tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Tue Jan 27 10:59:17 1998

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Re: Locatives and {-bogh} (was Re: KLBC Poetry)

Nice to see your position weakening, but I'm not ready to
concede that both methods are valid. I think the idea of using
any Type 5 noun suffix to indicate the head noun of a relative
clause needs to be extinguished, obliterated, disintegrated,
dishonored and shunned so profoundly that nobody ever brings it
up again as a "new" idea, unless Okrand personally and
explicitly says otherwise. You see it as a potentially useful
tool, possibly indicated by a single example which, with no
type 5 suffix at all would have no ambiguity whatsoever as to
what was the head noun. {meQtaHbogh qachDaq} only has one noun,
so it HAS to be the head noun. If the {-Daq} were missing,
there would be no reason to add {-'e'}.

According to Qermaq:
> 
> ghItlh charghwI':
> 
> >quSDaq Sopbogh HoD vIlegh.

Note the grammatical differences between {quSDaq Sopbogh HoD}
and {meQtaHbogh qachDaq}. The latter needs no {-'e'} to
disambiguate which noun is the head noun because there is only
one noun available to act as the head noun. The former needs no
{-'e'} to disambiguate the head noun because under any normal
circumstances, no noun with {-Daq} could be a head noun.

The building is not in any way evidence that {-Daq} can act as
{-'e'} because {-'e'} is not needed. If we do accept this new,
unsubstantiated rule that you suggest, then the chair HAS to be
the head noun. We are forced to that conclusion. If we ignore
this unsubstantiated ruleqoq, then the chair CAN'T POSSIBLY be
the head noun because head nouns are subjects or objects and
don't use any Type 5 suffix except maybe {-'e'}.

> >By my expectations, it means, "I saw the captain who ate in the
> >chair." (Note the statement is equally ambiguous in English as
> >Klingon. Did I see "the captain who ate" in the chair, or did I
> >see the captain "who ate in the chair"? We could use a comma if
> >the first meaning is intended, I suppose, but in most cases, the
> >two meanings both tell us you saw the captain in the chair and
> >he was eating.)
> >
> >By your advice, it would have to mean, "I saw it in the chair
> >which the captain ate." wejpuH. But there it is, {quSDaq}
> >obviously has a Type 5 suffix, so it must be the head noun of
> >the relative clause, right?
> 
> Not what I said, exactly.

No. It IS what you said, exactly. You said that any Type 5
suffix on a noun in a relative clause makes it the head noun,
just as if it were {-'e'}. If your rule holds, then there is no
way for us to interpret {HoD} as the head noun. {quSDaq}
becomes the head noun specifically because of your rule. If
your rule exists, you have to follow it. If you have the option
of not following it, then it doesn't exist. Make up your mind.

> Many valid interpretations may exist. 

Nope. Krankor's rule says {HoD'e' qIpbogh puq} means, "The
captain who was hit by the child". Because of this rule, it
cannot mean "The child who hit the captain". If your rule
exists, it should have the same strength and offer only one
valid interpretation, forcing this simple meaning I want to
express to become very difficult to express because your rule
gets in the way.

> Your example
> is a great illustration of context dictating what is right and wrong. "I saw
> it in the chair which the captain ate" is ludicrous, but possibly what was
> intended. If that was the intended meaning, how would you say it? Is there a
> better phrasing?

quS'e' Sopta'bogh HoD DaqDaq Dochvetlh vIlegh.

> Remember the old headline "Drunk Drivers Paid $10,000 in 1995"? This is
> ambiguous, but not wrong. Sure, avoid ambiguity if you can. But the meaning
> often cannot be determined from an isolated sentence. I'm willing to
> entertain the proposition that all the examples are valid.

Sorry. Your rule works, or it doesn't. It doesn't just work
when it is useful or convenient. If you have this kind of "well
sometimes it works" rules, what you get is a language it is
easy to translate into and very difficult to understand once
the translation is finished. This is the antithesis of what I
want to happen to this langauge.

> >I'm one of the controversial few who likes {mej} as a transitive
> >verb, antonym to {'el}, and would write this:
> >
> >SuvtaHmeH meQtaHbogh tach lumejQo' qoHpu' neH.
> 
> If <mej> can be transitive, it's good. But neither you nor I have a Klingon
> in your basement.

There's a lot more strength to the argument that {mej} takes an
object than there is to the pseudorule that any Type 5 noun
suffix can act as {-'e'} to disambiguate the head noun of a
relative clause.

> {:o) MO does. He used <-Daq> in a <-bogh> construction.
> Till he says "Oops" it's canon. How we use it is an academic point of
> discussion, and I enjoy our exploration of it. But, of course, it's all
> speculation anyway.

The point is that even if it IS a good example, which I doubt,
it is not a USEFUL example because it uses a single word twice
with a suffix that only works for one of its two uses, and we
have NO grammatical rule to tell us how this works and no other
examples to help us make up a meaningful rule. It tempts us to
make up meaningless rules, like the one you made up which
doesn't work because you are saying {-Daq} is acting like
{-'e'} when there was no reason for an {-'e'} there in the
first place.

At best, it just means that an obvious head noun (with no
ambiguity available) can take {-Daq} in order to function in
the main clause as a locative while not being a locative within
the relative clause. I don't see this as useful. I see it as
confusing. I don't need it, even in this one example and I have
no interest in corrupting other sentences with this kind of
weirdness.

> Qermaq

charghwI'

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