century before Christ, than has since been anywhere effected. Our notions on the early civilisation of the East are of so abstract a nature that we must expect to be startled occasionally by facts like these. But we now pass on to the general question.
Consonants and Vowels.
If we regard the human voice as a continuous stream of air, emitted as breath from the lungs and changed into vocal sound as it leaves the larynx, this stream itself, as modified by certain positions of the mouth, would represent the vowels. "The vowels," as Professor Wheatstone says, "are formed by the voice modified, but not interrupted, by the various positions of the tongue and the lips." In the consonants, on the contrary, we should have to recognise a number of stops opposing for a moment the free passage of this vocal stream. These consonantal stops, against which the waves of the vowels break themselves more or less distinctly, are produced by barriers formed by the contact of the tongue, the soft palate, the palate, the teeth, and the lips with each other.
Consonants.
Gutturals, Dentals, and Labials.
According to an observation which we find already in Vaidik grammars, the principal consonantal stops in any language are:—
- the guttural (k),
- the dental (t),
- the labial (p).
The pure guttural sound, without any regard as yet to its modifications (whether tenuis, media, aspirata, nasalis, semi-vocalis, or flatus), is produced by stopping the stream of sound by means of a contact between the root of the tongue and the throat, or, more correctly, the soft palate, or the velum pendulum. The throat is called the "place," the root of the tongue the "instrument," of the guttural.
The pure dental sound is produced by contact between tongue and teeth. Here the teeth are called the "place," and the tip of the tongue the "instrument."
