THE PHONOGRAPH AND VOWEL SOUNDS ²

Abstract

III. WE now pass to the general conclusions which may be drawn from our experiments. In the first place it seems clear that vowels do not depend on pitch alone or on the simple grouping of partial tones independently of absolute pitch. Before the constituents of a vowel can be assigned, the pitch of the prime must be named. But on the other hand the pitch of the most prominent partial of the group is not alone sufficient to allow us to name the vowel in which it appears; to do this we also require to be told the relation of the constituent partials to one another.