[2029] in tlhIngan-Hol
wa' yu'ghachHom
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU)
Tue Nov 16 10:32:34 1993
Reply-To: "Klingon Language List" <tlhIngan-Hol@klingon.East.Sun.COM>
From: shoulson@ctr.columbia.edu (Mark E. Shoulson)
To: "Klingon Language List" <tlhIngan-Hol@klingon.East.Sun.COM>
Date: Tue, 16 Nov 1993 10:27:54 -0500
In-Reply-To: DSTRADER@delphi.com's message of Mon, 15 Nov 1993 23:03:29 -0400 (
EDT) <01H5D0PGTT889D5KA9@delphi.com>
>From: DSTRADER@delphi.com
>Date: Mon, 15 Nov 1993 23:03:29 -0400 (EDT)
>How would one say "I am bigger than you." Somehow, I don't like
>*{jIH tIn law' SoH tIn puS}
>Suppose it's *{jItIn law' bItIn puS} where {law'} and {puS} really are
>something like "be greater than, be less than," respectively, in such
>a construction. Maybe the subject-verb syntax is not another isolated
>incident since we did find that Okrand asserted a similar odd syntax when
>dealing with the optative suffix {-jaj}.
>I don't expect anyone to be able to validate or invalidate any of these
>theories; I'd just like a little feedback.
Very interesting. And it makes some sense. {jIH tIn law'...} doesn't
sound good to me either (though absent any solid evidence, that's what I'd
use). The law'/puS construction has long been a tough nut, not quite
looking like nouns or verbs (word order wrong, etc). Okrand's
semi-explanation opens up another possible form, too. He says that {la'
jaq law' yaS jaq puS} is like "the commander's boldness is many, the
officer's boldness is few". So maybe it's like a noun-noun construction,
with the "-ghach" (if required) elided for whatever reason. This would
make your sentence into *{tInwIj law' tInlIj puS}, for what that's worth.
~mark
P.S. I'm also not seriously recommending we adopt any of these proposals
without hearing from Okrand; just throwing ideas around.
