Ask Grammaticality Brown SpecGram Vol CLXXXIX, No 2 Contents P.R.E.S.C.R.I.P.T.I.V.E.—An Improved Approach to Grammaticality Assessments—Judd Zh’mntəls-Peeqrs

Bilabial Angel of Mwah

Presented by
The Phreeee-Phinkin’ Philosophers of Philologogia
and The SpecGram Encyclopedia of Linguistic Deities

Recent archaeological scrapings around and scrabblings about in the Western Desert of Chx’reeb, New Mexico, have literally unearthed further evidence of the much-discussed and highly controversial1 Bilabial Angel of Mwah, a spiritual figure who is purported to have played a central role in the development of ritual in and around the area of what is now New Mexico c.5654–5639 BCE.

The trove2 contains some papyruses papyrae bits of papyrus in the recently deciphered Linear Vitamin C3 include songs, hymns, power ballads and spoken word poetry4 to The Angel of Mwah as well as lists of instructions to worshippers attending the Mwah-ritual. Worship appears to have taken the form of any kind of bilabial paralinguistic facial expression including pouting, pursing or puckering of lips. In terms of liturgy, every line of any text addressed to the Angel of Mwah was required to begin with pulmonic [p] with the additional expectation that priests, acolytes and the dead were to articulate all such sounds as ejective [p’] in acts of communal worship. Confirmatory material evidence for these stipulations takes the form of the abnormally enlarged larynxes of those categories of people.

This is an exciting series of finds and paves the way for further exploration in the area. It is hoped that this may uncover further evidence of the twin of the Angel of Mwah, the so-called Lateral Angel of La-la-la-la-la5 as well as contributing to our understanding of how bilabiality (and, by extension, palatalization) in human religion spread across the New World in the 6th millennium BCE.6


1 In academic circles only; not down your local pub, in the church hall, on the high street etc.

2 Which should really be the past tense of the verb ‘trive’ as in ‘Yesterday, I trove you all day, but I won’t be triving you again in a hurry, Professor Smithereens.’

3 Turns out you have to read it left to right.

4 Contrary to predictions by Fringe, Sideburns, Plait and Quiff (2013), no reggae or hip-hop was found with the recent find.

5 Not to be confused with the demonic spirit Tinky-Winky, and the goddesses Dipsy and Po.

6 I’ve found it: it’s ‘papyri’. But why?

Ask Grammaticality Brown
P.R.E.S.C.R.I.P.T.I.V.E.—An Improved Approach to Grammaticality Assessments—Judd Zh’mntəls-Peeqrs
SpecGram Vol CLXXXIX, No 2 Contents