Old English is so far removed from Modern English that one may take it for an entirely different language. This is largely due to the peculiarities of its pronunciation. The survey of Old English phonetics deals with word stress, the system of vowels and consonants and their origin. The Old English sound system developed from the Proto Germanic system. It underwent multiple changes in the pre-written periods of history, especially in Early Old English. The system of word stress inherited from Proto Germanic underwent no changes in Early Old English. Word stress was fixed. It remained on the same syllable in different grammatical forms of the word and, as a rule, did not shift in word building either.