(ORDO NEWS) — Scientists have found that orangutans living in trees have much more consonant sounds in their “speech” than other monkeys.
It is possible that in human speech they also arose due to the arboreal way of life of our ancestors.
The researchers compared the vocal repertoire of orangutans, chimpanzees and gorillas.
The last two had much fewer consonant sounds in its composition. For example, only a few populations of gorillas have a single “cultural” consonant.
Scientists have suggested that the reason for this lies in the handling of food. For example, chimpanzees usually beat nuts on the ground or hit them with stones to crack them.
To do this, you need a solid foundation. On trees, this is quite difficult to do. That is why tree monkeys began to use their mouths as a “hand” to hold or process food.
This allowed the development of neuromotor control of the lips, mandible and tongue. So monkeys, and even the ancestors of modern man, were able to reproduce deaf consonant sounds.
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