[tlhIngan Hol] verbs with {-bogh} and numbers

[SuStel]

On 10/19/2017 5:14 PM, nIqolay Q wrote:
> On Thu, Oct 19, 2017 at 3:53 PM, SuStel <sustel at trimboli.name 
> <mailto:sustel at trimboli.name>> wrote:
>
>     Is it any more ambiguous than the English /Romulan hunter-killer
>     probe?/ Is that a hunter-killer probe that hunts and kills
>     Romulans or a hunter-killer probe of Romulan make? Why isn't it a
>     /hunter-killer Romulan probe?/ Doesn't /hunter-killer Romulan
>     probe/ sound just plain WRONG to you, even though it can't be
>     misinterpreted?
>
> I do think the English phrase "Romulan hunter-killer probe" is 
> potentially ambiguous. As you point out, trying to clarify the meaning 
> simply by shifting a word doesn't sound right because of how English 
> arranges adjectives. If I were worried that context wouldn't make 
> things clear, I'd probably have to include other words entirely: "a 
> hunter-killer probe built by Romulans", "a probe that hunts and kills 
> Romulans". Both of those phrasings include relative clauses, and are a 
> little more complex than a noun phrase. So I would probably be willing 
> to put up with a little more grammatical ambiguity before I decide to 
> move away from the simpler four-noun phrase.
>
> This isn't the case with the Klingon, though. We don't know what 
> sounds wrong to native speakers, and clearing up the ambiguity simply 
> requires moving a noun, rather than rephrasing the idea entirely into 
> a somewhat more complex form. It's less of a hassle to remove the 
> ambiguity than it is in the English.

The word order and potential ambiguity is exactly the same as in 
English. The only difference is that Klingon uses relative clauses where 
English uses nouns.

*romuluSngan Sambogh 'ej HoHbogh nejwI'* is known to be good. Potential 
ambiguity: it could be a probe that hunts and kills Romulans.
/Romulan hunter-killer probe/ is known to be good. Potential ambiguity: 
it could be a probe that hunts and kills Romulans.
*Sambogh 'ej HoHbogh romuluSngan nejwI'* is not known to be good. 
Potential ambiguity: none.
/hunter-killer Romulan probe/ seems to be wrong because of the way 
English orders adjectives. Potential ambiguity: none.

And can't we resolve the ambiguity in almost exactly the same way as 
English?

*Sambogh 'ej HoHbogh nejwI' luchenmoHpu'bogh romuluSngan
romuluSngan Sambogh 'ej romuluSngan HoHbogh nejwI'
*

I really don't see the increase in complexity. Yes, you've got to 
conjoin those relative clauses with *'ej,* but in English you've got to 
use special punctuation or emphasis to indicate the special status of 
the phrase /hunter-killer:/ it's not a killer of hunters; the words 
/hunter/ and /killer/ are given equal status in the phrase.

It's perfectly fine if you have a preference. It's just that your 
preference doesn't seem to be borne out in at least one example, and 
might be unlikely given the English bias of the creator of canon. I 
don't think "removes some ambiguity" is sufficient cause to go against 
the grain. But if you wrote*quvHa'moHbogh 'ej QeHmoHbogh verengan qID* 
instead of *verengan quvHa'moHbogh 'ej QeHmoHbogh qID,* I wouldn't bat 
an eyelash.


> Lately, I've been thinking a lot about the fact that a lot of Okrand's 
> Klingon is translated from an English original, how that might have 
> affected the writing style of canon Klingon, and what other sorts of 
> less-English writing styles there are. But I don't have my thoughts 
> together enough to really post about it yet.

Exhibit A: the prefix trick.

Okrand sometimes breaks out of a strictly English way of thinking with 
relative clauses. When we first got /Klingon for the Galactic Traveler, 
/we got the phrase *SuDbogh Dargh 'ej wovbogh,* and this disturbed a lot 
of people. It wasn't completely clear at that time just what the rules 
were for conjoining dependent clauses, but even accepting that, most 
people wanted to see *SuDbogh 'ej wovbogh Dargh.* Some actually declared 
that they would not be using the new form. But it actually makes perfect 
sense, if you remember the rules of Klingon sentences (which apply to 
all the verbal clauses): if you're going to repeat a subject or an 
object in the second sentence, you can elide the second instance of that 
subject or object. That's all that's happening in *SuDbogh Dargh 'ej 
wovbogh:* applying Klingon sentence rules regardless of how one would 
approach the phrase in English. And it demonstrates how Klingon doesn't 
mind redundancy: it would be perfectly all right to say *SuDbogh Dargh 
'ej wovbogh Dargh* in the same place, and it's all one conjoined 
relative clause.

-- 
SuStel
http://trimboli.name

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