tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Sat Apr 22 04:35:31 1995

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Dochmey puS



If these topics have been covered already, plese bear with me. It takes me
awhile to translate the Digest.

qaStaHvIS *April jaj wa'maH chorghDIch jatlh charghwI':

>... the Klingon language deals only with what happens, not what could
>have or would have happened. There is no single device available to 
>convey this in Klingon.
>
>The question becomes whether it is more appropriate to come up with an 
>inventive way to convey the "should" or "would" or just drop the whole 
>idea ...

jIQochneS.  Could, would and should deal with ability <-laH>, willingness
<-qang>, and obligation <-nIS> respectively. Used in conjunction with
<-chugh> and/or <-pu' / -ta'>, I believe all these ideas can be conveyed
without resorting to overly contorted sentences.

tlhIngan Hol jatlhlaHmeH vIghojqangmoHchugh mutlhobpu' puqbe'wI'.
(would it be correct to split <ghojmoH> in order to use <-qang>?)

jatlh ~mark:

>Personal names are being transliterated (in the KBTP), generally without 
>introducing letters/sounds which are not in Klingon.  We (at least I) 
>also try to make the transliterations not break Klingon phonology rules 
>(no syllable-initial consonant clusters, or syllable-final ones other 
>than -rgh, -y' or -w', etc).

All cultures (terrestrial of otherwise) face the problem of how to deal with
words from other languages. Unless a people are willing to add new letters to
their alphabet, they must come up with an approximation. Hawaiian, for
instance, has rendered "Western" names into forms we would hardly recognize:
Kepola for Deborah, Keoki for George, Lauleneke for Lawrence.  Hawaiian has
only 7 consonants (h k l m n p w) and deals with other sounds as best it can.
 I see nothing wrong with transliterating foreign words (names or otherwise),
but they should be "tagged" so beginning ghojwI'pu' (like me) don't become
hopelessly confused.

There has been much hand-wringing over the proper use of <latlh>. 

jatlh yoDtagh:

>{puqpu' latlh} would mean "the childrens' other one". If you want to say 
>"the other children", it would be {latlh puqpu'}.  

I would read <latlh poqpu'> as "another one of the children". Would the
meaning of "other one of ____" or "additionl one of _____" imply that the
noun following <latlh> should always be plural? (If there's only one, how can
there be another?)

Doch rap SaHtaHbogh mu'tlheghmeyvam 'e' ghItlh charghwI':

>rapbe' latlh ghop ghop lath je. cha' ghop vIghaj. rIQchoHchugh wa' 
>ghopwIj, vaj ratlh ghopwIj latlh.
>
>"-then another of my hand remains" or "-then my hand's another one 
>remains". latlh ghopwIj 'oHbe' ghopwIj. latlh ghop 'oH.
>
>"Another's my hand is not my hand." -or- "The my hand of another is not 
>my hand. It is somebody else's hand."
>
>{latlh} is a noun, not an adjective. It must be used with all the usual 
>noun-noun rules of meaning. It makes for word order that may seem odd at 
>first, but after great argument, this is what most folks here settled on.

jatlh je charghwI'

>Think about this again. {puqpu' latlh} means "the children's another one" 
>or "another one of the children". This is probably what he wanted. {latlh 
>puqpu'} means "children of another one" or "another one's children", 
>which means children of a different parent. That may also be what he 
>meant, but that is not obvious.
>
>What *I* would have said would be {puqpu' latlhpu'}. "Other ones of the 
>children."

In order to convey the meaning of other children (other than the children
previously discussed) maybe we should say <puqmey latlhpu'>. {{;-)

jatlh ghunchu'wI':

>tI poH tay latlh wIchenmoHpu'.

Was there a vegetarian rite to begin with such that they could have created
another one? I would have said <tI poH tay pIm wIchenmoHpu'>

Brad


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