Welcome to the History of English Podcast, a podcast about the history of the English language.

This is episode 174, Speak and Spell.

In this episode, we're going to look at how plays composed in the late 1500s provide clues about

the pronunciation of words at the time. Modern scholars have been able to recreate much of that

pronunciation from the way words were used in rhyming poetry.

And during a time when spellings more closely represented the way words were pronounced,

those spellings also provide an important clue.

In fact, it was during this period that one of the first English spelling books was published,

and it proved to be very popular.

This time, we'll look at how spelling books helped to standardize English

spelling even if those spellings didn't match the pronunciations. We'll also continue to look at the

works of William Shakespeare during this period, and we'll examine how his rhymes and spellings reflected the way people spoke at the time.

But before we begin, let me remind you that the website for the podcast is

History of English Podcast dot com and you can sign up to support the podcast and get

bonus episodes at patreon.com slash history of English.

One other quick note before we begin, at the end of the last episode I said I was going to talk about Romeo and Juliet in this episode,

but I was being a bit too optimistic.

I'm not actually going to get to that play this time. The Elizabethan period was an incredibly active time in the history of English, and I think this episode will illustrate that.

William Shakespeare was about to reach his creative peak, and other poets and playwrights were making important contributions, and scholars were busy writing about various aspects of the English language.

So there's a lot to address in these episodes,

and to avoid making this episode over two hours long,

I've decided to save Romeo and Juliet for next time.

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