[87152] in tlhIngan-Hol
Re: The topic marker -'e'
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (David Trimboli)
Wed Nov 25 16:38:16 2009
Date: Wed, 25 Nov 2009 16:34:53 -0500
From: David Trimboli <david@trimboli.name>
In-reply-to: <a1173fff0911251248o42461709ld8212aa0896c8346@mail.gmail.com>
To: tlhingan-hol@kli.org
Errors-to: tlhingan-hol-bounce@kli.org
Reply-to: tlhingan-hol@kli.org
Christopher Doty wrote:
> Huh... It's not a N-N construction, though; the <yIHHomvaD> and the
> <may'> aren't in a N-N phrase?
But that's how you've used it. The first noun modifies the meaning of
the second noun. What kind of {may'} "battle" is it? It's a *{yIHHomvaD
may'} "minor tribble battle." That's the use of the noun–noun
construction, but the first noun isn't allowed a Type 5 suffix.
Beneficiaries (and locatives, etc.) only modify verbs.
Now, there *are* a couple of phrases on the Bird of Prey poster which do
this, and I'm not surprised, given that it started as a list of English
noun phrases to be translated. (I have no doubt that Okrand fell into
the same trap you did.)
--
SuStel
tlhIngan Hol MUSH
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