tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Tue Sep 27 17:30:33 1994
[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next]
Re: KLBC: {-chuq}
- From: "William H. Martin" <[email protected]>
- Subject: Re: KLBC: {-chuq}
- Date: Tue, 27 Sep 94 20:30:22 EDT
- In-Reply-To: <[email protected]>; from "Igor Nekyha" at Sep 26, 94 3:58 pm
According to Igor Nekyha:
>
> As a beginner, I'm probably missing something, but why not just say:
>
> peghmey niHta' tera'nganvo' romuluSnganvo' je
Yes, you are a beginner and you are missing something. If this
means anything at all, it means, "From the Romulan and from the
Teran accomplished stealing secrets." That doesn't mean very
much.
Just as many verbal suffixes make a verb dependent and
therefore not the main verb of the sentence, the noun suffix
{-vo'} turns a noun into a grammatical unit which is not
appropriate for a subject or a direct object. It essentially
becomes a prepositional phrase indicating direction of action.
> This seems to convey the intended meaning, ie that they stole secrets and
> that the theft was from themselves. Since they can't be stealing their own
> secrets, they must be stealing from each other.
I'm afraid that a noun cannot fulfill both these roles at the
same time. In general, words with {-vo'}, like other locatives,
are expected at the beginning of a sentence, in front of the
object, if there is one.
> There's nothing I can find in TKD which says that subjects can't take the -vo'
> suffix, though I admit there may not be many situations in which it would
> be appropriate.
>
> --
> EEG
Read 3.3.5 again, especially at the top of page 27. "Similarly,
in Klingon, nouns which indicate SOMETHING OTHER THAN SUBJECT
OR OBJECT usually must have some special indication of exactly
what their function is. Unlike English, this is accomplished BY
USING SUFFIXES." (My emphasis) Here, he is telling you that
type 5 noun suffixes are for nouns which are not subjects or
objects.
charghwI'