Let's consider a word whose earlier form has been one along the lines of
ʕə
or
n̩
or something else very very small. Let's also assume it's exceptional in some way - e.g. the only word to begin with ʕ, or the only onsetless syllable with a syllabic nasal or something else along those lines. Now let's imagine sound changes where this leads to this word turning into ∅, except also leaving traces on the previous word's last syllable - maybe some tonal thing, or nasalization or whatever.
Now, this wouldn't be so surprising with a grammatical marker, but let's imagine this word means something like, I dunno, 'man' or 'thing' or 'house' or something. Suddenly, you have a word with no syllables, yet it does have phonological form in some sense.
Could a human keep trace of such a thing, which behaves syntactically like a noun (or maybe a verb), yet does not provide its own syllable?
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