tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Mon Aug 13 07:58:46 2007
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Re: mu' chu' - 'el'I'jaH (?)
>Qov:
> >>paqDaq latlh mu' ghaj Okrand 'e' vIlegh. <'el'I'jaH> 'oHlaw'. 'ej
> >>"uninvited guest" 'oS. mu'vetlh maqbejbe'mo' chaq mu'na' bIHbe'.
>
>QeS:
> >chaq. 'ach mu'na' 'oHchugh tlhIngan Hol qID ngaSlaw' je. chaq {'I'} qID
> >yajlaHbe' tlhIngan Hol jatlhwI' - chay' qechvammey lurarlu', "armpit"
> >"uninvited guest" je? - 'ach lughlaw' {'el} {jaH} je: 'el, Sop, ghIq jaH
> >'el'I'jaH.
Voragh:
>>Do we have {'el'I'jaH} spelled right? Qov, did you hear three separate
>>glottal stops /'/? This sounds a bit odd for a pun on Elijah (*Eliyahu* in
>>Hebrew) the uninvited/unexpected guest, even for Okrand.
Qov:
>I never heard it pronounced. He opened a notebook and uncovered the
>word. I most certainly could have remembered it incorrectly. I saw it
>only as a Klingonized Elijah. I don't know Hebrew, so I wouldn't have
>recognized Eliyahu. I remembered it as containing all the letters of
>elijaH, with some stops thrown in. It could easily have been
>'elI'jaH. I think Lawrence saw it too, maybe he remembers.
ghunchu'wI':
> <'el'I'jaH> vIlaDbej jIH.
Voragh:
>>It strikes me that the sequence /'-'-'-H/ in one word would be very
>>difficult for most people to pronounce. (Not that that would stop Okrand,
>>of course. <g>)
Quvar:
>I do not see any problem here; {'el'I'jaH} follows the typical klingon
>letter pattern (cvc), and is compound of three syllables, which are not
>difficult to pronounce: {'el-'I'-jaH}
Perhaps not for you, but I would guess most native English speakers would
have a bit of trouble enunciating three alifs /'/ in a row clearly.
Voragh:
>>Also, we've only seen the syllable - or even the string - {'I'} once
>>before: in {'I'} "armpit".
Quvar:
>That might be a coincidence; we do have 'a', 'e', 'I', 'o', 'u'. You are
>right, no other word contains the syllable 'I'. Do you think of a
>spelling like qelI'qam, Ha'DIbaH or vIlInHoD?
'ISqu':
>The word Okrand wrote in my notebook during last year's qep'a' was spelled
><<'elI'jaH>>. The English translation, written by Lawrence below the
>Klingon word, was "unexpected visitor".
Aha! Now *that* spelling wouldn't surprise me at all. Perhaps Okrand got
carried away with the /'/s when he wrote it in that notebook. Interesting,
that Okrand had already come up with this at least a year ago. (During a
Seder, perhaps?) I wonder how many other words he's coined - and Lawrence
knows - there are that we don't know about?
Assuming everyone is remembering this correctly, perhaps
{'elI'jaH}/{'el'I'jaH} exists in two variants. We've seen this before with
{qItI'nga'} "K'Tinga class (vessel)" which I believe was once seen spelled
{qI'tI'nga'} with an extra /'/ - interestingly next to the vowel /I/ again.
--
Voragh
Ca'Non Master of the Klingons