tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Thu Feb 09 20:26:41 2012
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Re: [Tlhingan-hol] Semantic roles with -moH... again
ghItlhpu' ghunchu'wI', jatlh:
> In known and officially explained cases, such as {qajatlh} and
> {ro'qegh'Iwchab HInob}, the prefix points to a first- or second-person
> "object" even though the true object is either null or third-person.
> When the rule of {rom} is bent in this way, the mismatched prefix is
> interpreted as indicating the beneficiary. I suggest that the trick
> also works when the prefix indicates a third-person object but the
> verb has no true object. With this interpretation, {Qang vIQongmoH} is
> thus syntactical shorthand for {QangvaD jIQongmoH}. With this
> interpretation, every occurrence of a verb of quality plus {-moH} with
> an apparent object is actually an example of the prefix trick.
An intriguing perspective, but there are no "un-tricked" parallels in
canon, and we do have quite a few examples of -moH on univalent verbs.
To me it's simplest to explain it as a kind of demotion process that
follows a hierarchy of subject > direct object > indirect object. I think
-moH basically demotes the original grammatical subject, and where it ends
up is based on that hierarchy.
In univalent verbs - 'oy', vem, quq, and so on - the direct object slot
is empty, so the demoted subject can move down the hierarchy to fill it.
In bivalent verbs - qaw, Sop, legh, etc. - where the direct object slot
is full, the demoted subject has to move down the hierarchy, but the
direct object slot is unavailable, so it has to move to the *indirect*
object slot, the only one left available.
YMMV, and I might be biased by the natural languages I know that do the
same thing, but it's simple and accurately accounts for the argument
structure of every -moH I know of in canon, even tuQmoH.
taH:
> It also resolves the {tuQ} and {tuQmoH} question as a syntactical
> issue. The "natural" object of {tuQ} is clothing, but if the clothing
> isn't mentioned, the person being caused to wear it can trick his way
> into the object slot.
I don't think I understand how that solves the tuQ/tuQmoH issue. HIchuH.
QeS 'utlh
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