tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Sat Mar 06 17:48:47 1999
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Re: mu'mey Dajqu'
ja' quljIb:
>tlhIngan mu'mey Dajqu' Sanob
>(I give you some very intereting Klingon words.)
While these indeed are interesting, each one of your "literal" translations
is based on a major misreading of one of the parts of the word. And that's
even before we start to address the issue of trying to make a compound out
of a noun and a verb, or the issue of trying to tease meanings out of the
multi-syllable vocabulary words in the first place.
>gho'Do - sublight speed. lit. "stepping speed." From:
> <gho'> - to step, and
> <Do> - speed/velocity
{gho'} means "step on", not "step". It's more like what you do to crush a
bug than how to walk from place to place.
>raQpo' - passenger. lit. "a camp(ing) expert/an expert camper." From:
> <raQ> - a (military) camp, and
> <po'> - be (an) expert
{po'} says nothing about *an* expert. It means "be skilled"; you would have
to interpret it as "a skilled camp" if you could even presume that this word
began as a noun-verb compound.
>HablI' - data tranciever. lit. "it progresses smoothly." From:
> <Hab> - be smooth, and
> <-lI'> - progressive aspect suffix
> (This is prehaps a reference to _smoothly_ recieving and
> transmitting data.)
No way. {Hab} is a verb of quality, meaning "be smooth"; verbs do not act
as adverbs. {-lI'} is a verb suffix indicating ongoing action with implied
progress toward a gol; verb suffixes do not by themselves carry a verbal
meaning. {HablI'} as a sentence *does* have a literal meaning of something
like "it is in the middle of being smooth" -- which is kind of an odd idea.
What's the implied goal of a state or quality?
>Last and certainly best:
>
>Ha'DIbaH - animal. lit. "let's go kill (shoot) them!" From:
> <Ha'> - let's go, and
> <DIbaH> - we fire (missiles/arrows/etc.) at them.
Yes, this one is cute, but {baH} means to "fire" missiles, not "fire at"
something else ({chuH} has that meaning). If you want to call this word
{Ha', DIbaH}, it's more like "Come on, we will fire them (from a cannon)."
>Are there any more mu'mey Dajqu'? If so let me know; I'm compiling a list.
I sometimes think it would be neat if {Qu'vatlh} were derived from the
exasperated cry of a crewman who was just handed his hundredth job of
the day...but I don't go looking for things like {nIteb} "acting alone"
also meaning "they fill you" or {HIja'} being both "yes" and "tell me."
-- ghunchu'wI'