'Doh' may have been one of man's first words!

London, Nov 24 (ANI): Popular catchword 'Doh' apparently has prehistoric origins and was one of the first words used by humans to communicate, a new study has suggested.

Interestingly, it is also the very modern catchphrase used by American fictional character Homer Simpson.he research suggests that the shape and mechanics of the mouth, throat and other parts of the vocal tract of our ancestors from one million years ago would have allowed them to speak - but not a lot.

Vowels would have all sounded like 'u'. And 'd' goes particularly well with 'u' - making 'duh' a distinct possibility.

According to Bart de Boer, an expert on the evolution of speech, 'Buh' could also have been used to communicate.

Since the mouth, tongue and throat are mainly made of soft tissue, so there is little evidence of them in the fossil record.

But there is one bone in the vocal tract - the hyoid - and the university of Amsterdam researcher Dr de Boer began studying it.

In apes the hyoid attaches to a large pouch called an air sac, that makes sounds bigger and deeper.

Our ancestors from 3.3 million years ago had hyoids that were similar in shape to those of present day apes, suggesting they too had air sacs.

To find out how having an air sac changed the sounds produced, Dr de Boer created plastic models of the mouth, tongue and throat and forced air down them to produce different vowel sounds.

Some of the models contained an air sac, the Daily Mail reported.

Dr de Boer, of the University of Amsterdam, then played the sounds to people and asked them to identify the vowel.

According to New Scientist, if they got it right, they were asked to try again, only this time, noise was added to make the sound harder to recognise.

This demonstrated that noises made from tubes without air sacs, the tubes mimicking the modern vocal tract, were much clearer.

Ann MacLarnon, of the University of Roehampton in London, said that the finding supports the theory that the need to provide complex sounds to communicate better led to air sacs shrinking.

More sounds meant more information could be shared, giving those who lacked air sacs a better chance of survival in a dangerous world.

This indeed implies that losing our air-sacks 500,000 years ago was a step towards the future and speech, as we know it today. (ANI)