tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Sun Mar 10 19:42:03 1996
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Re: nabwIj - tlhIngan wo' batlh
- From: [email protected] (Alan Anderson)
- Subject: Re: nabwIj - tlhIngan wo' batlh
- Date: Sun, 10 Mar 1996 22:43:50 -0500
[email protected] writes:
>Practice is always needed. Here's some nonsense:
Though the label "nonsense" is a wee bit strong, I'm afraid it has
a grain of truth to it. There's a lot of good work here, but there
is also a lot of very bad grammar (and a few silly errors).
>tlhIngan wo' batlh
>
>nabwIjmo' qIb che' tlhIngan wo'
maj.
>woQ wIghoSqa' 'ej lanna'maj tlhap --- che'pu'wI' !
I don't think {ghoS} works here -- I'm not at all sure what you mean.
{lan} is a verb. The noun you should use here is {Daq}.
>(Can I use a noun plural on a verb thast has been turned into a noun with
>wI'?)
Yes. verb+wI' is a full-fledged noun, and may have noun suffixes, but the
noun suffixes must follow the verb suffix {-wI'}; after all, it's verb+wI'
that is the noun itself. Your last word should be {che'wI'pu'}.
>wa'DIch, *pIcarD* wIHoHnIS
This "adverbial" use of {wa'DIch} isn't mentioned in TKD, and I don't know
of any canon examples of it. I don't like it.
>nuSengchu'taHmeH law'
nuqjatlh? "It is many in order to continuously perfectly cause us trouble"
or something like that. I'm not completely comfortable with {Seng} as a
transitive verb, but I understand it okay. But what's with {law'} here?
Please explain what you were trying to say.
>wImevnIS
maj.
>So'ta' baHlaHvIS toQDujwIj
{-vIS} is always accompanied by {-taH} (TKD 4.2.9). Also, subordinate
clauses (TKD 6.2.2) come either before or after the main clause of the
sentence; you have incorrectly put one in the middle. {baHlaHtaHvIS}
needs to either precede or follow {So'ta' toQDujwIj}. However, I think
this idea can be expressed better as {So'taHvIS baHlaH toQDujwIj}.
>toQDujDaj *chang* rap
nuqjatlh? "It is the same his Bird-of-prey's Chang." Maybe if you
reversed the words' order and dropped the {-Daj} it would make more
sense. Klingon has two ways to indicate possessive: noun suffixes
(TKD 3.3.4) and the noun-noun construction (TKD 3.4). Using both to
mean the same thing at the same time is redundant at best, is usually
very confusing, and rarely means what is intended. I'm pretty sure
that {rap} "be the same" shouldn't have an object; I don't think it
means "be the same as". I'd say {rap *chang toQDuj}, or maybe make it
{rap *chang toQDuj toQDujwIj je}.
>bIlegh, *pIcarD* HoH toQDujwIj
"You see,..." is one of those annoying extraneous phrases one finds
scattered throughout English. It is certainly not something that a
true Klingon would say, and most Klingons would see it as a sign of
dithering and lack of straightforwardness.
>je DIvI' vIQaw' 'ej tlhInganpu' che'
This is *extremely* confusing. {je} meaning "also" *follows* what it
is referring to; do you mean "I will destroy the Federation also" or
"I also will destroy the Federation"? I'm pretty sure you have the
word order reversed in the second sentence. "He rules Klingons" doesn't
seem to fit what you're talking about.
>DIvI' vIQaw'ta'DI', jo DIlo' verengan charghtaH ngeDmeH
>'ej romuluSngan charghtaH rotlhmeH
>(is this clear? rotlhmeH and ngeDmeH are sort of being used as adverbs...is
>this allowed?)
If you create a purpose clause with {-meH}, it *precedes* the noun or verb
it is describing (TKD 6.2.4). But that's not how you seem to be trying to
use it. It looks like you are trying to translate something like "it is
easy to..." and "it is tough to...", but that's not easily translatable.
Also, {jo DIlo'} and {verengan charghtaH} have no grammatical connection,
so it's hard for me to tell what you really mean. Finally, if you want to
contrast with {ngeD}, you probably should use {Qatlh} instead of {rotlh}.
>juppu'wI' bIleghmeH, romuluSngan HoS puS 'ach DIchargh
"My friends, for you to see, few strong Romulans; but we conquer them."
I'm at a loss to understand the middle of this sentence. What did you
want to say?
-- ghunchu'wI' batlh Suvchugh vaj batlh SovchoH vaj