tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Thu Aug 29 21:56:06 1996

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Re: An offer you shouldn't refuse!

qaSDI' 96-08-27 22:00:45 EDT, jatlh ~mark:

> Same with the
>  way English enjoys making the same verb do double-duty as transitive and
>  intransitive.  It might be said that it's "soooo Klingon" to use the same
>  verb for both ("Hey, I know the meaning, after all!") but we know that's
>  not the case: the existence of the -moH suffix argues strongly against it,
>  and we have canon (vem/vemmoH, and others).

I think the most striking example of this comes from Captain Klaa in Star
Trek V.  He shouts {HIvHe yIchoHmoH} for "Alter the attack course!"  Without
getting into why I think that {HIv} actually is a noun as well as a verb,
please note that {choH} means "alter, change."  I had always thought I could
say something like ~~{Hemaj vIchoH} for "I change our course," and didn't
understand why Klaa needed to use {-moH} on this verb.  When I finally began
following the discussions of transitivity of verbs in Klingon, it slowly sunk
into my head that the subject of {choH} must be the thing that is changing.
 Therefore, "I change our course" would really be {Hemaj vIchoHmoH} ("I cause
our course to change").

SuStel
Stardate 96659.4

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