tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Wed Aug 16 11:29:46 1995
[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next]
Re: }} charghwI' writes his first poem
- From: "William H. Martin" <[email protected]>
- Subject: Re: }} charghwI' writes his first poem
- Date: Wed, 16 Aug 1995 11:29:46 -0400 (EDT)
According to R.B Franklin:
> > According to Marc Ruehlaender:
>
> > > > DaH QuchlaH no'wI''e' qa'pu' DaHoHta'bogh.
> > ...
> > > the way I think it SHOULD work would be
> > > no'wI' DaHoHta'bogh qa'pu'
> > > but that is obviously not an allowed phrase
>
> Why is it not allowed? I think it should be {no'wI' DaHoHta'bogh qa'pu'}
> and canon supports this type of construction.
Revisiting this, I completely agree. The only reason I didn't
immediately see it this way was that I thought I had a more
generally useful grammatical construction by allowing the head
noun of a relative clause to be marked with {-'e'} even if it
is the first noun of a noun-noun pair. Your argument is strong
enough that I can forego my proposal. We do lose the potential
to say certain things, but I guess it is a small enough number
of things that we can let go of that rather than mess too much
with the existing rules of grammar.
I thought it was a small enough change with large enough
application that it would be worth it. This apparently is not
an idea so clearly good that it gains much support, so I'll let
go of it.
> In PK we have {jagh lucharghlu'ta'bogh HuH} (the bile of the enemy which
> someone has defeated) or (the bile of the defeated enemy) or "the bile
> of the vanquished". The final noun {HuH} of this N-N relative clause
> construction is the object of the sentence {jagh lucharghlu'ta'bogh HuH
> ghopDu'lIj lungaSjaj.} (Despite the weird O-S-V construction of this
> ritual phrase.)
True, and well described.
> Another canon example of a N-N relative clause construction is on DS9
> trading card #99 (1993 series): {He ghoSlu'bogh retlhDaq} (on the side
> of a course which one follows) or (on the side of a followed course) or
> "beside a passage". Here the locative {-Daq} is correctly placed on the
> final noun of the N-N construction.
>
> In a N-N construction, the reason Type 5 suffixes only go on the last
> noun is because it is the main noun of the pair. There is nothing
> ambiguous about saying {DaH QuchlaH no'wI' DaHoHta'bogh qa'pu'}.
> {no'wI' DaHoHta'bogh qa'pu'} is still a N-N construction, and the final
> noun {qa'pu'} is the main noun of the N-N pair and it is therefore the
> subject of this sentence.
All of this is clearly accurate.
Earlier, I had said:
> > It could be that my suggestion of using the topicalizer to
> > point to the head noun (as is already deemed acceptable) can be
> > expanded to violate the rule that the topicalizer can't be
> > applied to the first noun in a noun-noun construction. I prefer
> > this myself because it handles a wider range of instances where
> > your suggestion would fail to indicate which noun of the
> > noun-noun phrase is the head noun of the relative clause.
> > Furthermore, I think that rule about the topicalizer being
> > applied to the first noun was written BEFORE it was decided to
> > use the topicalizer to indicate head nouns at all, so it is
> > time to modify that rule.
>
...
> In any event, when you topicalize the head noun of a relative clause, you
> are marking which noun in the clause is the subject or object of the main
> verb.
That is not the way it was originally presented. The {-'e'} is
used to mark the head noun of a relative clause when the verb
in that clause has both an explicit subject and an explicit
object. I don't think it has been established that the head
noun necessarily has to be the subject or object of the main
verb.
We have pretty much admitted defeat in cases where another Type
5 noun suffix is needed. This is the classic "ship in which I
fled" problem. The grammar simply does not support this
expression well.
I was simply not giving up yet on a case like:
"I entered the ship of my brother who sells tribbles."
yIHmey je'bogh loDnI'wI''e' Duj vI'el.
See?
If I use no {-'e'}, it could mean that I'm entering the ship of
the tribbles which are sold by my brother. I would state the
latter as:
yIHmey'e' je'bogh loDnI'wI' Duj vI'el.
If I follow the rule and move the {-'e'} to the second noun in
the noun-noun pair, then it would definitely mean, "I entered
my brother's ship which sells tribbles." Talented ship, that.
This is why I thought I had a proposal which would make a
simple exception to a rule and result in a wider range of
potential unambiguous expressions. Meanwhile, since you presume
that the {-'e'} marks the subject or object of the main verb,
it makes all of this simpy impossible to say in one sentence.
I can deal with that. It seems like a loss of potential for the
language, but I've supported similar losses that others have
proposed. I just thought this one would have less of a negative
impact on the grammar than others that have been suggested.
> In the original sentence, "The souls of my ancestors which you have
> killed can be happy now," the word "souls" is the subject of the main verb
> so anyways you would not topicalize "ancestors" as you have done.
You are completely correct here.
> yoDtargh
charghwI'
--
\___
o_/ \
<\__,\
"> | Get a grip.
` |