. The pronunciation of English in Scotland . have two syllables and onlyone vowel. Only very rarely are other consonants usedto form a syllable as in the exclamation pst. As we havealready seen (see §§ 20,21) that vowels are the most sonorousof sounds, that liquids come next to them, and that theother consonants have the minimum of sonority, it is easyto infer a connection between the sonority of sounds andtheir power to form syllables. But even vowels are notalways syllabic, in the diphthongs (see § 208), and theliquids are more frequently non-syllabic than syllabic, as1 in bolt, bolt, a
. The pronunciation of English in Scotland . have two syllables and onlyone vowel. Only very rarely are other consonants usedto form a syllable as in the exclamation pst. As we havealready seen (see §§ 20,21) that vowels are the most sonorousof sounds, that liquids come next to them, and that theother consonants have the minimum of sonority, it is easyto infer a connection between the sonority of sounds andtheir power to form syllables. But even vowels are notalways syllabic, in the diphthongs (see § 208), and theliquids are more frequently non-syllabic than syllabic, as1 in bolt, bolt, and n in bunt, bAnt. If botl and bolt arecompared, it will be noted that in the first word there aretwo heights of sonority in o and 1 with a deep fall betweenthem in t; while in the second word, bolt, there is only 74 PHONETICS one height, viz. in o, as there is a fall from o to 1 and from1 to t without any rise. An undulating line to representthe flow of sound and the rise and fall of the sonority,makes this plain to the eye. Hjotl bolt. 205. These facts may be briefly expressed in the fol-lowing form: when two sounds of a group are separatedby one or more sounds less sonorous than each of them,the two sounds are said to belong to different syllables;and conversely a group of sounds is said to form a singlesyllable when no two of the sounds are separated by asound less sonorous than both of them. Thus in botlo and 1 are separated by t, a sound less sonorous thaneither, and consequently form two syllables, but in bolto and t are separated by 1, which is less sonorous than obut more sonorous than t, hence there is only one the word strange, strends, although there are sevensounds, there is only one syllable, because from s to ethere is no break in the rise of sonority, and from e to 3 THE SYLLABLE 75 there is no break in the fall— there is only one heightof sonority. 206. The most sonorous sound in a syllable is saidto be syllabic. Syllabic consonants are ma
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