tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Mon Feb 20 04:35:15 2006
[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next]
Re: Klingon WOTD: nga'chuq (verb)
- From: "QeS 'utlh" <[email protected]>
- Subject: Re: Klingon WOTD: nga'chuq (verb)
- Date: Mon, 20 Feb 2006 22:34:49 +1000
- Bcc:
ghItlhpu' Holtej, ja':
>Note: it is unclear about what part of speech this may be,
>though it is probably a verb
As most will no doubt have realised, this is probably a compound of an old
or archaic verb *{nga'} "to mate with" and the type 1 verb suffix {-chuq}
"each other". One presumes that *{nga'} has either evolved into {ngagh} "to
mate with", or is an ancient inflected form of the verb. It seems that
consonantal alternations were a substantial part of older forms of Klingon.
Another possible such change may have been the {q} ~ {Q} alternations, whose
formations were originally probably more expressive than lexical:
{qeH} "to resent" ~ {QeH} "to be angry"
{qaq} "to be preferable" ~ {QaQ} "to be good"
{qay'} "to be a problem" ~ {Qay'} "to blow one's top"
The same phenomenon may have led to the pairs {qam} "foot" ~ {Qam} "to
stand", {qeq} "to practise" ~ {Qeq} "to aim", and {qap} "to insist" ~ {Qap}
"to succeed", and perhaps even {qotlh} "to tickle" and {Qotlh} "to disable";
an opposing pair is found in {qup} "elder" ~ {Qup} "to be young". Then, of
course, there's the pair {qeS} "advice" and {QeS}... {{:P
>and "always subject" probably refers to the concept that all
>involved parties collectively make the subject of this verb.
Considering that verbs with the suffix {-chuq} cannot normally take object
prefixes anyway, this supports the idea that {nga'chuq} is a verb.
Savan,
QeS 'utlh
tlhIngan Hol yejHaD pabpo' / Grammarian of the Klingon Language Institute
not nItoj Hemey ngo' juppu' ngo' je
(Old roads and old friends will never deceive you)
- Ubykh Hol vIttlhegh
_________________________________________________________________
New year, new job ? there's more than 100,00 jobs at SEEK
http://a.ninemsn.com.au/b.aspx?URL=http%3A%2F%2Fninemsn%2Eseek%2Ecom%2Eau&_t=752315885&_r=Jan05_tagline&_m=EXT