This work examines and documents the syllable structure and types inherent in Etsako, using Yekhee as a case study. The syllable is a unit of speech consisting of a vowel, sequence of vowels (diphthong) or a syllabic nasal which functions as the nucleus, and a consonant or sequence of consonants which functions as either the onset or coda which can be produced in a breath pause, carrying other phonological features like stress and tone.
According to Williamson and Blench (2000) Yekhee is an Edoid language that belong to Eastern Kwa which is part of putative Western Benue-Congo group of the New Benue-Congo (NBC).
Elugbe (1989:23) identified two dialect of Yekhee which are the Auchi dialect and the Anvbianwu dialect. The reason he gave for the distinction of these dialects is that the Avbianwu dialect employs a voiceless bilabial plosive where the Auchi dialect employs a voiceless labiodental fricative .This work is based on the Auchi dialect ofYekhee. The theoretical framework adopted for this work is CV Phonology. This theory captures all aspects of the syllable. The theory derives from two earlier studies by G.N Clements and Samuel Jay Keyser “A Three-Tiered Theory of The Syllable” published in 1981. The major idea of this model lies in the addition of a CV tier to the segmental and syllable tier already accepted within autosegmental phonology, where the C is linked to consonantal segments and V to vowel segments.
The method of data collection employed in this work was “direct interview” and the instrument for data collection was the “Swadesh Word List of 200 Item List”, an audio recorder was used to record data from informants, data collected were phonetically transcribed and tones were marked. Two informants participated as subjects for data collection.
This study shows that the syllable structures inherent in Yekhee are V, CV, CCV ,CCCV and CVV, Yekhee syllable structure can be complex and simple, it operates an open syllable, Yekhee words can be mono-syllabic, bi-syllabic, tri-syllabic and poly-syllabic. Also, only vowels are syllabic in the language, syllabic nasals are not found in the language. Also in consonant clustering, the second consonant in syllable initial cluster is either /b, p, j, w/.
