“Soft and Melodious”- Let Linguists World Wide Concur with Great Queen Victoria

Short Communication

This is yet another appeal to linguists worldwide to rectify a longstanding blunder [1, 2, 3]. About a century and a half ago, Bishop Samuel Ajayi Crowther met The Empress of India in her palace. He recited The Lord’s Prayer to her in Yoruba. At the completion of the recital Queen Victoria said the Yoruba language sounded “soft and melodious” [4].

The Humming Drum is Tangible Evidence Yoruba is a Language Isolate

Physical evidence that Yoruba is a language isolate exists in the humming drum [gangan]. What is called the “talking” drum should actually be called the humming drum because that is what it actually does-it hums. It produces doh reh mi [drm] tonic solfa sounds. These drum sounds were used in the past for military signaling, panegyric, and of course for entertainment. So the way a person nowadays could hear a tune on the radio or a flautist playing “Yankee doodle” or “Happy birthday To You” and instantly name the song in a similar fashion those humming drums were used. Also leaders of Yoruba armies had their signature tunes much like the way World wrestling Entertainment Stars of today have their signature tunes. Peruse the following from History of The Yorubas.

“Having learnt how to make their instruments, they begin to learn how to SPEAK with them, an operation to which The Yoruba language readily lends itself, as it consists chiefly in the modulation of the voice; this the instruments try to imitate [5]” “Earwitness” accounts from none other than The Empress of India, Queen Victoria herself and so many other explorers and missionaries from the past upon hearing The Yoruba Language, not to mention the heterophones all declare Yoruba to be a language isolate. What are today are linguists waiting for?