tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Tue Jun 11 08:49:47 2002

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RE: cha'DIch KLBC rI' BG

> > >I think he should have left of the -pu'.
>
> > Now that I look at it again, I think you're
> > right. Since all three sentences have it, probably none need it (or else
>only the > first needs it, and the others can inherit its time context).
>
>Aaah, no, there is no time context implied by -pu'.  It's RELATIVE
>COMPLETION.  The time context is provided by time words.

Relative completion implies a relative time context; if it is completed at 
the time of the sentence, then it must have been performed sometime prior to 
that.  You are correct that there is no absolute time context involved in 
{-pu'}, but there very definitely *is* a relative one.

What I was trying to say is that either no sentence needed the {-pu'}, or 
else the fact that the first sentence already provided the information that 
the action was already completed, the others could inherit that.  If there 
were absolutely zero time context, then all three sentences would need 
{-pu'}, as all three actions had been completed.

At the time of utterance, the actions of all three statements were completed 
(while some of the actions may have been done again later, the instances I 
was referring to were completed).  So should they all have {-pu'}?  That was 
my first instinct.  But upon hearing DloraH's advice, I reconsidered.

If what you are saying is that the relative time context implied by {-pu'} 
does not extend to other statements (unlike absolute time contexts supplied 
by time words), then my first instinct was correct.  On the other hand, we 
already know that in at least one case such contexts are inherited; a 
sentence for which {'e'} is the object inherits the aspect (and thus the 
relative time context) of the sentence which {'e'} represents (TKD, p 66).

>choQaHpu' 'e' DanIDba'.  tlhoy jIDoy'ba'pu' 'ej pe'vIl jIjangpu'.

As you can see from my original sentence, in the SAO which I used, {-pu'} 
does not appear on the second verb of the SAO, although it appears on all 
three of the other verbs.

So I guess my question now is, is the aspect (and thus the relative time 
context) inherited by any sentence other than the second sentence of an SAO 
contruction?

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