Laryngeals and anatomy
From: MCLSSAA2@...
Message: 7404
Date: 2001-05-26
A possible clue as to whether a people spoke laryngeals. If H2 and H3
were the Arabic-type h.a and ayin as in [MuH2ammad] (the name) and
[H3ayn] = "eye": Pronouncing tghese sounds seems to me to involve a
movement of the larynx not used for other more usual sounds, and
after pronouncing Arabic text containing these two sounds for a while
I can feel a definite muscle-overuse strain in my English-habituated
larynx area. (I am a man.) If so, perhaps a lifetime of pronouncing
these sounds would cause a particular pattern of hypertrophy of
muacles in and near the larynx, and that might cause hypertrophy of
those muscles' insertions and attachments on the larynx and/or
epiglottis cartilages, which could perhaps be looked for in skeletons
of older men where much of the larynx has got calcified or ossified.