tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Thu Feb 11 06:39:52 2010
[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next]
RE: suffixes -lu'wI'
Andre:
>>> Now, while looking through {ghIlghameS} I had an idea: As {-lu'}
>>> means more or less "someone verbs" (with a change of A and P for the
>>> pronominal prefixes), and {-wI'} means "someone who does" OR
>>> "something which does", is it possible to create a patient
>>> nominalization with {-lu'wI'}?
>>>
>>> So, does {tlhoblu'wI'} mean "that which is asked" (i.e. the question
>>> or request)? I think, the word I found in {ghIlghameS} was something
>>> like {leghbe'lu'wI'} = "the unseen", but I don't quite remember.
>>>
>>> Are such forms grammatical? [...]
>>> Do you think it's a nice way to say "question" or "request"?
SuStel:
>>This is an old chestnut, and you won't find a consensus here. For my
>>money, this is not valid. {-wI'} nominalizes the verb into the subject,
>>but {-lu'} means the verb has no subject. The two are mutually
>>incompatible.
>>> Do we even have canon examples for this?
There are no canon examples of words ending in *{-lu'wI'}.
Andre:
> I guess I'm not the first one who asked this question, and if you have
> a link to a previous discussion on that, I'd be happy reading it. But I
> guess it's true that there is no consensus. It interests me what other
> people think about this {-lu'wI'} thing.
You're not the first to have proposed such forms. E.g.
*chellu'wI' addendum, appendix [Qov]
*leghbe'lu'wI' unseen (one) [GIL]
*ngoHlu'wI' the Christ [KBTP]
*rachlu'wI' an Augment (genetically enhanced human) [source?]
Grammaticality aside, these tend to be "hindsight words", i.e. confusing words that make sense only after they've been explained by the person who coined them. I've always been leery of them.
--
Voragh
Canon Master of the Klingons