tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Mon Jul 10 10:53:12 2000
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Re: -law'
pIl'o':
> ps: wot mojaq poQ'a' De'vID cha'DIch mu'tlheghDaq <bIH>?
De'vID:
: What do you mean? yIQIj!
pIl'o':
> I was trying to ask if the <bIH> in your 2nd sentence required a verb
> suffix. Did I miscast my question?
"Does the <bIH> in David's second sentence require a verb suffix?"
Klingon can't handle locative relative phrases like "the <bIH> in De'vID's
second sentence" -- particularly when used as a subject or object. Unlike
English, locative phrases in Klingon have to go at the beginning of the
sentence where they modify the entire sentence, not just a particular noun in
the sentence. Fortunately in your case, this won't alter the meaning much:
De'vID mu'tlhegh cha'DIchDaq wot mojaq poQ'a' <bIH>'e'?
In David's second sentence, does the <bIH> require a verb suffix?
(Also note the correct position of {cha'DIch} following the noun {mu'tlhegh}.
And before someone complains, I'll also mention that putting a noun suffix on
an ordinal number is controversial, although Okrand has done it himself once.)
FYI: This is frequently called "the ship in which I fled" problem here on the
mailing list. (You will discover many long discussions about this if you check
the list archives.) There are other, more clumsy, ways to get around this
problem when translating. For example, you might use the verb {ngaS} "contain"
plus {-bogh} in your question:
wot mojaq poQ'a' <bIH> ngaSbogh De'vID mu'tlhegh cha'DIch?
Does David's second sentence containing <bIH> require a verb prefix?
Although this should elicit the same answer to your question, notice that the
subject has now broadened to "David's second sentence which contains <bIH>" --
which may imply to some readers that there are at least *two* sentences
containing <bIH>, of which you're questioning only the second. If you want to
shift the focus of the question back to <bIH> instead of {mu'tlhegh}, use the
topic marker {-'e'}:
wot mojaq poQ'a' <bIH>'e' ngaSbogh De'vID mu'tlhegh cha'DIch?
But as I said this is clumsy, not to mention confusing and inelegant IMHO.
Come to think of it, this would be perfect for rendering turgid academic prose.
--
Voragh
Ca'Non Master of the Klingons