MacDonnell II - Wilbourhall.org

28 EXTEKNAL CONSONANT SANDHl [29Classification of Consonants.29. The assimilation, of which the applicationof therules of consonant Sandhi consists, is of two kinds. It isconcerned either with a shift of the phonetic position inwhich a consonant is articulated, or with a change of thequality of the consonant. Hence it is necessary to understandfully the classification of consonants from these two aspects.15, 2b-h) an arrangement according to theIn §Sh c d (cp.place of articulation is given of all the consonants exceptfour, the breathing h and the three voiceless spirants, whichare phonetically described in § 15, 2 ij.a. Contact of the tongue with the throat produces thegutturals, with the palate the palatals, with the roof ofth« mouth the cerebrals, with the teeth the dentals, whilecontact between the lips produces the labials.b. In forming the nasals of the five classes, the breathpartiallypasses through the nose while the tongueor thelips are in the position for articulating the correspondingtenuis. The real Anusvara is formed in the nose only,while the tongue is in the position for forming the particularvowel which the Anusvara accompanies.c. The semivowels y, r, 1, v are palatal, cerebral, dental,and labial respectively, pronounced inthe same position asthe corresponding vowels i, r, 1, u, the tongue being inpartial contact with the place of articulation in the firstthree, and the lips in partial contact in the fourth.d. The three sibilants are hard spirants produced bypartial contact of the tongue with the palate, roof, and teethrespectively. There are no corresponding soft sibilants(English z, French j), but their prehistoric existence may beinfei-red from various phenomena of Sandhi (cp.15, 2 Jca).tendency to normalize the terminations so as to have s in the 2. s. andt in the 3. s. Some half-dozen examples of this have been found inthe Brahmanas ;e. g. a-ves 2. s. impf. (= a-ved-s) from vid knoiv.