tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Mon Nov 29 12:37:08 1993

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Chapter 1 of Ruth



>From: Nick Nicholas <[email protected]>
>Date: Sun, 28 Nov 1993 00:12:13 +1100 (GMT)

>To Mark E. Shoulson respond I thus:

>For "man from Bethlehem in Judea", I'd say "*yeHu'Da* *betleHem* ghot" ---
>Judea's Bethlehem's man. I'm assuming Bethlehem is stressed on the final
>syllable, from the Greek transliteration Bhqlee'm.

Actually, it's on the penult.  It's a compound of "beit" + "lechem" ==
"breadhouse".  I wouldn't stress too much on the scansion (pun intended);
we don't have a perfect list of Klingon stress rules and we probably
couldn't do much about it anyway.  'Sides, nobody else cared when
translating the Bible:  Who'd recognize Abraham Isaac and Jacob in avraHAM
yitzCHAK and ya`aKOV?

>#Wilson's transliteration rules would have you use "*beytleHem," but "-ytl"
>#isn't something you'd ever see in the middle of a Klingon word, so I'd
>#avoid it in transliterations.  

>These are names, after all... Still, we could always add an extra vowel, a
>schwa substitute, like "beytIleHem". I'm beginning to suspect transliterated
>names in Klingon will look like Japanese...

Yeah, they're names, but that didn't stop the Greeks(?) from tacking on
"-s"s everywhere because they couldn't deal with vowel-final names like
"mosheh"-->"moses".  Most transliterations are tweaked to conform to what
the target language considers "pronounceable".  Hmm.... Actually, it
*isn't* a schwa.  The Hebrew there has "Beit lechem" as *two* words, thus
there isn't a schwa there.  In other cases I might agree...

>#Otherwise you should use something
>#like "wa'vaD rut ponglu'", but that's less sure.

>Oh, I like this though. Seems elegant.

Me too, ingeneral... but my over-literal translation style would probably
stick to "rut 'oH wa' pong", since that's what the Hebrew has.  Modern
Hebrew would do "wa'vaD rut ponglu'" fairly frequently (leading me to
advocate "chay' Daponglu'" for "what's your name", along the lines of
"chay' jura'").

>#I don't trust "ghotpu'" for "people" in this case: this is the singular
>#"people", as in tribe.  Maybe "qorDu'['a']" (cf what I tried in Jonah).

>Hm. I used "ghotghom" in the Gettysburg address addendum. In Esperanto, the
>equivalent of "ghotghom" means "humanity", but a case could be made for
>restricting that meaning to "tlhInganghom, Humanghom", and keeping "ghotghom"
>for a large group of people. This doesn't connote nationhood, though. Maybe
>"wo'nganghom"?

I still like extensions on "qorDu'", especially in Biblical contexts, where
some familial relation is implied.

>#>1:11 peDoH puqbe'wI'
>#>qatlh tutlha'
>#>bogh puqloD 'e' vIghaj'a' 'e' loDnalra' chaHjaj

>#Maybe "loDnalra' chaHmeH puloDpu' vIghaj'a'/vIboghmoHlaH'a'?"

>Much better; I'd have said "loDnalra' mojbogh puqloDpu''e' vIboghmoHlaH'a'?

Heh.  I once had to translate "Do you take this woman to be your wife?"  I
did "be'nallI' ghaHmeH be'vam Datlhapqang'a'?"  "-meH" rules.  SImilarly I
once did the Jewish line that's roughly equivalent to "with this ring I
thee wed", which is "Behold, you are consecrated to me with this ring
according to the laws of Moses and Israel".  I came up with ""Moshe"
"yisrael" je lalDanDaq be'nalwI' SoHmeH SoHvaD Qebvam vInob" (stretch on
"-Daq", yeah).

>#>voghDaq bIlengchugh pa'Daq jIleng
>#>vogh bIyInchugh pa' jIyIn

>I think "jIlengqang" or "jIlengrup" would be more explicit; Klingon "if" is
>very vague...

Yeah, forgot about those suffixes.  They're excellent here.

>#And it's qorDu''a'lIj/qorDu''a'wIj, nations aren't speaking.  

>Not even as a mass of jatlhlaHwI'? This isn't as clearcut to me...

It is to me.  This isn't lojban either, masses don't partake of the
features of their elements.  A qorDu' is something considered as a mass,
not as a sentient, speaking organism.  I suppose you could talk about the
police force, say, saying something, but in general I'd consider even
groups to be non-sentient.

>#>1:17 Daq bIHegh jIHegh 'ej pa' jImol
>#>jIHvaD Dochvam latlh je qaSmoHjaj joH'a' nulagh Heghghach
>#I think "DaqDaq bIHegh pa' jIHegh" sounds better; you need the locatives.

>'Scuse? "At the place you die. There I die." This only makes sense in English.
>Surely you mean... oh shite, it's another one of those "ships where I ate"
>relative clauses. Well, you could do all sorts of things here. The Tok Pisin
>solution would be "vogh bIHeghchugh, pa' jIHeghqang". The Turkish solution
>I have advocated would be "bIHeghghach DaqDaq jIHeghqang", or perhaps "HeghlIj
>DaqDaq jIHeghqang".

The ones you put at the end seem closest to Okrand's "DaqwIj vISovbe'" and
"ghe''orDaq luSpet 'oH DaqlIj'e'".  Probably better.  I dunno that my use
of relatives and correlatives was so bad, but maybe you're right; that's a
very IE concept.

>#>1:21 jImejDI' jInaQ 'ej jIcheghDI' jIchIm
>#>jIHDaq joH'a'mo' qaSpu' Dochmey 'e' Datu'DI' ney'omI chopong'a'
>#I love that first clause.  

>Yeah, I'll pay that. It sounds biblical enough... 

>#Great.  Maybe "mucheghmoHDI' joH'a' jIchIm"?

>And kill the symmetry?

Maybe.  The symmetry isn't in the Hebrew: I full went, and empty returned
me the LORD.

~mark



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