tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Sat Jun 17 13:13:15 2000

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Re: A grammar question...

jatlh juDmoS:
>mayDaq loDnI'pu'wI' :
>Fellow warriors:

jang SuStel:
>/may/ is "be fair."  /may'/ is battle.  But even adding the apostrophe, the
>phrase doesn't make sense.  You've got two nouns, and the first has a Type 5
>suffix.  THE KLINGON DICTIONARY, page 31, says "When the noun-noun
>construction is used, only the second noun can take syntactic suffixes (Type
>5)."  /-Daq/ can't be used where you've placed it.

Your conclusion is, of course, valid, but I'm not sure about your
reasoning. I don't think juDmoS was trying to use the noun-noun
construction in this situation. The noun-noun construction is used only
for possession (qar'a'?). I think juDmoS was simply using a sentence
fragment here. For example, in the sentence
     tachDaq chom vIghom.
the phrase {tachDaq chom} is obviously legal. This is not an example of
the noun-noun construction -- it is simply a fragment.

SuStel:
>You're obviously trying to render this as "my brothers in battle."  Not only
>do the objections of the above paragraph hold, but the Type 5 noun suffix
>/-Daq/ is used to indicate the noun refers to a spatial concept.  "Battle,"
>in "brothers in battle," is not a spatial concept.  The brothers are not
>inside a space or object called "battle."  There is no spatial relation.

I agree with this objection.

SuStel:
>Another thing to try would be to simply refer to /SuvwI'/ or /SuvwI'pu'/.
>There's nothing explicitly identifying the speaker as a "fellow" warrior,
>though.

Would {latlh SuvwI'pu'} work?

Alternatively, juDmoS could just say {SuvwI' maH} and then go into his
speech.

juDmoS:
>meblI' jIHmo' jIquvqu'.
>It is my great Honor to be your guest.

I doubt a Klingon would bother with the pleasantry of saying, "It is my
great honor..." I would just say {meblI' jIH} or {meblI' jIHneS}. Hey,
wait a second...I thought you were addressing multiple warriors. Why are
we using {-lI'} instead of {-ra'}?

                                        DujHoD

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