Etymology - Word Origins .htm
Old English had a consistent orthography

Compared to the current English orthography, Anglo Saxon - the source of 85% of our most frequetly used words - had a consistent spelling. We still spell many of these words the same way, but we do not pronounce them the same as they were pronounced prior to 1400.

The traditional speling has been characterized as historic rather than phonemic because it represents an older pronunciation -- not the current one.

Historically, Anglo Saxon vowels were the same as continental Europe: the long vowels were a: e: i: o: u: not the diphthongs ei i: ai ou iu. The long a was ah, the long e was close to /ei/ or the final vowel in resumé or naiveté and the long o was a sound close to "awe".

It is often said that Language is a graveyard of dead metaphors. A similar statement can be made about almost every aspect of written language.

The shwa or turned e [] is represented below as a'
In old English, it was often represented as e or a.

Anglo Saxon Sound Spelling CCS English Sound Spelling CCS
break
bake
beer
deep
curs
stan
diacon - servant		 bre:a'k
ba:ka' (bah-kuh)
be:a'
de:op, dea'p
c'rs
stan (staan)
dia'kon		 break
bake
beer
deep
curse
stone
deacon		 breik (breh-eek)
beik
be:a' (bir)
dip
c'rs
sto'n
di'kn
ere, eyra, oor, ear
earl
cra:we		 e:a'
e:a'
crawa'		 ear
earl
crow		 ei:a' (ir - eer)

cro'
do:tter (ON)
kuga, kue, cow
hete
hoer
heorte
heap
feed
heah (har-ON)		 dotr
kau
heta'
har
hart
he:a'p
fe:a'd
he:a'		 daughter
cow
hate
hair
heart
heap
feed
high		 dota' (dotr)
kau
heit
her
hart
hi'p
fi'd
h'y

This page is in construction and would benefit from the comments and contributions of scholars. The purpose is to underline the fact that TO is based on history and etymology and semi-consistent morphology rather than pronunciation. I don't think that anyone disputes this fact. There are those that defend it and those who believe that the spelling system should be alphabetical. The way a word is spelled should indicate its pronunciation. Etymology and history should be left to dictionaries and other reference books.

Magic E
E serves as

1.a letter in its own ryt: usually e, e:, ei, i:, or shwa.
2.a magic letter as in lace where it works at a distance to change e. into ee [i:].
3.an assistant to d in past tense where it is sometimes pronounced as shwa but usually silent.
4.an assistant to s in 3rd person verbs
5.a softener of g
6.a softener of c
7.a hardener of v (so as not to confuse with f)
8.an extender marker in digrafs (including with itself)