[490] in tlhIngan-Hol
shiny noses
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU)
Tue Mar 2 16:32:02 1993
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Reply-To: "Klingon Language List" <tlhIngan-Hol@village.boston.ma.us>
From: mark <mark@dragonsys.COM>
To: "Klingon Language List" <tlhIngan-Hol@village.boston.ma.us>
Date: Tue, 02 Mar 93 15:25:15 EST
The phrase book translates
boch ghIchraj
as "Your nose is shiny". True enough, boch = "to shine" and ghIch
= "nose", but raj is the 2nd person PLURAL possessive (non-
language-using) suffix. The sentence refers to more than one
addressee/possessor.
Unless Klingons can share noses, the translation should be "Your
noses are shiny". The plural suffix is optional, and would not be
necessary in context. If it were used, the sentence would read
boch ghIchDu'raj
There are two other alternatives. One is to correct the Klingon
sentence rather than the English translation, to
boch ghIchlIj ,
using the 2nd person SINGULAR possessive (non-language-using)
suffix. This is probably the most accurate reconstruction of the
compiler's intention.
The third possibility is that Klingons can indeed share noses,
e.g. as trophies (perhaps for a conquest achieved jointly). Since
the possessive suffixes do not distinguish between non-language-
using possessed-things that are body parts and those that are not,
this interpretation jibes with one grammatical interpretation of
the Klingon sentence as it stands, as well as with the English as
it stands. A reader committed to the inerrancy of the phrase book
would be forced to accept this reading as the only one requiring
no change in the text.
Note that under the third interpretation, the explicitly
pluralized form of the sentence (corresponding to the translation
"Your[plural] noses[not considered as body parts] are shiny")
would read
boch ghIchmeyraj .
See the discussion of -mey on p. 23.
- marqem
Mark A. Mandel
Dragon Systems, Inc. : speech recognition : +1 617 965-5200
320 Nevada St. : Newton, Mass. 02160, USA
QaQqu' yabchabvam; SoHvaD 'oHvo' jIpe' DaneH'a'?
