[tlhIngan Hol] Disturbing irregularities

kechpaja at comcast.net kechpaja at comcast.net
Tue Jun 21 11:40:23 PDT 2016


On Jun 21, 2016, at 13:54, mayqel qunenoS <mihkoun at gmail.com> wrote:

>> There's no problem in saying {mayqel jIH}  "I am Michael"
>> Next, {SoH 'Iv} equals to {'Iv SoH}, both words can act as the verb.
> 
> ok, I came back..
> 
> if I write {'elaDya'ngan jIH}, this can only mean "I am (a) greek",
> right ? So, how come if I write {mayqel jIH}, this can mean "I am
> michael' ? even if we take into account, that klingon does not have
> "a/the", then again the meaning can only mean "I am a michael".

I think your mistake is that you are translating "_ jIH" as "I am a _", when in fact it means simply "I am _". However, the word {'elaDya'ngan} can refer either to a specific Greek person ("the Greek") or to a randomly selected one ("a Greek"). 

You should think of the English article as being part of the translation of the Klingon noun, rather than the pronoun-as-verb. 

-SapIr



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