#  -ough words Third Group 

 



 The third group is more heterogeneous than the other two, which derive in regular ways from Middle English sounds.

 **Through** and **thorough** derive from the same Old English word *þurh*. By a common sound change known as **metathesis**, the vowel and \[r\] switched positions in some dialects, which led to a proliferation of Middle English pronunciations and spellings. The *u* -sound was initially short and lax (\[ʊ\]), which helps explain why it did not go through the Great Vowel Shift and become the diphthong \[aʊ)\] as in *plow*. The sound was subsequently tensed as \[u\], giving the current prounciation of *through.*

 **Thorough** (as the early stressed form of *through*) and **borough** (OE *burh*) have a similar history in the development of a second syllable after the introduction of a sympathetic vowel. (A current example of a sympathetic vowel is commonly heard with *realtor*, pronounced with a third syllable.)

 An early example of the different pronunciations this version of *-ough* may attain is with the word **slough** (noun). It is even spelled two different ways in John Bunyan's *Pilgrim's Progress* in the late 17th century:

 "They drew near to a very Miry **Slough** ... The name of the **Slow** was Dispond"

 Bunyan, *Pilgrim's Progress* I.9

 **Slough,** meaning a swampy depression or waterway, has two current pronunciations: \[slaʊ\], which is more British, and \[slu\], which is more American. The latter seems to be Starbuck's pronunciation, otherwise there would be no rhyme for "through." There are a variety of Middle English spellings which suggest variant pronunciations for the vowel, either \[u:\] or \[o:\]. How might this hypothesis account for today's different dialectal pronunciations?