Specimens of English literature from the 'Ploughmans crede' to the ...

XviINTR OD UC TION.;A stroke over a vowel signifies 7?i or ?i ; as in su, h'l, hoiid,meaning suw, \\\?n, houwd.An upward curl, above the line, signifies er ; as in vian^,s^ue, for man^r, s^rue (serve). But if this symbol followsthe letter />, it means re ; as in p^che for prt'che. It arosefrom a roughly written e, the letter r being tmderstood.A small undotted i above the line means ri, the letter rbeing understood, as before ; hence p'lice, c^st. for pnhce,cr/st (Christ).A roughly written a (cu) in like manner stands for raas in g"a\ py, for gr^rce, pr^y.A curl, of a form which arose from a roughly written v(for It) signifies ur ; as in tne, o, for tz^rne, our.The reason for the upward curlafter p being used for re,arose from the fact that there was already a way of writingper, viz. b}- drawing a stroke through the tail of the p; as inpi7, for pt^ril. Sometimes this sign stood for par; as in p/yfor party.A similar stroke, but curling, enabled the scribe to abbreviatepro.Thus we have ^^tc, ^ue, for pr