tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Tue Jun 22 04:45:10 2004

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Re: mIvDaq yIH

MorphemeAddict ([email protected]) [KLI Member] [Hol taghwI']

In a message dated 2004-06-21 2:50:48 PM Eastern Daylight Time, 
[email protected] writes:

> {telDaq wovmoHwI'mey} = "Light causers on wing"
> 
> Doesn't {mIvDaq yIH 'oH} mean "It is a tribble in/on a hat"? "Cat in the 
> hat" on
> the other hand really means "Cat wearing a hat" unless the cat is physically
> sitting inside the hat.
> 
> Maybe I'm missing the point here..
> 
> qurgh
> 
I think you *are* missing the point.  The original question wasn't what does 
{mIvDaq yIH 'oH} mean.  You added the {'oH}, perhaps so that it *would* make 
sense and be grammatical.  The line from the BoP has no verb, so it looks like 
a noun-noun construction, except it can't be because the first noun has a type 
5 noun suffix on it, which TKD expressly prohibits.  It also doesn't have the 
semantics of a noun-noun construction.  That's why I'm asking how that BoP 
phrase is interpreted syntactically.  When you say "cat in the hat" really means 
"cat wearing a hat", you're taking one possible meaning and making that the 
translation, although you did in fact mention other possible meanings.  "Cat in 
the hat" is only one example of the whole class of English noun phrases 
modified by prepositional phrases.  What you did is paraphrase it to something 
easily translatable into Klingon.  That *does* seem to be the way to deal with 
this sort of English phrase - namely, find a verb that the prepositional phrase 
can modify and use that.  
So, is the BoP phrase just a verb elision, and if so, what is likely to be 
the verb?  Or is that anybody's guess too?

lay'tel SIvten

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