tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Mon Feb 17 05:40:09 1997

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Re: Word Origin Speculation II

Glen Proechel wrote via Kenneth Traft:
> 
> D'[A]rm[o]nd Spe[e]rs recently called into question the existence of
> a category of related words called "reversies" in which words which are
> either synonyms and antonyms or related in some other way are created
> by simply reversing the order of the phonemes.  [...]  I should like to
> provide a longer list of examples.
> 
> SIm/mIS (calculate/confuse)
> jab/baj (serve food -- as a job/earn)[...]
> mup/pum (strike, fall)
> ghup/pugh (swallow, dregs)
> 
> This brings the total to twelve -- does twelve "reversies" constitute
> a significant observation?

That depends on their quality, I should say.  I vote against counting
them all together, as if each were worth exactly as much as any other.
A hundred contrived ones of the {jab/baj} variety can hardly carry as
much weight as {lom/mol} or {ghop/pogh}.

As for how many constitute a significant observation, well, I kenna.
If the assignment of meanings to sounds is completely arbitrary, how
many of them are there going to be, on the average?  Much fewer than
twelve?  Then they do.  About twelve?  Then they don't.  More?  Then
MO must have been avoiding them consciously.

What if we try to prove that there is such a category in English too?
Let's see: _meet_/_team_ (both have to do with people getting together),
_eat_/_tea_ (very obvious if one takes _tea_ as meaning {'uQ} as well as
{Dargh}), _dog_/_god_ (a delightful alt.atheism joke), _cub_/_buck_
(infant vs. adult animal), _sip_/_piss_ (this one doesn't make much
sense, but it's no worse than your {ghup/pugh}).  Of course they're
more common in Klingon, but that's because the space of monosyllabic
words is narrower and more densely populated there, and it's far more
common for them to be reversible than it is in English.

> Another category which d'[A]rm[o]nd Spe[e]rs appears to be unaware of
> is those words which use q a Q as semantically related phonemes.
>
> qam/Qam (foot, stand)
> wuq/wuQ (decide, headache)
> qay'/Qay' (problem, blow one's top)
> qeH/QeH (resent, be angry)
> qaq/QaQ (preferable, good)

Okay, let's prove that the same holds of any two Klingon consonants,
no matter how different ... say, {l} and {S}.  Here's what I found:

 {lach} `exaggerate'       {Sach} `expand'
  {la'} `commander (rank)'  {Sa'} `general (rank)'
  {leH} `maintain'          {SeH} `control'
  {lon} `abandon'           {Son} `relieve'
  {lop} `celebrate'         {Sop} `eat'
  {lot} `catastrophe'       {Sot} `be in distress'
  {lu'} `yes, OK, I will'   {Su'} `ready, stand by'

Impressed?  I'm not.  I had chosen those two consonants at random,
precisely because they're not similar in any way.  I don't doubt
that one could obtain similar `results' for any two consonants.

> rarchuqbogh mu'mey boghovlaHchugh, mu'tay'lIj boghurmeH ngeDqu'.

`If you (pl.) can recognise connected words, it will be very easy
in order for you (pl.) to increase your (sg.) vocabulary.'  Yeah.

--'Iwvan

-- 
"reH Sov yInej 'ej Dap yImuS,          <dOstI bA mardom-e dAnA nEkO-st,
 jagh val qaq law' jup QIp qaq puS"     do^sman-e dAnA beh az nAdAn dOst>
                 (Sheikh Muslihuddin Abu Muhammad Abdullah Saadi Shirazi)
Ivan A Derzhanski  <[email protected], [email protected]>
Dept for Math Lx,  Inst for Maths & CompSci,  Bulg Acad of Sciences
Home:  cplx Iztok  bl 91,  1113 Sofia,  Bulgaria

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