After Chaucer, Northumbrian English became a mere popular dialect no longer represented in literature. But the form of Northumbrian spoken north of the Tweed, Lowland Scotch, has during the next three hundred years quite a different history. From the Scottish war of Independence to the Union of the Crowns, Scotland had its own literary language. It is customary to speak of three periods of Scottish language and literature as Old, Middle and New: Old Scotch extending down to about 1450; Middle Scotch to the Union of the Crowns; and New Scotch covering the period after the Union. This is, of course, simply a Northern and later form of the Northumbrian we have discussed above.
[15. Some Characteristics of Scotch. O. E. ă, ā.]
There are no monuments in O. Sco. dating back to the 13th or first half of the 14th Century. The first of any importance that we have is "The Bruce" of 1375. By this time the language of Scotland had already undergone many changes that made its general character quite different from literary or Midland English. None of these changes tended so much to differentiate the two as the very different development of O. E. long and short a. In the south O. E. a > ē (name > nę̄m > nēm); but O. E. ā > ǭ, later ō (stān > stǭn > stōne, hām > hǭm > hōme). The change of ā to ǭ (probably about 1200) took place before that of ă to ā, else they would have coincided and both developed to ō or ē. The last is precisely what took place in Scotland. O. Nhb. ă > ā and early coincided with original ā, and along with it developed to later ē, as only short a did in the south. The two appear together in rhyme in Barbour. Their graphic representation is a, ai, ay. The sound in Barbour is probably ǣ or ę̄. In "Wallace" Fr. entré is also written entray, entra. Fr. a and ei and Eng. diphthong ai (< æg) rhyme regularly with Sco. a, ay, ai, from O. E. ā. On O. E. and O. N. ā- and M. Sco. ē-sounds in general see Curtis, §§ 1-165.
[16. Curtis's Table.]
The following (see Curtis §§ 144-145) illustrates the development of O. E. ă, and ā, in England and Scotland:
| 1. Central Scotland. | { { | O. E. ă O. E. ā | } } | > an ē-vowel. |
| 2. S. Scotland and Ellis's D. 31[.2.]in England. | { { | O. E. ă O. E. ā | } } | > ē > an i-fracture in the mdn. diall. |
| 3. The rest of Northern England and Midland. | { { { { | O. E. ă | { { { { | > an ē-vowel > ē, later ī-fracture in D 25, 26, 28, 29. |
| { { | O. E. ā > ō or ū,with fracture. | |||
| 4. Southern England | { { | O. E. ă > an e-fracture or i-fracture. O. E. ā > ā > ūor ō. | ||
In 1. O. E. hām > hēm, năme > nēm.
In 2. hām > hēm > hiəm, năme > nēm > niəm.
In 3. hām > hōm, hoəm, hoᵘm or hūm with fracture.
năme > nēm.