52 



THE SPEECH OP THE TASMANIAN ABORIGINES. 



H. Ling Roth (p. 183) enumerates the following con- 

 sonants — " b. c (? k), g, h (only at the end of words), 

 k, 1, m, n, p, q (qii) [? k], r, t, [w], ch, and gh (pro- 

 nounced as in German hochachten)." 



Now, it Avill be shown that, very probably, these 

 may be reduced to the following groups — b p w, d t, g 

 k ch gh, 1 m n r ng. 



d is apparently characteristic of the Western dialect ;: 

 H. Ling Roth does not include it in his list ; ng, belong- 

 ing to most dialects, is also omitted. 



Again, we find 1, m, n, r, ng as alternatives of t, p, 

 t, k respectiveh' ; ng ma}- also stand for n, sometimes 

 for nag. Thus we have practically only four con- 

 sonants, corresponding to the labial, dental, guttural, 

 and liquid sounds ; the 'liquid sounds themselves are 

 often assignable to other groups. 



The vowels, again, are liable to be changed at will, 

 within certain limits. For instance, we have the same 

 meaning expressed by pana, pena, plena, poina, puna ; 

 (v. infra). 



It should be staited that in this essay the vowels of 

 Tasmanian words are to be read as if they were Italian.. 

 This is probably not quite accurate, but sufficiently so 

 for our purpose, especially in view of the instability of 

 the Aboriginal speec'h-sounds. 



Thus the number of possible syllables was very 

 small ; but we shall see that, though small, it was suffi- 

 cient for the needs of the speakers. The long words of 

 our vocabularies can be cut up into syllables v/hich are 

 tlie real words of the language. 



In my essay on the Evolution of Words, part of 

 which I read before this Society in September, 19(35, I 

 endeavoured to connect the original speech sounds w^ith 

 definite psychic states and processes, and the principles 

 then enunciated seem to be strikingly illustrated in the 

 clearly primitive speech of Tasmania. I shall have occa- 

 sion to refer to them incidentally later on ; for the pre- 

 sent, one example will suffice. On page 17, I wrote, 

 inter alia — " Terms of endearment are essentially of a.i 

 objective character, and require sounds of high pitch. 



