Friday, April 20, 2018

Consonants & Vowels: Taking Stock

I think it's time to take stock now. I've published quite a few articles on this topic over the last month or so, and it would probably be good to allow it all to ferment for a while. I'll mull over what I have and come back to it all afresh at some point in the future. Otherwise I'm going to end up getting a little lost :)

So I now have 12 consonants and 10 vowels. Not the 7 vowels that originally began this chain of thought in my original series a few years back.

These are the consonants I'm left with;


And these are the vowels;


Giving us an alphabet that looks somewhat like this;


However, if we ignore the removal of the "push" consonants - which would perhaps be more sensible at this point - then we would get this alphabet, with 16 consonants and 10 vowels. Back to a full 26 :)


2 comments:

  1. why are these sacred vowels please explain

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    1. The ten vowels in this article aren't especially sacred (I don't think!). They're just the vowel sounds I've identified as being in common use in everyday English.

      As for the "seven sacred vowels" often spoken of in popular tradition, and that I refer to in this series, it's difficult to pin them down.

      The general story is that the ancient Greeks had a belief system based around seven gods, said to be equivalent with the seven wandering stars. Supposedly for this same reason we have seven days in a week, each named for these seven gods.

      There were also thought to be seven vowel sounds or vocalisations equivalent with these seven gods/planets/weekdays. Again though, what these sounds actually were, and why they in particular were thought to be sacred is difficult for us to tell so removed from that history.

      There are also traditions in other cultures of using certain sounds and vocalisations. Such as the famous "Ohm" sound often used in meditation. Again though, why such sounds are used and if there is any real or imagined logic to there use is difficult to ascertain.

      In short, I don't really have the answers :) It's a very interesting topic to look into though.

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