tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Fri Sep 30 06:20:28 1994

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Re: Hoch, et al.



>From: Terry Donnelly <[email protected]>
>Date: Thu, 29 Sep 1994 18:45:22 -0500 (CDT)

>Exactly!  I would express this thought in this way: the Klingon
>N-N construction indicates that the first noun modifies the
>meaning of the second noun in some way, and that the possessive
>N-N construction and the attributive N-N construction are both
>subsets of this more general concept.

Maybe it's me, but I find the distinction between "possessive" and
"attributive" to be splitting hairs more often than not.

>I think the attributive use of the N-N construction is beyond
>argument: it's obviously being used this way by Okrand himself
>(cf. the phrase {peQ chem} in TKD).  Since {Hoch} is listed in
>TKD as a noun, I see no reason why it shouldn't fall under the
>same rules for attributive N-N constructions as any other noun
>(i.e. to express "all", {Hoch} comes before the modified noun);
>and the same goes for {nuq, 'Iv, latlh}, et al.

Alternatively, "peQ chem" is "magnetism's field", i.e. a field which is
some attribute of (and thus part of/possessed by) magnetism.  But I don't
see that this implies that "Hoch" should come first; quite the contrary.
See below.

>If you claim that {Hoch} meaning "all" should come *after* the
>modified noun, you have a lot of questions to answer:  Why does
>the N-N construction suddenly reverse its usual interpretation
>when {Hoch} is involved?  Where is the canonical evidence for
>this?  Is {Hoch} a special case, or are there other nouns used
>attributively that follow this pattern?  If it's special, why is
>it special?  If there are other nouns that follow this inverted
>pattern, how can we recognize them and distinguish them from the
>nouns that follow the usual N-N pattern (where attributives come
>first)?

Not at all.  In Klingon N-N pairs, whatever name you attach to them, the
modifying noun comes first, yes.  HOWEVER, "Hoch" is not the modifying
noun.  It is the noun being modified.  "Hoch" is a noun meaning "all" or
"everything" or "totality"; a collective universal noun referring to the
mass of all things under consideration.  "no'lI' Hoch" is thus "the mass of
all things related (in a specific way) to your ancestor(s)"; i.e. their
all, the totality they comprise.  "Hoch" is by no means a special case,
it's following normal usage.  This is common in scads of languages: English
("all of...", using the possessive "of" on the noun "all"), Hebrew (uses
possessive forms of the word for "all" in just the same way I claim Klingon
does), Esperanto (doesn't use a possessive preposition, but Klingon is
short of prepositions.  But the word for "all" is still the head word, and
the thing being universalized is the object of the preposition: the
modifier), and so on.  I mean, consider the direct translation: "nuH pegh"
means "Secret of the weapon," right?  generally, "n1 n2" can be translated
to "n2 of the n1" (note reversal).  So "no'lI' Hoch" translates to "Hoch of
no'lI'", substituting for words: "all of your ancestors."

>On the other hand, if you accept the attributive usage of the N-N
>construction and accept that {Hoch}, et al., as simple nouns fall
>into this same pattern, then there are no awkward questions to be
>answered.  No canonical examples of Klingon are contradicted by
>this interpretation, and the logic of the grammar (as shown in 
>the existing canon, implicitly if not explicitly) is preserved.

I find using "Hoch" beforehand problematical, myself.  To me, it's the one
that needs to explain stuff.  in "Hoch no'lI'", "Hoch", meaning
"everything/everyone/all" should modify "no'lI'".  So we're dealing with
"Your ancestors" which are somehow modified by/associated with everything.
So everyone owns your ancestors?

>Terry


~mark



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