4-Letter Word Chain Game #4

Yeah, that's why the country is called United Arab Amirates...

Arabic has only three vowels, transcribed as "a," "i," and "u." The latter two are identical to their Latin counterparts, but "a" has two distinct sounds depending on the preceding consonant. 20 consonants make "a" sound like the English "man" [mæn], while 8 others make it sound like the English "car" [kɑɹ].

There are two schools of thought in transcribing Arabic "a": always using "a," or using "e" for [æ] and "a" for [ɑ]. [æ] doesn't sound like "e" in English or Spanish, but some consider it closer to [ɛ] than [a], preferring "e."

Hence, [ʔæmiːr] may be transliterated as "amir" or "emir." The second approach is often inconsistent, with many [æ] sounds being written as "a." In words like Mecca or Medina, "a" and "e" both represent the same [æ] sound.

Recent transliterations have largely adopted the simplified approach, using only "a," "i," and "u," leading to the changes: Mohammed → Muhammad, Mecca → Makkah, Medina → Madinah, Moslem → Muslim, and Koran → Quran.

Someone has counted what words are actually shouted most often in canyons? 'Hello' in its many language forms would be my guess as the most shouted in most canyons. (Not sure if the Grand Canyon is an echoey one.) I should think that often the people thought of 'Echo' echo echo echo echo ... just to hear it.

The story (Greek myth) was that Echo was fated to fade away till just her voice remained and she could only repeat what she heard. Pining for love, I think.

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