Re: Japanese phonemes (was Re: The Monovocalic PIE Myth (wasGermans have no /w/, ...))

Quoting John Cowan <cowan@...>:

> Nik Taylor scripsit:
>
> > For /wj/?  Both are glides, sequences of two glides are very rare in
> > world languages.  For that matter, sequences of consonants with equal
> > sonority are banned in a great many languages.  Tho some languages will
> > allow clusters like /pt/ or /sf/ or /lr/, it's pretty rare.
>
> My phavorite phonotactic restriction:  Classical Greek (I don't know
> about modern Greek) doesn't tolerate /sl/ or /sn/, but does favor
> /skl/ and /skn/.  The Romans weren't so good at these, which is
> why the god of healing, Asklepios, was Aesculapius to them.
/skn/? Can't offhand think of any Greeky word with that cluster; could you give
me an example? Do the vowel-changes, BTW, come with an explanation?

I've always found it kind of neat that while /pl pr tr kl kr/ are all over the
place in the Germanic languages, **/tl/ doesn't turn up.

                                                                Andreas