tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Thu May 04 00:26:15 1995
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Re: Transitivity
On Wed, 3 May 1995 22:06:20 -0400, [email protected] said:
> This one should draw some comments!!!
maj, Datlhobpu'. :-) 'oy'chugh yIbepQo'. :-)
> Perhaps Klingons do not think of Klingon language verbs as being
> transitive or intransitive at all. Transitivity is implied not by
> the verb roots themselves but by pronomial verb prefixes.
Of course. Just as in Latin transitivity is implied not by the verb
roots themselves, but by the use of accusative case. How is Klingon
any different?
And you mean the verb *stems*, not the verb *roots*: {chenmoH} and
{chen} have the same root, but the former is obviously transitive,
whereas the latter looks intransitive enough to me.
> Klingons can tell whether a verb has an object and use one set
> of prefixes or whether a verb does not have an object and use a
> different set of prefixes.
Right. But how can they? That is the question.
Verb prefixes come in two kinds: such as don't express an object
({jI-}, {bI-} etc.) and such as do ({vI-}, {Da-}, {mu-}, {Du-} etc.),
and either (1) any Klingon verb can meaningfully take any verb prefix
or (2) some verbs can't take a prefix which expresses an object.
If (1), then it must be explained what, say, {vItIn} means, how its
meaning is related to {jItIn} (is the relation the same as between
{vIQong} and {jIQong}? between {vISop} and {jISop}?) and so forth.
If (2), then the classification of verbs by transitivity is just as real,
and just as essential, as in any other language.
--'Iwvan