tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Thu Jan 26 00:40:11 2006

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Re: Klingon phonotactics (was Re: Klingon at the Thanksgiving table - A month la

Philip Newton ([email protected]) [KLI Member] [Hol ghojwI']

On 1/26/06, Russ Perry Jr <[email protected]> wrote:
> At 10:38 AM +1000 1/26/06, QeS 'utlh wrote:
> > (would it be {jawoy} "beloved Lord" or ??{jaw'oy}?).
>
> Uh...  I'm not familiar with ?{oy} or ?{'oy}, but you'd pronounce it
> the way it was spelled.  Is there a suffic ?{oy} AND ?{'oy}?

No, there's only a suffix {oy}. However, its use is only attested on
words ending in a consonant; it is not known for sure what happens
when you add it to a word ending in a vowel.

TKD, however, provides this guess: "Though there are no examples, it
is suspected that for those few nouns which end in a vowel, {'} is
inserted before this suffix."

For that reason, whether {w} in {aw} is a vowel or not is important in
determining what the diminutive of {jaw} would be -- if it were a
vowel, then {jawoy} would be an invalid word, since the second
syllable does not begin with a vowel, and (by TKD's guess) the word
would have to be {jaw'oy} instead. If, on the other hand, the {w} in
{jaw} is a consonant, then {jawoy} is legal, while {jaw'oy} would be
something different.

Also, if a {w} or {y} after a vowel is also considered a vowel, as
part of a diphthong, and if TKD's conjecture is correct, then a word
such as {Duy'oy} would be ambiguous between "dear agent" and "dear
defect". (While the difference in semantics should be clear from
context, I consider the ambiguous morphology unaesthetic.)
--
Philip Newton <[email protected]>
HovpoH 5221.80

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