tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Sat Dec 27 10:57:31 1997
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Re: There has been an incident in Praxis
- From: "William H. Martin" <[email protected]>
- Subject: Re: There has been an incident in Praxis
- Date: Sat, 27 Dec 1997 13:55:36 -0500 (Eastern Standard Time)
- Priority: NORMAL
On Fri, 26 Dec 1997 11:23:06 -0800 (PST) Eduardo Fonseca
<[email protected]> wrote:
> nuqneH
>
> I was seeing the Undiscovered country and Kerla said:
> "There has been an incident on Praxis".
>
> *Praxis*Daq qaStaH wanI� (An event is happening on Praxis)
This is fine, except that the original says, "There HAS BEEN an
incident on Praxis." Instead of {-taH}, consider {-pu'}.
> *Praxis*Daq qaStaH �e� wanI� tu�lu� (There is an event that is happening on Praxis)
This is gibberish. Just because the English uses two verbs
and the word "that" between them doesn't mean you can
automatically use {'e'} and call it a Sentence As Object
construction. The object of {tu'lu'} is {wanI'}. So, what is
{'e'} doing here? It's not the object of {tu'lu'}, so it doesn't
belong here. What would better serve this task?
Well, your first clue is that the OTHER most common use of
"that" linking verbs in Klingon is a relative clause. It
actually uses one verb to describe a noun which is related to
the other verb.
In this case, "has happened on Praxis" is describing the
noun "event" which is the object of "There is". This, as a
relative clause would be:
*Praxis*Daq qaSpu'bogh wanI' tu'lu'.
You could also state this as:
*Praxis*Daq qaSbogh wanI' tu'lu'pu'.
It really doesn't matter. Either there has been an event that
happened on Praxis, or there is an event that has happened on
Praxis. They both really point to the same timeframe.
> But, can I use [ tu�lu�lI� ] to [ There has been ]? or
> [ tu�lu�pu� ] to [ There had been ] ?
{tu'lu'lI'} means literally, "One is currently discovering it in
a continuous state, but at some specific point in the future,
the discovery will be complete and one will then cease to
discover it." It is like {-taH} except that there is a known end
point. Typically, this is a goal that the action of the verb is
set upon to accomplish. It most assuredly does NOT mean "There
has been". It is closer to "There is currently being..." with a
foreseeable end point.
Meanwhile, {tu'lu'pu'} can mean either "There had been" or
"There has been" or even "There will have been". The verb can
have the tense present, past or future independent of either of
these suffixes. Aspect is not tense.
In Klingon, tense is acertained from context, like a time stamp
in this sentence or some other preceeding sentence. Aspect then
describes the state of completion of the action of the verb
within the time setting of the sentence.
As Okrand has explained on the audio tapes (and I'll simplify it
to stick with one verb):
wa'Hu' jI'oj. Yesterday, I was thirsty.
DaHjaj jI'oj. Today, I am thirsty.
wa'leS jI'oj. Tomorrow, I will be thirsty.
Now, to expand on aspect.
wa'Hu' jI'ojpu'. Yesterday, I had been thirsty.
DaHjaj jI'ojpu'. Today, I have been thirsty.
wa'leS jI'ojpu'. Tomorrow, I will have been thirsty.
wa'Hu' jI'ojtaH. Yesterday, I was constantly thirsty.
DaHjaj jI'ojtaH. Today, I am constantly thirsty.
wa'leS jI'ojtaH. Tomorrow, I will be constantly thirsty.
wa'Hu' jI'ojlI'. Yesterday, I was thirsty until I drank
something.
DaHjaj jI'ojlI'. Today, I am constantly thirsty, but I expect to
drink something in the foreseeable future and I won't be thirsty
any more.
wa'leS jI'ojlI'. Tomorrow, I will be constantly thirsty until I
get something to drink, which I fully expect to do.
wa'Hu' jI'ojta'. Yesterday [because of a pending wedding for
which I was fasting] I successfully achieved my goal of being
thirsty.
DaHjaj jI'ojta'. Today, I have successfully been thirsty.
wa'leS jI'ojta'. Tomorrow, I will have successfully been
thirsty. It is my goal and I intend to achieve it.
Does this clarify things?
> Other thing: Incident in sense of �unexplained event� could be:
>
> wanI� QIjHa�lu� (the event is unexplained)
I'd use {wanI' QIjbe'lu'} here. Using {-Ha'} tends to indicate
some greater extreme negative than {-be'}. By this, I mean that
{QIjbe'} means "He did not explain it." {QIjHa'} would tend to
mean that it had already been explained, but after he did
whatever he did, the explanation was sucked away. He unexplained
it. This is similar to the way {ghomHa'} means disperse while
{ghombe'} means to not meet. You had to meet before you could
disperse, but you didn't have to meet before you didn't meet.
It could also mean that he intended to explain it but botched
the explanation so badly that he misexplained it. This is
similar to the way {yajHa'} means, "He misunderstands," while
{yajbe'} means, "He does not understand." Misunderstanding is
different from not understanding. One who misunderstands
believes they understand when they don't. One who does not
understand knows of their ignorance.
> QIjlaHbe�bogh wanI� (an event which can�t be explained)
This means "the event that cannot explain". {wanI'} is placed as
the subject of {QIjlaHbe'bogh}. You wanted {wanI''e' QIjlaHbogh
pagh}. "The event which nobody can explain." The {-'e'} is added
to {wanI'} in order to make it clear that we are talking about
the event that nobody can explain rather than the nobody who can
explain the event. Since the "head noun" of a relative clause
can be subject or object of the verb with {-bogh}, if such a
verb has both an explicit subject and object, you can indicate
which one is head noun with the noun suffix {-'e'}.
Our own Captain Krankor came up with this idea and Okrand liked
it. It is official, though it was not mentioned in TKD.
> and at finally, the arghhhh use of -ghach.
> wanI� QIjHa�ghach (unexplained event)
Nope. This means, "The unexplanation of the envent" or "the
event's misexplanation." You have done a good job of
illustrating why {-ghach} is so rarely a good idea.
> __
> Eduardo Fonseca || Belo Horizonte, Brasil
> Pau Brasil: The brazilian's VGA Planets home page
> http://www.geocities.com/BourbonStreet/2460
> Hovmey DIvan
>
charghwI', taghwI' pabpo' ru'
Temporary Beginner's Grammarian, December 20-30