tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Fri Jun 12 05:31:01 1998
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Re: Relative clauses
ghel lot'Har:
>>...But his
>>example sentences are all quite easily translated using a particular
>>method.
>
>Which particular method?
The method I employed in order to translate them, of course. I had hoped
that it was obvious by example. In case that wasn't enough, though, I'll
try to explain it. First, some background:
English has a large number of words that can act as relative pronouns.
Many of these words have a related use as interrogative pronouns. For
example, "Where is your food?" and "I slept where your food fell" both
have a word "where" in them. The first one is asking a question, and
can be translated using the Klingon word {nuqDaq}. The second one is
using "where" to substitute for a particular location which is related
to and described by the food falling; that's a relative pronoun.
We don't have any evidence that Klingon uses its question words the same
way. Indeed, we don't have any evidence that Klingon uses any relative
pronouns at all. Instead, there is the verb suffix {-bogh} to create a
relative clause which describes or specifies a noun using a verb phrase.
{Hew vIlegh} "I see the statue." If I want to specify a particular one,
{Hew DachenmoHbogh vIlegh} "I see the statue which you made." The noun
being described is called the "head noun" of the relative clause.
With one odd exception which I'll ignore for the moment, all the examples
we have of {-bogh} use the head noun as the subject or the object of the
relative clause. They can all be translated using the English relative
pronouns "that", "which", or "who". So how do I express ideas that in
English use other relative pronouns like "why" and "where", the way the
sentences presented by peHruS do? Simple: I pick a *real* noun instead
of the pronoun. "I know why you are smiling" becomes {bImon; meq vISov}.
{yuch Dapol; Daq vIqaw} "I remember where you keep the chocolate."
This construction is analogous to sentence-as-object, but instead of the
pronoun {'e'} to represent the entire first sentence, a real noun is used
to represent the desired idea which is related to the sentence. I doubt
that anyone would have difficulty understanding it.
Oh, the "odd exception" about {-bogh} that I mentioned before is from the
Useful Klingon Expressions appendix of TKD: {jIHtaHbogh naDev vISovbe'}
is translated "I'm lost." It defies analysis using the established rules
of grammar.
-- ghunchu'wI'