This is a presentation of the phonological history of the Scots language. Scots has its origins in Old English (OE) via early Northern Middle English; though loanwords from Old Norse and Romance sources are common, especially from ecclesiastical and legal Latin, Anglo-Norman and Middle French borrowings. Trade and immigration led to some borrowings from Middle Low German and Middle Dutch. Some vocabulary has been borrowed from Scotland's other language, Scottish Gaelic. Consonants Instance of between and a following or /r/ were lost or did not develop: OE æmerġe → Modern Scots emmers and English embers OE þȳmel → Modern Scots thimmle and English thimble OE timber → Modern Scots timmer and English timber Certain clusters were reduced: A word-final reduced to except in some inflected forms (e.g. Modern Scots act, expect, strict). reduced to in final position (e.g. Modern Scots attempt, corrupt). Note that the English words like empty that come from OE words that did not have a cluster also don’t have clusters in Scots (in this case, OE æmetiġ became Scots empy). often reduced to (e.g. OE frēond, 'friend', became Modern Scots freend). Final often reduced to (e.g. Modern Scots auld 'old'). OE and clusters appeared word-initially, though this feature is now highly recessive (e.g. knaw, 'know'; gnegum, 'tricky nature'). While OE became in Modern English, Scots has retained the original pronunciation (e.g. OE sċylfe, 'shelf', became skelf). Old English became when adjacent to a front vowel (e.g. shinners from OE sinder, 'cinder'). OE was often dropped in certain contexts: OE delfan → Modern Scots del and English delve OE dēofol → Modern Scots deil and English devil OE dufe → Modern Scots dou and English dove OE ġefan → Modern Scots gie and English give In contexts where OE and palatalized to and , respectively, in Modern English (that is, after a front vowel), Scots has retained the original velar pronunciation: OE birċe → Scots birk and English birch OE brēċ → Scots breeks and English britches OE þæċ → Scots thack and English thatch OE ġiċċan → Scots yeuk and English itch OE hryċġ → Scots rig and English ridge Word final OE (written or ) was deleted in a few words (e.g. OE mūþ, 'mouth', became mou in Scots). OE was lost in English, but remained in Scots, spelled : OE beorht → Modern Scots bricht and English bright OE hlōh → Modern Scots lauch