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  • From: Peter Kirk <peterkirk AT qaya.org>
  • To: trepp AT telus.net
  • Cc: b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] Re: PS /g/
  • Date: Sun, 14 Nov 2004 18:02:58 +0000

On 14/11/2004 17:21, trepp AT telus.net wrote:

...

As to English [ch], I first noticed how many languages do not have it. Then I noticed that, outside of the Far East (China, etc.), the only languages featuring it that I yet knew of were Slavic, except for Latin - as in [c] before [i] or [e] - Italian - in the same manner as in Latin (though with some exceptional additional occurences), - and English.


Indeed not every language has this sound. But a large number do. Here are some that I know of: Spanish, of course, but that may go with Italian in your mind. German, although written as a tetragraph (as in the final consonant of "Deutsch") or a pentagraph (as in at the end of "Delitzsch"). All Turkic languages. Persian/Farsi. Most Indic languages, I think, with two variants (aspirated and unaspirated). This is certainly not a rare sound.

I soon noticed how Teyth could be seen as a Taw leaning in the direction of English [ch]. It is cut too short of the degree of morphing (away from Taw) that characterizes English [ch], perhaps, for this phonetic kinship to at once be seen. I wonder to what degree the breath in Teyth might originally have differed from that in Taw. As I have found with all alphabetical characters in general: each character was originally assigned its own exclusive phonetic value, and the pairing of two characters to a single sound point to the antiquity of the lettering system, and to changes in speach without a parallel alphabet reform.


It is possible, I suppose, that the original sound of Hebrew Tet was like English ch, a modified t sound. But it is I think more likely that it was like the Arabic letter which it correponds with, with is a pharyngealised t.

This got me wondering (if not actually expecting) whether the greater degree of breath in Sin than in Samek (=[s]), might not properly signify a possible root of the [s]-morpheme in English "measure". Interestingly enough, this sound, too, I found missing from many languages' phonology, but present in French, English, and Slavic languages.

This is an interesting sound and probably rarer than English ch. Interestingly, it is present as a distinct phoneme, but extremely rare, in languages as diverse as English, Turkish and Persian/Farsi. It is I suppose possible that this was the original sound of sin (it is after all a voiced variant of the sound of shin), but I don't know of any evidence for this. Do you?

--
Peter Kirk
peter AT qaya.org (personal)
peterkirk AT qaya.org (work)
http://www.qaya.org/






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