tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Thu Jul 17 15:43:25 1997
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Stardate
- From: "Duncan Barrett" <[email protected]>
- Subject: Stardate
- Date: Thu, 17 Jul 1997 23:46:12 +0100
Though a Stardate is not the age of a star or anything like that, the star
part does carry a meaning - that it is a date not altered by inter*stellar*
travel.
Thus the "star" meaning should certainly be encorporated somehow (though we
could call it a "common date" or a "universal date" or an "unalterable date"
or something like that, I suppose - but we would have to think of an
appropriate - and more descriptive - alternative to "star").
Duncan.
ps. Maybe the Klingons copied the idea of stardates from the Federation -
in which case the star part would be more important than the meaning.
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>I saw someone write Hovjaj for stardate.
>*Hovjaj* ghItlhtaH vay' 'e' vIleghpu'
>qatlh? Dochvam nuq?
>
>Hovjaj would mean star-day. Which one is correct?
>Hov poH would be the stars' time.
Well, it depends, I guess, on what it is you are trying to say. I don't
personally know of any canonical use of the term in Klingon, so it is left
to
linguistic logic.
I will avoid making a compound here, since we aren't here to invent words,
but
perhaps a compound is acceptable, if it works within the limits of the
grammar. But "stardate" is an odd construction anyway. The term refers to a
universal, relativistically unaltered system of chronology. The word 'star'
is
just a cool-sounding marker to make it soud futuristic and space-like. It
carries no meaning of the word 'star' in this construction. So, I would not
use it thinking it was a grammatical function. Putting the noun Hov before
another noun creates either possession (the star's radiation) or apposition
(the star Wolf 359). Neither of these constructions will yield anything even
approximating 'stardate'.
Now, how do we specify the time? From Conv. Klingon, we have vagh rep, 5
o'clock. We don't know for sure how it's used grammatically (or at least I
don't) and I don't think the time of day is really what 'stardate' is most
useful for, so this is not a good choice.
Since there is no helpful canon of either terms for 'stardate' or words to
express the basic concept of the date, we are left without a *legitamite*
Okrandian word for 'stardate'. Which leaves us with one choice - fake it.
For linguistic discussion, the best way to do this is use the English in
asterisks. Today's stardate is 97542 = DaHjaj Hut Soch vagh loS cha' 'oH
*stardate*-'e'.
For more unofficial fan-oriented usage, I suppose *Hovjaj* (marked here to
denote that it is non-canon) is my favorite. It sounds good, even though it
is
not correct Klingon. Not that my opinion is the only option, either.
Qermaq