you started

Words spelled with -oo today are always long, even if we now pronounce them with short vowels. When is a vowel long? Single vowels and digraphs (a combination of two letters to represent one sound, as in sea or see) are long if the modern word has a long vowel or a diphthong. O, oo – as in law: use this sound when the modern word is like most, stone, throat

O, oo – as in German Sohn, French chose: use this sound when the modern word is like food, good, blood, other Long VowelsĮ, ee, ie – as in German sehen, French été: use this sound when the modern word has a sound like he, seeĮ, ee – as in there: use this sound when the modern word has -ea, as in speak, dream, and also head, bread

Exceptions are words like bread, breath, dead, heaven, where the vowel is like French père and gone and hot, where the vowel is like law. When is a vowel short? Single vowels before single or double consonants usually are short if the same word has a short vowel today.

Middle english dictionary online