tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Wed Dec 19 08:00:19 2007

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Re: jIHtaHbogh naDev vISovbe'

David Trimboli ([email protected]) [KLI Member] [Hol po'wI']



Alan Anderson wrote:
> ja' SuStel:
> 
>> In the sentence
>>
>>     pa'DajDaq ghaH HoD'e'
>>     The captain is in his quarters
>>
>> what English has as a preposition Klingon has, in my analysis, a  
>> nominal
>> predicative.
> 
> The previously given definition of a nominal predicative says that it  
> "renames the subject".  I don't see that happening in the sentence  
> you give here as an example.  You can't use {pa'Daj}, with or without  
> {-Daq}, to refer to the same thing as {HoD}.

The predicative in a Klingon "to be" sentence isn't complementing the 
topic, it's complementing the copula. This is why I didn't call the 
topic of a copula a "subject" instead.

I'm applying the word "predicative" to Klingon grammar, not English, and 
I'm defining it slightly differently than it is defined in English, so 
don't get too caught up in its English definition. Klingon doesn't 
really have an "indirect object" either, even though Marc Okrand has 
used the term to describe certain formations. Instead, it has {-vaD}, 
which is a combination of English dative and benefactive meanings. This 
is no different. My purpose has been to DEFINE a grammar that describes 
the Klingon copula, not to restrict myself to describing it with English 
categories.

SuStel
Stardate 7966.2

-- 
Practice the Klingon language on the tlhIngan Hol MUSH.
http://trimboli.name/klingon/mush.html





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