Ancient Sounds: mixing acoustic phonetics,statistics and comparative philologyto bring speech back from the past

Investigator: John Coleman Project Partner: John Aston Phonetics Laboratory Statistics LaboratoryUniversity of Oxford University of Cambridge

@sounds_ancient

Coleman supported by an AHRC Science in Culture Innovation Award

What would comparative and historical phonology be like if we worked with sounds instead of symbols?

Can interesting statistical or signal processing methods give insights into language?

Could we bring back to life the sounds of dead languages?

Phylogenetic phonetics

After Schleicher (1860) Deutsche Sprache, and Aston, Buck, Coleman, Cotter, Jones, Macaulay, MacLeod, Moriarty, and Nevins (2011) Phylogenetic inference for function-valued traits: speech sound evolution. doi: 10.1016/j.tree.2011.10.001

Phylogenetic phonetics

Phylogenetic phonetics

Latin Italian Spanish Portuguese French

1 [ˈu:nu-s/m] [ˈu:no] [ˈu:no] [u(ŋ)] [œ], [ɛ]

2 [ˈduo] [ˈdu:e] [dos] [dois], [doiʃ] [dø]

3 [tre:s] [tre:] [tres] [tres], [treʃ] [tʀwa]

4 [ˈkwatwor] [ˈkwat:ro] [ˈkwatro] [ˈkwatru] [katʀ]

5 [ˈkwi:ŋkwe] [ˈtʃiŋkwe] [ˈsi:ŋko], [ˈθi:ŋko] [ˈsıŋku] [sɛk]

6 [seks] [sɛi] [seis] [sɐĭs], [sɐĭʃ] [sis]

7 [ˈseptem] [ˈsɛt:e] [ˈsjete] [ˈsɛti] [sɛt]

8 [ˈokto] [ˈot:o] [ˈotʃo] [ˈoĭtu] [ɥit]

9 [ˈnovem] [ˈnɔve] [ˈnweve] [ˈnɔvɨ] [nœf]

10 [ˈdekem] [ˈdjɛtʃi] [ˈdjɛs], [ˈdjɛθ] [ˈdɛʃ] [dis]

Regular similarities ⇒ Shared ancestryDissimilarities ⇒ Historical divergence

Latin Italian Spanish Portuguese French

1 [ˈu:nu-s/m] [ˈu:no] [ˈu:no] [u(ŋ)] [œ], [ɛ]

2 [ˈduo] [ˈdu:e] [dos] [dois], [doiʃ] [dø]

3 [tre:s] [tre:] [tres] [tres], [treʃ] [tʀwa]

4 [ˈkwatwor] [ˈkwat:ro] [ˈkwatro] [ˈkwatru] [katʀ]

5 [ˈkwi:ŋkwe] [ˈtʃiŋkwe] [ˈsi:ŋko], [ˈθi:ŋko] [ˈsıŋku] [sɛk]

6 [seks] [sɛi] [seis] [sɐĭs], [sɐĭʃ] [sis]

7 [ˈseptem] [ˈsɛt:e] [ˈsjete] [ˈsɛti] [sɛt]

8 [ˈokto] [ˈot:o] [ˈotʃo] [ˈoĭtu] [ɥit]

9 [ˈnovem] [ˈnɔve] [ˈnweve] [ˈnɔvɨ] [nœf]

10 [ˈdekem] [ˈdjɛtʃi] [ˈdjɛs], [ˈdjɛθ] [ˈdɛʃ] [dis]

But these are not sounds!

Latin Italian Spanish Portuguese French

1 [ˈ] [ ˈ ] [ ˈ ] [� ŋ ] [] [ɛ]

2 [ˈ] [ˈ] [] [ ],

[ʃ]

[]

3 [] [] [ ] [ ],

[ʃ]

[ ʀ ]

4 [ ˈ ] [ ˈ ] [ ˈ ] [ ˈ ] [ʀ]

5 [ ˈ ŋ] [ˈʃŋ] [ ˈ ŋ],

[ˈθ ŋ]

[ ˈ ıŋ] [ɛ]

6 [] [ɛ] [] [ɐĭ], [ɐĭʃ] []

7 [ˈ] [ˈɛ] [ˈ ] [ˈɛ] [ɛ]

8 [ˈ] [ˈ] [ˈʃ] [ˈĭ] [ɥ]

9 [ˈ] [ˈɔ] [ˈ] [ˈɔɨ] []

10 [ˈ ] [ˈ ɛ ʃ] [ˈ ɛ ], [ˈ θɛ ] [ˈɛʃ] [ ]

But these are not sounds!

[un-o]

[u]

LPC spectrogram

LPC spectrogram 1

Sound change continuum: nasalization in un-us, -um

LPC spectrogramLPC spectrogram

LPC spectrogramLPC spectrogram

LPC spectrogramInterpolatedLPC spectrograms

LPC spectrogram 2

GENERATION OF SYNTHETIC SPEECH

D Moore, J Coleman Eur. Patent 1,504,443

[u]

LPC spectrogram

LPC spectrogram 1

Sound change continuum:nasal vowel lowering

LPC spectrogramLPC spectrogram

LPC spectrogram [œ]LPC spectrogram

LPC spectrogramInterpolatedLPC spectrograms

LPC spectrogram 2[ɛD ]

Objectives for 2015 (this award)

“Triangulation backwards”: to reconstruct (audible) acoustic examples of the likely ancestors of words in: Romance (from Latin), Germanic, and Greek

Develop techniques to overcome obstacles besetting these methods

Presentations, publications and a workshop on the new methods

To lay foundations for an “attack” on other branches: Celtic, Slavonic, Indo-Aryan