tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Tue Jun 10 10:24:17 2003
[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next]
Re: I too need help with Vocabulary
Klingon Warrior wrote:
>I have a question about one of your sentences, though. You wrote:
> <<jaj Hoch qaStaHvIS vum(taH)>> (he's been working all day).
Oops! Firstly, I should have followed correct OVS word order:
qaStaHvIS jaj Hoch vum
"During all of the day, he worked."
qaStaHvIS jaj Hoch vumtaH.
"During all of the day, he was working continuously."
[insert replacement proverb here <g>]
>Why is <<qaStaHvIS>> in there? I may not understand just quite how to use
>qaStaHvIS. I know the rough translation is, "while it
>happens/occurs." Please explain.
That's it exactly. {qaStaHvIS X} is a way of saying "while X occurs/is
happening" and is used when describing durations as opposed to points in
time. A more colloquial translation would be "during X", "throughout X",
"over the course of X", etc. We first saw it in TKD:
qaStaHvIS wa' ram loS SaD Hugh SIjlaH qetbogh loD
4,000 throats may be cut in one night by a running man. TKD
("during one night...")
Other examples are:
qaStaHvIS wa'maH puq poHmey, wo'rIv batleH ghaj qorDu'Daj
Worf's bat'telh has been in his family for ten generations. S8
("during ten generations...")
qaStaHvIS wej puq poHmey vav puqloDpu' puqloDpu'chaj je quvHa'moH vav
quvHa'ghach
The dishonor of the father dishonors his sons and their sons for three
generations. TKW
("during three generations...)
Since {qaStaHvIS X} is a dependent clause, it precedes the main clause like
most dependent clauses in Klingon. (It's not required, but it's apparently
considered good style as it's nearly universal in canon.) You can easily
identify dependent clauses as they are marked by Type 9 verb suffixes.
As for the anomalous position of {Hoch}, cf.
nIn Hoch natlhlu'pu'
All the fuel has been consumed. KGT
{Hoch jajmey} is "all the days"
{Hoch jaj} is "each day, every day"
{jaj Hoch} is "all of the day, the day's all"
--
Voragh
Ca'Non Master of the Klingons