tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Sat Dec 12 23:13:25 1998

Back to archive top level

To this year's listing



[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next]

Re: Klingon Bird of Prey (KBP) poster: THE TEXT!



On Fri, 11 Dec 1998 14:47:25 -0800 (PST) Steven Boozer 
<[email protected]> wrote:

> >> 36. Saqjan
> >>     Landing Gear
> 
> charghwI':  
> :  Another verb becomes part of an apparent compound noun, though I 
> :  guess it's just a polysyllabic noun. No compound.
> 
> peHruS:
> : We already had Saqghom (TKD).
> 
> I'm surprised charghwI' forgot about this one; it's one of my favorite
> examples.  Compare:

jISaHbe'. wot 'oHtaH <<Saq>>'e'. DIp mojbe'. wa' DIp'e' 
mojpu'bogh cha' DIp 'oSbe' <<Saqghom Saqjan>> joq.
 
>  Saqghom  "landing party"  
>  tIjwI'ghom  "boarding party"
> 
> Which just shows that you can't predict which way Okrand will choose when
> creating new words.  

Basically, {tIjwI'ghom} looks like a "compound noun", while 
{Saqghom} looks like a two-syllable noun that happens to have 
one syllable that sounds like a noun and one syllable that 
sounds like a verb.

The unfortunate thing is that Okrand's doing the latter with no 
rule to justify it only makes me wonder why he bothered making 
the rule justifying the former, especially since we are not 
really encouraged to make up our own compound nouns. Why not 
just say, "Nouns can have more than one syllable and only Okrand 
can make up new nouns."?
 
> _________________________________________________________________________
> Voragh                            "Grammatici certant et adhuc sub judice
> Ca'Non Master of the Klingons      lis est."         Horace (Ars Poetica) 

charghwI' 'utlh




Back to archive top level