tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Thu Jul 29 12:49:52 2004

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RE: TKD phrase: {-meH} clause

d'Armond Speers, Ph.D. ([email protected]) [KLI Member] [Hol po'wI']

Voragh wrote:
> QeS lagh:
>> I think part of the problem may be that you're
>> misinterpreting the {-meH} clause here. As I see it, the
>> TKD sentence {Dochvetlh DIlmeH Huch 'ar DaneH} uses the
>> {-meH} clause {Dochvetlh DIlmeH} to modify {Huch}, not
>> to modify the main clause. These are the two possible
>> analyses:
>>
>> <Dochvetlh DIlmeH> Huch 'ar DaneH
>> - in which we'd probably expect {Dochvetlh vIDIlmeH Huch
>> 'ar DaneH}; and
>>
>> <Dochvetlh DIlmeH Huch> 'ar DaneH
>> - in which both it and {Dochvetlh vIDIlmeH Huch 'ar
>> DaneH} are fine.
>>
>> I think that the second is the case, and that yes,
>> context clearly identifies who's paying whom.
>
> Exactly right:  "How much money-to-pay-for-that-thing do
> you want?"
>
> {DIlmeH Huch} is a "purpose noun" and *not* part of a
> purpose clause.  If it helps, think of {DIlmeH Huch} as
> "price" (lit. "money for paying [for something]).
> {Dochvetlh} modifies this purpose noun:  {Dochvetlh
> <DIlmeH Huch>} the price of that thing (over there) vs.
> this thing (here).

Just to offer a differing view, my mind parses this as

<Dochvetlh DIlmeH> Huch 'ar DaneH
"In order to pay for that thing, how much money do you want?"

This seems more natural to me than the alternative, "how much
money-to-pay-for-that-thing do you want."  It's ambiguous because it's in
the object position; which of these two do you prefer:

Dochvetlh DIlmeH yapbe' HuchwIj
yapbe' Dochvetlh DIlmeH HuchwIj

Both are grammatical, but I find the first one more natural to say and
understand.  You seem to be implying that the only correct view is the
<DIlmeH Huch> one, and I disagree.  Is the disagreement over why, if the
<DIlmeH> reading is preferable to the <DIlmeH Huch> one, this isn't
{<Dochvetlh vIDIlmeH> Huch 'ar DaneH} (with an appropriate prefix)?  If
{Huch} is the subject of {DIlmeH} in the <DIlmeH Huch> case, then it can be
the subject (as an elided pronoun) in the <DIlmeH> one too.  Yes?

Supporting canon:

TKW p. 182
{HIvmeH Duj So'lu'}
A ship cloaks in order to attack.

This is "one cloaks a ship in order to attack," not "one cloaks an
in-order-to-attack-ship."  If it were the latter, I'd expect the translation
to be something more like "The attack ship is cloaked."  This doesn't suffer
from the prefix problem above, but it shows that N-meH N V can be parsed as
<N-meH> N V rather than <N-meH N> V.

--Holtej

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