tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Thu Jan 07 21:29:58 1999
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Re: Verbs with Prepositional Results
ja' peHruS:
>Many Klingon verbs either do include a prepositional concept or may include a
>prepositional concept.
More precisely, many Klingon verbs express ideas that are rendered in
English using a preposition. There's nothing inherently "prepositional"
about the word {buS}, for example, but its translation of "focus on" has
a preposition because there is no single word in English for it.
>Examples: ... lan put [down];
Where have you seen it used that way? It means "place" as in to put
something in a location. {roQ} carries the "put down" meaning.
>roQ put down; let go [of].
Where is "let go [of]" from? I only know "put down" from TKD, and I
can't find it having been used anywhere by Okrand.
>Obviously there are many more.
Based on the unauthoritative "definitions" you're giving, I suspect some of
these "many more" exist only in an oddly annotated dictionary of your own
devising.
>Sometimes Klingon has two verbs to indicate different directions of the
>action. Examples: woH pick up [from a lower place]; jotlh take down [from a
>higher place].
Either the direction of action is important, or these are different sorts
of actions. I tend to think {woH} refers to grasping something that was
just lying there originally, whether or not it was on the floor or a table
or even a high shelf. {jotlh} seems like it could refer to the opposite of
{cher} "set up", like taking down a tent or a display booth at a fair.
>But we have one example in canon which shows us that Klingons sometimes must
>use a second sentence to express the prepositional result of the verb. 'uSDaj
>chop; chev Bite his leg off!
There are *many* examples in canon that use multiple sentences where a single
more complex English sentence is given as translation. But in this example,
I'm pretty sure "off" is not being used as a preposition.
> I feel this construction can be quite useful in
>other situations, too: yuQ yItlheD; yIjaH may complete the desires of the
>speaker more fully than yuQ yItlheD alone accomplishes.
This sounds to me like a great place for {ruch}. {yuQ yItlheD, yIruch!}
-- ghunchu'wI'