tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Wed Sep 18 12:11:41 2002
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RE: Description
> >In reference to Pronoun-as-Tobe TKD p68 tell us:
> >
> >"If the subject is a noun, it follows the third-person pronoun (ghaH
> >he/she, 'oH it, chaH they, bIH they) and takes the -'e' topic
> >suffix (see section 3.3.5)."
> >
> >
> >This is one of those "just because it says so" rules.
>
> i found some comfort in the observation that /-'e'/ is used in the
> clause "the child that hit the officer".
>
> yaS qIpbogh puq'e' vIlegh.
> i see the child that hits the officer.
>
> yaS'e' qIpbogh puq vIlegh.
> i see the officer, that the child hits.
>
>
> hm, is /pongwIj'e' 'oH Gina/ a legal sentence?
No
In those qIpbogh sentences, the -'e' is marking the head noun of the clause.
Without the -'e' you wouldn't know which english sentence it meant.
In a Pronoun-as-ToBe sentence, -'e' goes on the subject noun following the
pronoun/verb; and it does this simply because we're told to.
Altho, if you are from the Morskan region... KGT p23:
>>>
Although the basic grammar of all dialects of Klin-
gon is the same, there is some variation. The Morskan
dialect, for example, does not put the suffix -'e' on the
subject noun in a sentence translated with "to be" in Fed-
eration Standard (though the suffix is not missing in
other contexts where it is used to focus attention on one
noun rather than another within the sentence). Compare:
Morskan: tera'ngan gha qama'. ("The prisoner
is a Terran.")
Standard: tera'ngan ghaH qama''e' (tera'ngan,
"Terran", ghaH, "he, she"; qama', "prisoner")
<<<
DloraH, BG