ABSTRACT
T h e artificial vocal cav ity w ith which th e first experim ents were m ade is shown in Fig. 31.1
I t was, as will be seen, a very rough im ita tion of the in terio r of a hum an m outh and was approxim ately full size. I t h ad a sm all m outh orifice and a fixed “ tongue ” (m ade by pushing up the floor of the m odel from below), b u t instead of the elaborations of soft pa la te-uvula-epiglottis and pharynx , it h ad a simplified bulbous back cav ity , of approxim ately th e sam e estim ated capacity as th a t of th e space betw een th e vocal cords and th e back of the h ard pa la te of a sm all sized hum an m outh. The first m odel was found to produce tw o resonances, which were heard as faint, half-w histled, notes
when air was blown across th e m ou th of the model. The notes observed were # a '" 1824 and #g' 406, which, by com parison w ith the vowel ch a rt on page 42, will be seen to be very near those of th e vowel b (earth), th e lower resonance being ju s t w ithin th e lower range, and the upper resonance one sem itone above the upper range of th e ch arted resonances. There were no m eans of voicing th is model, b u t it gave a sound like a w hispered v (earth) w hen blow n across.
