How did uhn-uh come to mean “no” and uh-huh come to mean “yes” in English?

Question

Pretty much the title. Also curious if other languages have similar non-word sounds for negation/affirmation.

In: Other

Answer 1

I can help answer part two of your question as I recently studied it in my Japanese class… In Japanese, there is not ‘uhn-uh’ and ‘uh-huh’, it is ‘u-uhn’ and ‘un’, respectively. The ‘no’ sound is an extended ‘u’ with an inflection twisting sound similar to how American English might make an ‘I don’t know’ sound, ending with an ‘n’ sound. All in all, not too dissimilar. However the ‘yes’ sound is only the single note ‘un’.