developed to (e.g. palm). The of the late 17th century has generally backed to in several varieties of contemporary English, for example in Received Pronunciation. The following table shows some developments of Middle English in Received Pronunciation. The word gate, which derived from Middle English , has also been included for comparison. The table below shows the results of these developments in some contemporary varieties of English: * May undergo -tensing. Old and Middle English Old English (OE) had an open back vowel , written , as well as a front vowel , written . These had corresponding long vowels and but were not normally distinguished from the short vowels in spelling although modern editions of Old English texts often mark them as and . In the low vowel area, there was also a pair of short and long diphthongs, and , written (the long one also in modern editions). In Middle English (ME), the short became merged into a single vowel , written . In some cases (before certain pairs of consonants) the corresponding long vowels also developed into this short . Mostly, however, OE and were raised to become Middle English (the sound that often gives in modern spelling), and OE was raised and rounded to become ME (often , in modern spelling). For more details, see English historical vowel correspondences. During the Middle English period, like other short vowels, the was lengthened in open syllables. Later, with the gradual loss of unstressed endings, many such syllables ceased to be open, but the vowel remained long. For example, the word name originally had two syllables, the first being open, so the was lengthened; later, the final vowel was dropped, leaving a closed syllable with a long vowel. As a result, there were now two phonemes and , both written , the long one being often indicated by a silent after the following consonant (or, in some cases, by a pronounced vowel after the following consonant, as in naked and bacon). Further development of Middle English As a result of the Great Vowel Shift, the long that resulted from Middle English open syllable lengthening was raised, initially to and later to . "seems to have been the normal pronunciation in careful speech before 1650, and after 1650". After 1700 it was raised even further, and then diphthongized, leading to the modern standard pronunciation , found in words like name,