From ȳg in drȳge we have dreie, but also drye.
O. E. ō. Gower, like Chaucer, rhymes the word do (misdo, undo, &c.), and occasionally to in therto, with words that have ǭ derived from ā, not only so, also, two, wo, but also tho, adv. (i. 2609, iii. 683, v. 5331, &c.), go, ago (ii. 2483, 3513, iv. 1161, 3465, v. 5173, &c.), overmo (i. 2385), no (v. 4776), fo (iv. 3407). These words also rhyme with proper names, such as Juno, Lichao, Babio. The other forms of do, as doth, don, rhyme nearly always with ọ̄, but once we have doth : goth, v. 3967 f., and once don : anon, v. 3627 f. The rhyme soth : goth also occurs, v. 1579 f. This latter class of rhyme, as don : anon, don : gon, sothe : bothe, soth : wroth, occurs frequently in Chaucer’s earlier work, as the Book of the Duchess, but much less so in the later.
These rhymes, like those of hom with com, &c., noticed above under ā, are to be explained as due to scarcity of exactly corresponding rhyme words. The only exact rhyme for do and to is in fact schoo, which is found in Prol. 356, but obviously could not be of frequent occurrence. The explanation given by ten Brink, Chaucers Sprache, § 31, and repeated mechanically by others, is that certain words which have ǭ from ā, as wo, two, so (swā), may equally have ọ̄ upon occasion owing to the influence of w. This is shown to be wrong both by the fact that the rhymes in question are, as we have seen, by no means confined to these words, and by the absence of other evidence in the case of wo and so that they ever had a tendency to ọ̄. The fact that the rhyme do : so is by far the commonest instance is due simply to the more frequent occasion for using the words.
In the rhyme glove : love, v. 7047 f., we have to deal with ọ̄, and there can be no question here of love from lufian. Both sense and rhyme point to a verb love corresponding to the substantive lof or love, mod. luff, and signifying the action of bringing a ship’s head up nearer to the wind. The other rhymes used with glove are behove, Prol. 357, prove, iii. 2153.
We may note that wowe from wōgian rhymes with bowe (būgan), which does not fit in with ten Brink’s very questionable theory about the development of ou (ow), Chaucers Sprache, § 46, Anm.
(3) Romance Vowels. A few notes only will be added here to what has already been said in the Introduction to Gower’s French Works.
Words with -oun (-on) ending, as condicioun (-on), opinioun (-on), &c., rhyme only among themselves or with toun, doun, &c. There are no rhymes like Chaucer’s proporcion : upon, and it is to be noted especially that the rhyming of proper names in -on, as Salamon, Acteon, &c., with this class of words, which is very common in Chaucer, does not occur in Gower’s English, though we occasionally find it in his French. At the same time the possibility of such rhymes cannot be denied, for we have toun : Ylioun, v. 7235 f., and Lamedon : Jasoun, v. 7197 f.
Adjectives in -ous do not rhyme with -us, as in Chaucer Aurelius : amorous, Theseüs : desirous.
The terminations -arie, -orie are not used at all, but instead of them the French forms -aire, -oire, as adversaire, contraire, necessaire, gloire, histoire, memoire, purgatoire, victoire. Latin proper names in o rhyme with ǭ, as Cithero (: also), Leo (: also), Phito (: tho), Juno (: so, tho), &c., but also in several cases with do. There seems no sufficient reason to suppose, as ten Brink does, that they regularly had ọ̄.
(4) Consonants. The termination -liche (-lich) in adjectives and adverbs, which Fahrenberg judging by the rhymes sets down as very uncommon compared with -ly, is by far the more usual of the two. It is true that -ly occurs more frequently in rhyme, but that is due chiefly to the greater abundance of rhyme words corresponding to it, e.g. forthi, by, cri, merci, enemy: we have, however, redely : properly, Prol. 947 f. The general rule of usage is this: -ly usually in rhyme (but besiliche : swiche, iv. 1235 f.), and before a consonant in cases where the metre requires a single syllable, as i. 2069, ‘Al prively behinde his bak’ (but frendlich, viii. 2173), -liche or -lich before a vowel, as i. 373, ‘That ronne besiliche aboute,’ cp. ii. 1695, v. 1247, and -liche of course where two syllables are required, as i. 1035, ‘Was thanne al openliche schewed,’ so ii. 918, iv. 57, and compare also iii. 2065 f.,