tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Sat Jan 31 16:47:02 1998

Back to archive top level

To this year's listing

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

Re: Nature phenomenon

[Insert standard speculation disclaimer for Klingonists who like to attack
without reason.]

Suppose for a moment that you are Marc Okrand writing The Klingon
Dictionary.  You look out the window and realize you need to invent a few
words describing the weather.  You decide concepts of "raining" or "snowing"
will be represented by verbs, like many other things in Klingon.

How do you put this down in the dictionary?  It is unlikely that you have
thought about this and decided that these verbs always have unspecified
subjects; you simply think of the words.  {SIS} "rain," {peD} "snow."  You
jot them down in your word list like that.  You never consider usage (at
least, not right away).

Now we're stuck with the predicament of words which just don't seem to WANT
to be verbs.  Verbs require a subject, even if it is unspecified.  Again,
just how would YOU write a verbal, non-idiomatic translation of "It is
raining"?

I don't like the idea of {SISlu'} or {peDlu'}.  It looks to me entirely like
an English speaker's attempt to get around the problems of translation.

I don't like the idea of {SIS} and {peD} NOT having subject at all.  It
doesn't fit in with anything we've ever learned about the language.
Unfortunately, we have no information about what that subject is.

However, suppose for a moment that these verbs do not, in fact, have any
subject whatsoever.  They are flukes of the language in that regard.  It
certainly seems to me that they actually function more like {chuvmey}
exclamations, except that they can (probably) take verb suffixes as well.
It would be like being able to say {majlaw'} for "I think that's
satisfactory" or {majqu'} for "That's very satisfactory" (perhaps this
phrase was the forerunner of {majQa'}, being spoken extremely emphatically).
{SIS} and {peD} might be in a transition phase going from verb to leftover,
or the other way round.

[Repeat standard speculation disclaimer stated at beginning.]

SuStel
Stardate 98081.7

Back to archive top level