tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Mon Sep 14 09:28:45 1998

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Re: Missing Vocab. ?

: ja' Chyrstofier:
: >I was surprised not to find a Klingon word for 'Death'. Is this just an
: >oversight on my behalf?
: 
: Yes, it *is* just an oversight on your behalf.  Look at the middle of
: page 187; it is also near the top of page 182.  It's a pain having to
: remember to look things up in the addendum as well, and the problem is
: compounded by having yet another list of words in the book _Klingon for
: the Galactic Traveler_.  That's one reason why, sooner or later, it's a
: really good idea to anyone who's learning Klingon to recopy all of the
: vocabulary into a single list.
: 
: -- ghunchu'wI'

Here's the entry from my own annotated vocabulary list:

Hegh  death (n.) (cf. vb. Hegh "die")
 - Hegh neH chav qoH
   A fool's only achievement is death. TKW 

Bear in mind that Klingon may not actually use the word {Hegh} where English
uses "death".  Marc Okrand explains two such usages in _Klingon for the
Galactic Traveler_ (p.49):

   ... the verb suffix {-chu'} (perfectly), when used with some verbs of
   fighting, implies that the fight results in death. From the Klingon point
   of view, {Suvchu'} (fight perfectly) is "fight to the death". A similar
   construction is used for dueling ({Hay'chu'}, "duel to the death").
   {Hay'chu' chaH} "They duel to the death." {Hay'chuqchu'} "They duel one
   another to the death." 

   The archaic Klingon phrase {ghIqtal} also means "to the death", though it
   is generally used as a sentence in its own right, a type of exclamation.


-- 
Voragh                           "Grammatici certant et adhuc sub judice
Ca'Non Master of the Klingons     lis est."         Horace (Ars Poetica)

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