tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Fri Oct 07 14:56:26 1994
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Re: Good day to die.
- From: "...Paul" <[email protected]>
- Subject: Re: Good day to die.
- Date: Fri, 7 Oct 1994 17:54:31 -0400
>From: "William H. Martin" <[email protected]>
>Date: Fri, 7 Oct 94 17:26:51 EDT
>Subject: Re: Good day to die.
>
>According to Thornton Rose:
>>
>> 2. -vam mean "this" and "jaj" is "day (n)". So, wouldn't j"jajvam" mean
>> "this day"?
>
>I feel uneasy about this because the locative suffix {-vam}
>indicates location in space. {jaj} has no location in space. It
>has a temporal "location". In English, we mix these two concepts
>together all the time. We have no reason that I know of in
>Klingon to feel comfortable doing the same. I can put a paper
>clip in my hand and say, {mavjopvam} and even though the floor
>may be covered with paper clips, you will know to WHICH paper
>clip I refer. How do I point to a {jaj}? I can't hold it in my
>hand. I can't lean up against it and pat it with my palm. I
>can't point to it.
My copy of TKD says "Like its English translation, this suffix indicates
that the noun refers to an object which is nearby or which is the topic
of the conversation." Same for -vetlh. -vam and -vetlh are not locative,
they're specificative (if that's a word)...
>> 4. The previous questions I had asked myself, which is how I got to:
>>
>> HeghmeH jaj QaQ 'oH jajvam'e'.
>> For the purpose of dying, today is a good day.
>
>I probably mistook this for the other examples which I believe
>omitted the first {jaj}. If all of the examples had the initial
>{jaj}, then I apologise for going off the deep end. I thought
>what you had said was {HeghmeH QaQ 'oH jajvam'e'}. That would
>have been stating the "is" twice, hence my eruption.
>
>I have only two minor, but successfully nagging problems with
>this. We already have the word {DaHjaj} which points out which
>day we indicate without using the English-centric {jajvam'e'}
>that confuses location in space and time. Why insist on using
>{jajvam'e'}?
HeghmeH jaj QaQ 'oH jajvam'e' suffers from redundancy, IMHO. It's like,
in English, you can say "The dog is good", or, the more redundant way,
"The dog is a good dog." I think what the original poster was getting
confused is that adjectives in Klingon are actually verbs; the problem
(I had the same problem) is that the way TKD reads, it leads you to believe
that adjectival verbs can ONLY be used after a noun; ie. "jaj QaQ" for
"good day". However, if the sentence is going to say "the day is good",
you can simply say "QaQ jaj". The point about adjectives is to allow
you to modify a noun without having to go through a very intricate
sentence structure...
ObSuggestionFor"GoodDayToDie": HeghvaD QaQ jajvam
...Paul
s