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These apostrophes widely used in poetry, but rarely in prose, and only between the 16th and 19th centuries.

In Shakespeare's time, there were two ways to pronounce many regular past tenses of English verbs. For example, you could either pronounce expressed as express'd, to rhyme with best, or you could pronounce it expressèd, to rhyme with less said. In earlier Middle English, past tenses were always pronounced /-ɛd/, but by the time Shakespeare wrote, dropping the /ɛ/ was common.

Poets in Shakespeare's times used this freedom in pronunciation to make their poetry scan. For example, in the line from Shakespeare's Sonnet LIV,

When summer's breath their masked buds discloses,

you need to pronounce maskèd with two syllables for it to scan. But in the line from Sonnet XXXIII,

The region cloude hath mask'd him from me now.

mask'd needs to be pronounced with one syllable for it to scan.

Poets generally (not always) used apostrophes to tell the reader how to pronounce it — expressed would be pronounced with three syllables, while express'd would be pronounced with two syllables.

For prose, where it didn't matter how it was pronounced, the spelling was almost always without an apostrophe, like the modern spelling, and the reader was free to pronounce it however they wanted.

Many poets kept up this convention through the early 19th century, well after the /ɛ/ was dropped in non-poetic speech, as it was so convenient to be able to adjust the number of syllables in your lines to make them scan. For example, in 1820 Keats wrote

I saw their starv'd lips in the gloom
With horrid warning gaped wide,
And I awoke, and found me here
On the cold hill side

-- La Belle Dame sans Merci

Here, to make it scan, gaped needs to have two syllables, and starv'd just one.

Looking through Google books, it seems that by the 1840s, many editors reprinting older poetry had stopped using mask'd to indicate the one-syllable pronunciation, undoubtedly because most readers didn't read mask'd any differently than masked. And by the 1860s, some editors had started using maskèd with an accent on the e to make this distinction

These apostrophes were widely used in poetry, but rarely in prose, and only between the 16th and 19th centuries.

In Shakespeare's time, there were two ways to pronounce many regular past tenses of English verbs. For example, you could either pronounce expressed as express'd, to rhyme with best, or you could pronounce it expressèd, to rhyme with less said. In earlier Middle English, past tenses were always pronounced /-ɛd/, but by the time Shakespeare wrote, dropping the /ɛ/ was common.

Poets in Shakespeare's times used this freedom in pronunciation to make their poetry scan. For example, in the line from Shakespeare's Sonnet LIV,

When summer's breath their masked buds discloses,

you need to pronounce maskèd with two syllables for it to scan. But in the line from Sonnet XXXIII,

The region cloude hath mask'd him from me now.

mask'd needs to be pronounced with one syllable for it to scan.

Poets generally (not always) used apostrophes to tell the reader how to pronounce it — expressed would be pronounced with three syllables, while express'd would be pronounced with two syllables.

For prose, where it didn't matter how it was pronounced, the spelling was almost always without an apostrophe, like the modern spelling, and the reader was free to pronounce it however they wanted.

Many poets kept up this convention through the early 19th century, well after the /ɛ/ was dropped in non-poetic speech, as it was so convenient to be able to adjust the number of syllables in your lines to make them scan. For example, in 1820 Keats wrote

I saw their starv'd lips in the gloom
With horrid warning gaped wide,
And I awoke, and found me here
On the cold hill side

-- La Belle Dame sans Merci

Here, to make it scan, gaped needs to have two syllables, and starv'd just one.

Looking through Google Books, it seems that by the 1840s, many editors reprinting older poetry had stopped using mask'd to indicate the one-syllable pronunciation, undoubtedly because most readers didn't read mask'd any differently than masked. And by the 1860s, some editors had started using maskèd with an accent on the e to make this distinction

These apostrophes were never used in prose, just in poetry, and only between the 16th and 19th centuries.

In Shakespeare's time, there were two ways to pronounce many regular past tenses of English verbs. For example, you could either pronounce expressed as express'd, to rhyme with best, or you could pronounce it expressèd, to rhyme with less said. In earlier Middle English, past tenses were always pronounced /-ɛd/, but by the time Shakespeare wrote, dropping the /ɛ/ was common.

Poets in Shakespeare's times used this freedom in pronunciation to make their poetry scan. For example, in the line from Shakespeare's Sonnet LIV,

When summer's breath their masked buds discloses,

you need to pronounce maskèd with two syllables for it to scan. But in the line from Sonnet XXXIII,

The region cloude hath mask'd him from me now.

mask'd needs to be pronounced with one syllable for it to scan.

Poets generally (not always) used apostrophes to tell the reader how to pronounce it — expressed would be pronounced with three syllables, while express'd would be pronounced with two syllables.

For prose, where it didn't matter how it was pronounced, the spelling was almost always the same as the modern spelling, with no apostrophe, and the reader was free to pronounce it however they wanted.

Many poets kept up this convention through the early 19th century, well after the /ɛ/ was always dropped in non-poetic speech, as it was so convenient to be able to adjust the number of syllables in your lines to make them scan. For example, in 1820 Keats wrote

I saw their starv'd lips in the gloom
With horrid warning gaped wide,
And I awoke, and found me here
On the cold hill side

-- La Belle Dame sans Merci

Here, to make it scan, gaped needs to have two syllables, and starv'd just one.

Looking through Google books, it seems that by the 1840s, many editors reprinting older poetry had stopped using mask'd to indicate the one-syllable pronunciation, undoubtedly because most readers didn't read mask'd any differently than masked. And by the 1860s, some editors had started using maskèd with an accent on the e to make this distinction

These apostrophes widely used in poetry, but rarely in prose, and only between the 16th and 19th centuries.

In Shakespeare's time, there were two ways to pronounce many regular past tenses of English verbs. For example, you could either pronounce expressed as express'd, to rhyme with best, or you could pronounce it expressèd, to rhyme with less said. In earlier Middle English, past tenses were always pronounced /-ɛd/, but by the time Shakespeare wrote, dropping the /ɛ/ was common.

Poets in Shakespeare's times used this freedom in pronunciation to make their poetry scan. For example, in the line from Shakespeare's Sonnet LIV,

When summer's breath their masked buds discloses,

you need to pronounce maskèd with two syllables for it to scan. But in the line from Sonnet XXXIII,

The region cloude hath mask'd him from me now.

mask'd needs to be pronounced with one syllable for it to scan.

Poets generally (not always) used apostrophes to tell the reader how to pronounce it — expressed would be pronounced with three syllables, while express'd would be pronounced with two syllables.

For prose, where it didn't matter how it was pronounced, the spelling was almost always without an apostrophe, like the modern spelling, and the reader was free to pronounce it however they wanted.

Many poets kept up this convention through the early 19th century, well after the /ɛ/ was dropped in non-poetic speech, as it was so convenient to be able to adjust the number of syllables in your lines to make them scan. For example, in 1820 Keats wrote

I saw their starv'd lips in the gloom
With horrid warning gaped wide,
And I awoke, and found me here
On the cold hill side

-- La Belle Dame sans Merci

Here, to make it scan, gaped needs to have two syllables, and starv'd just one.

Looking through Google books, it seems that by the 1840s, many editors reprinting older poetry had stopped using mask'd to indicate the one-syllable pronunciation, undoubtedly because most readers didn't read mask'd any differently than masked. And by the 1860s, some editors had started using maskèd with an accent on the e to make this distinction

These apostrophes were never used in prose, just in poetry, and only between the 16th and 19th centuries.

In Shakespeare's time, there were two ways to pronounce many regular past tenses of English verbs. For example, you could either pronounce expressed as express'd, to rhyme with best, or you could pronounce it expressèd, to rhyme with less said. In earlier Middle English, past tenses were always pronounced /-ɛd/, but by the time Shakespeare wrote, dropping the /ɛ/ was common.

Poets in Shakespeare's times used this freedom in pronunciation to make their poetry scan. For example, in the line from Shakespeare's Sonnet LIV,

When summer's breath their masked buds discloses,

you need to pronounce maskèd with two syllables for it to scan. But in the line from Sonnet XXXIII,

The region cloud hath mask'd him from me now.

mask'd needs to be pronounced with one syllable for it to scan.

Poets generally (not always) used apostrophes to tell the reader how to pronounce it — expressed would be pronounced with three syllables, while express'd would be pronounced with two syllables.

For prose, where it didn't matter how it was pronounced, the spelling was almost always the same as the modern spelling, with no apostrophe, and the reader was free to pronounce it however they wanted.

Many poets kept up this convention through the early 19th century, well after the /ɛ/ was always dropped in non-poetic speech, as it was so convenient to be able to adjust the number of syllables in your lines to make them scan. For example, in 1820 Keats wrote

I saw their starv'd lips in the gloom
With horrid warning gaped wide,
And I awoke, and found me here
On the cold hill side

-- La Belle Dame sans Merci

Here, to make it scan, gaped needs to have two syllables, and starv'd just one.

These apostrophes were never used in prose, just in poetry, and only between the 16th and 19th centuries.

In Shakespeare's time, there were two ways to pronounce many regular past tenses of English verbs. For example, you could either pronounce expressed as express'd, to rhyme with best, or you could pronounce it expressèd, to rhyme with less said. In earlier Middle English, past tenses were always pronounced /-ɛd/, but by the time Shakespeare wrote, dropping the /ɛ/ was common.

Poets in Shakespeare's times used this freedom in pronunciation to make their poetry scan. For example, in the line from Shakespeare's Sonnet LIV,

When summer's breath their masked buds discloses,

you need to pronounce maskèd with two syllables for it to scan. But in the line from Sonnet XXXIII,

The region cloude hath mask'd him from me now.

mask'd needs to be pronounced with one syllable for it to scan.

Poets generally (not always) used apostrophes to tell the reader how to pronounce it — expressed would be pronounced with three syllables, while express'd would be pronounced with two syllables.

For prose, where it didn't matter how it was pronounced, the spelling was almost always the same as the modern spelling, with no apostrophe, and the reader was free to pronounce it however they wanted.

Many poets kept up this convention through the early 19th century, well after the /ɛ/ was always dropped in non-poetic speech, as it was so convenient to be able to adjust the number of syllables in your lines to make them scan. For example, in 1820 Keats wrote

I saw their starv'd lips in the gloom
With horrid warning gaped wide,
And I awoke, and found me here
On the cold hill side

-- La Belle Dame sans Merci

Here, to make it scan, gaped needs to have two syllables, and starv'd just one.

Looking through Google books, it seems that by the 1840s, many editors reprinting older poetry had stopped using mask'd to indicate the one-syllable pronunciation, undoubtedly because most readers didn't read mask'd any differently than masked. And by the 1860s, some editors had started using maskèd with an accent on the e to make this distinction