Re: That pesky H again (was: varia)

raccoon@ELKNET.NET wrote:
> Ah... interesting. I've been wondering, when ( is written over the second
> vowel of a diphthong, such as in e(i-, is the [h] pronounced before the
> first vowel, or the second? (i.e. [hei] or [he:] vs. [ehi])
The first.  It's simply an arbitrary convention to place diacritic
marks which affect diphthongs as a whole (like the '(' which puts an
[h] before the diphthong as a whole) over the second element of the
diphthong.

> Also, I find the idea of suprasegmental aspiration interesting. But is
there
> really such a thing as an aspirated vowel? I've had an idea to make final
> vowel+h become an aspirated vowel, which would then aspirate the previous
> consonant but lose aspiration on the vowel:
>
>         H
> tah -> ta: -> tha:
Maybe, but in Greek, putting a '(' over a vowel simply indicates a
preceding [h], which Ray suggests probably had less than fully
phonemic status.  But when you transliterated such things into Latin,
it was clear enough -- you threw an 'h' on the beginning on the word,
as in 'Hymen.'

In both Latin and Greek, these [h]'s of course disappeared quickly,
so that you can find no trace of them in, say, Italian or Modern
Greek.  That happens to [h] all the time.

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"In the labyrinth of the alphabet the truth is hidden. It is one
 thing repeated many times." -- AOS
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