tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Thu Jun 15 08:01:20 1995
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Re: tlhIngan name for Elizabeth
- From: "Mark E. Shoulson" <[email protected]>
- Subject: Re: tlhIngan name for Elizabeth
- Date: Thu, 15 Jun 1995 11:01:19 -0400
- In-reply-to: <[email protected]> (message from Heidi Wessman on Wed, 14 Jun 1995 12:37:59 -0400)
>Date: Wed, 14 Jun 1995 12:37:59 -0400
>Originator: [email protected]
>From: Heidi Wessman <[email protected]>
>On Wed, 14 Jun 1995, Elizabeth C. Hoyt wrote:
>> On Wed, 14 Jun 1995, M.W._van_Arkel wrote:
>> > nuqneH Liz,
>> > A good way for creating a tlhIngan name is to translate the meaning of your
>> > name.
>> Thanks for the tip, but Elizabeth means `consecrated to God' and I'm not
>> sure how that would come out in tlhIngan!
>mu'ghomwIj vIghajbe', but there are many words similar in meaning to
>'consecrate' (And for all I know, 'consecrate' may very well be in our
>religious list of words. vISovbe'.)
quvmoH, perhaps.
> *IF* I remember, toH'a' is the Klingon word for God. Find an English
>synonyn for 'consecrated' (chosen, honored, etc.) And you're half-way there.
It's "joH'a'", and to say it's ">the< Klingon word for God" is probably a
little strong. It's Klingon for something like "Great Lord", and I coined
it for use as "God" in some Bible translation work, where it's pretty well
accepted. I don't know if it's the best or worst or even bearable, but it
seems to work okay for me.
>> So I was thinking of trying to
>> describe my personality, perhaps HaghwI' (I really *do* roll on the floor
>> laughing out loud occasionally).
>That could work. My friend tevram was named by her husband. tevram is a
>descriptive name, rather than a translation.
It should be noted that a lot of languages (like English) have names that
don't really mean anything. Sure, "Elizabeth" means something... but not
in English. Leon is "lion", but not in English. And even names that do
mean things aren't necessarily obvious (I'm certainly not named for a spot
on something!) We have evidence of Klingon names being more or less
meaningless (or at least having their meanings so obscure we can't work
them out). viz. qeylIS, valQIS, mara, torgh. We have names that look like
they sort of mean something, but very possibly not what they appear (like
English "Cliff" is not naming after a rock formation), viz. qeng. And we
have Klingon names that do seem to have meaning, viz. matlh. People here
seem to be fond of giving themselves names which are more titles than true
names (viz. ghunchu'wI'). I'd say there's room for all these. My Klingon
name sortakinda could mean something, but probably doesn't (It's Seqram,
taken from an idea another Mark had on this list. His name was/is Mark
Mandel, and he took to calling himself marqem, using the "M" from his
second initial. I did the same, with marqeS, and spelled it backwards).
Yeah, it means "trivial seismic fault," or "night of the seismic fault,"
but I just consider it a collection of sounds.
It's nice when the sounds make sense pronunciation-wise, though, so
something like "r'Hul" I have trouble reading, since there's a truly
impossible consonant cluster at the beginning (Klingon doesn't have *any*
initial consonant clusters, least of all r followed by glottal stop
followed by H). Still, it's a name, and it really doesn't matter much, if
people recognize it.
~mark