tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Thu Mar 18 11:15:00 1999

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The Naked Stars and *klingonaase*



Voragh:
: Of these, I think {Duj jen} works best here.  Looking up from the deck,
: the tall masts of a sailing ship seem to soar high up into the sky, 
: which is where the stars you steer her by are.  To make this more Klingon, 
: you might even call them the "naked stars". <g>

quljIb:
> jIQochbe'. maj Duj jen. But I'm puzzled. How would calling them "naked
> stars" make the phrase sound "more Klingon"?
 
Voragh again:
: Read John Ford's _The Final Reflection_ from the early 1980s, before Star
: Trek: The Motion Picture, ST3 and TNG etc.  This is a great authorized
: pro-novel with an alternative view of fusion-Klingon (i.e. TOS smooth
: foreheads) society that introduced another Klingon language - *klingonaase*
: 	[snip]	
: It's well worth looking for.  Many in Klingon fandom still consider TFR to 
: be the finest Klingon-related Trek novel ever written.
: 
: In the novel, the theme of the "naked stars" is a leitmotiv.  This refers
: to the Klingon belief that "all things done before the Naked Stars are
: remembered".  On Ford's version of Klinzhai, the very humid Klingon
: homeworld, the skies were hidden by a thick cloud covers most of the year,
: so clear nights when the stars were visible were rare.  Of course once the
: Klingons moved out into space, the naked stars were always visible, but the
: sentiment and the proverb remained.

I dug out my copy last night and looked up this proverb in full (TFR
[1984], p. 23 et passim):

	If there are gods, they do not help, and justice belongs to the 
	strong: but know that all things done before the naked stars are 
	remembered.  

Many have tried to translate this into tlhIngan Hol, none very successfully
IMHO.  "Naked stars" is itself an especial problem.  I've seen {Hovmey
lu'anglu'bogh}, {Hovmey luleghlaHbogh vay'}, {tuQbe'bogh Hovmey} and even
{Sut lutuQbe'bogh Hovmey}.  None of these feel right to me for an
oft-repeated sentiment.  Perhaps something less literal: {Hovmey wov} "the
bright stars", {Hovmey boch} "the shiny stars" or {bochbogh Hovmey} "the
shining stars"?

As for klingonaase, various fan authors writing in Ford's "universe" have
expanded our knowledge of this interesting language a bit, most notably Ann
K. Schwader's marvelous Neysa and Karan stories and novels.  Most writers
however only came up with words and expressions as they needed them in the
story, so we're lacking a complete sketch of the grammar and a working
vocabulary like Okrand's "The Klingon Dictionary."  

For the curious, here are some of Schwader's "Naked Stars" related
vocabulary and phrases from my notes:

k'la   
star (pl. k'lai)

k'tra ghahrin   
"Let it be remembered" 
(response to the Naked Stars proverb, a traditional affirmation)

k'tra khes'hrin   
"Let it be forgotten" 
(i.e. before the Naked Stars, a traditional curse or denial)

V'kari K'lait   
Festival of a Thousand Stars, a three-day celebration honoring Klinzhai's
most famous meteorologic oddity. Overall, the Homeworld's skies were
cloudless only about one night in a hundred. At the mid-point of Klinzhai's
winter, however, the chances of this improved--and the higher one went in
the mountains, the more likely one was to see the stars. This was a time to
recall past deeds, and to take actions worthy of the Naked Stars' future
remembrance. Even if the skies remained cloudy all three nights, many
Klingons regarded this festival as a particularly appropriate time to take
care of unfinished business--or begin some.

I'm not aware of any klingonaase word for "naked, unclothed, etc." so I
don't even know how to say the famous phrase itself.  Ah, well...



-- 
Voragh                       
Ca'Non Master of the Klingons



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