tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Thu Apr 22 04:19:42 2004

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Headless relatives and {SuDbogh Dargh 'ej wovbogh}

QeS lagh ([email protected]) 

While fixing up the section on multiple adjectives on the "Common Grammar 
Problems" Wiki page, I just had a rather ground-shaking thought (or so I 
believed) with regard to the acceptability of headless relative clauses in 
Klingon. While we all say that

{Dajatlhbogh vIyajbe'}

is clearly a headless relative (and therefore somewhat bizarre), I was just 
reading through KGT on adjectival verbs, and noticed the construct {SuDbogh 
Dargh 'ej wovbogh}.

Now, from a grammatical point of view, the conjunction {'ej} would seem to 
signify that {wovbogh} is grammatically separate from {SuDbogh Dargh}. But 
if {wovbogh} *is* grammatically separate, it therefore lacks an explicit 
head; the head noun is assumed to be {Dargh}, which has been left behind in 
the clause with {SuDbogh}. I know that this isn't as blatantly headless as 
{Dajatlhbogh vIyajbe'}, but from a grammatical point of view {wovbogh} would 
appear to be headless.

Is this evidence that headless relatives might not be quite so rare as we 
suppose, or is the connection between clauses with {'ej} somewhat more solid 
than just that between two sentences?

QeS lagh

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