Underwoods/Common Scottish Vowel Sounds

by Robert Louis Stevenson

BOOK II.—In Scots

TABLE OF COMMON SCOTTISH VOWEL SOUNDS.

ae ai	$\scriptstyle {\left.{\begin{matrix}\ \\\ \end{matrix}}\right\}\,}$	= open A as in rare.
a' au aw	$\scriptstyle {\left.{\begin{matrix}\ \\\ \end{matrix}}\right\}\,}$	= AW as in law.
ea = open E as in mere, but this with exceptions, as heather = heather, wean = wain, lear = lair.
ee ei ie	$\scriptstyle {\left.{\begin{matrix}\ \\\ \end{matrix}}\right\}\,}$	= open E as in mere.
oa = open O as in more.
ou = doubled O as in poor.
ow = OW as in bower.
u = doubled O as in poor.
ui or ü before R = (say roughly) open A as in rare.
ui or ü before any other consonant = (say roughly) close I as in grin.
y = open I as in kite.
i = pretty nearly what you please, much as in English. Heaven guide the reader through that labyrinth! But in Scots it dodges usually from the short I, as in grin, to the open E, as in mere. Find and blind, I may remark, are pronounced to rhyme with the preterite of grin.