tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Wed Oct 22 23:28:09 1997

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Re: KLBC: qoHpu'



At 12:36 97-10-22 -0700, muHwI' wrote:
> KW 105: "Only fools have no fear."
> {not qoHpu''e' neH ghIjlu'}
> [never fools! only one-scare]
> 
> chay' vImugh
> vIyajbe'

SoHvaD vIchenqa'moH.

adverb: not
object: qoHpu''e' neH
verb: ghIjlu'
subject: indefinite

{ghIj} + {-lu'} = {ghIjlu'} "one scares him"   "someone scares him"  
"he is scared" 
{qoH} + {-pu'} + {-'e'} + {neH}= {qoHpu''e' neH} 
"only FOOLS" or "FOOLS alone"
{qoH ghIj} - she/he/it scares a fool
{qoH ghIjlu'} - a fool is scared
{not qoH ghIjlu'} - a fool is never scared
{not qoH neH ghIjlu'} - Only a fool is never scared
{not qoH'e' neH ghIjlu'} -  Only a FOOL is never scared
{not qoHpu''e' neH ghIjlu'} - Only FOOLS are never scared.

DaH Dayaj'a'?

I know you're not afraid to ask again if I haven't explained the part that
didn't make sense to you.

If you had given this to me as a KLBC I would probably have suggested 
to you that it might mean "Never are only fools scared" (i.e. 
someone else is always scared along with them."  But that makes less 
sense and even the English could be misinterpreted as "Unaccompanied 
fools are unafraid."

I also would have pointed out that with the indefinite subject, third 
person plural object, the {lu-} prefix is required on {ghIj}, but we 
know that this is a grammatical error Klingon native speakers make, 
and it's present in this proverb.

Qov     [email protected]
Beginners' Grammarian                 



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