tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Wed Apr 22 08:37:45 1998
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Re: -be'taH & -taHbe'
- From: "David Trimboli" <[email protected]>
- Subject: Re: -be'taH & -taHbe'
- Date: Wed, 22 Apr 1998 00:20:48 -0400
From: William H. Martin <[email protected]>
>{Hoch DaSopbe'chugh vaj batlhHa' bIHegh,}
>I really think that using this example to justify the extremely
>dubious conclusion that {-be'} negates whole words regardless
>of its placement among other suffixes is an EXTREMELY weak
>argument.
Okay, how about something like {QongDaqDaq Qotbe' tlhInganpu'} "Klingons do
not lie in bed." (TKW 40) Sure, it's a proverb, but I'm sure you'll agree
that there's no questionable grammar here. Yet we don't mean "Klingons do
not lie down, and they do this not-lying-down in bed," we mean "Klingons do
not use beds to lie down in."
The negation works like this:
[QongDaqDaq Qot]be' tlhInganpu'.
Not like this:
QongDaqDaq [Qotbe'] tlhInganpu'.
There are other examples of this sort of thing. I'm not saying that this
proves this or that, except that it shows that negation is not always as
simple as negating the immediately preceding verb element. If {[QongDaqDaq
Qot]be' tlhInganpu'} is acceptable, why not {[batlh bIHegh]be'}?
SuStel
Stardate 98305.8