[tlhIngan Hol] Curses, epithets, and invectives grading

[nIqolay Q]

On Mon, Sep 4, 2017 at 8:34 AM, mayqel qunenoS <mihkoun at gmail.com> wrote:

> There are various curses: Qu'vatlh, ghuy'.
>
> There are various epithets: petaQ, Qovpatlh, taHqeq, toDSaH, yIntagh.
>
> And there are various invectives: baQa', ghu'cha', ghay'cha', Hu'tegh,
> va', QI'yaH.
>

I'm not really sure there's an actual difference between curses and
invectives as you have them listed here. Based on what we know at the
moment, it seems like there's three categories of curse words:

   1. Nouns for people you don't like, i.e. epithets: *petaQ, toDSaH,
   taHqeq, yIntagh, Qovpatlh*
   2. Exclamations to say when things are going poorly and you're mad: *QI'yaH,
   ghuy'cha', ghay'cha', ghuy', Qu'vatlh, va, baQa', Hu'tegh*
   3. Adverbials to remind the translator to put a cuss word somewhere in
   the English: *jay'*

The Star Trek: Klingon game (listed as KCD in sources) says that *QI'yaH*
is "one of the strongest, most foul expressions in the Klingon language. It
defies adequate translation." Other than that, based on the usage in the
series, the curses can sometimes be correlated to English invectives. For
instance, *petaQ* seems to be roughly equivalent to "bastard", "dumbass",
or "asshole". Also, sometimes the Klingonist community uses *va* as a
relatively mild curse. Maltz hasn't commented on this, though.



I have questions I'd like to ask Maltz about Klingon cursing too, and I
suppose this is as good a thread as any to post them. (It'll be nice to get
them off my mind, even if Maltz never sees them.) They're cultural
questions rather than questions about missing vocabulary, since I really
enjoy the linguistic peeks into Klingon culture we get, even if they're not
so useful in day-to-day translations.

1) As I said before, there seem to be only three categories of invectives
so far, which seems strange to me, given Klingons' reputation as renowned
cursers. I know that other sorts of curses could be expressed using an
appropriate verb or noun with *jay'*, so this question isn't really about
filling a vocabulary gap, but are there other, more specific curses as
well? Are there invective nouns for things besides people? (For example:
Things? Situations? Places? Very specific categories, like misbehaving
animals or poorly-made weapons? It's probably too late in Klingon's
development to introduce an invective noun suffix.) Are there more specific
adverbial invectives? Are there verb invectives? Are there invective
exclamations for other emotions besides anger? Are there invectives with
positive connotations? Klingon's an alien language; does it get real weird
with curses? (A swear-word pronoun? An invective number?) Or does *jay'* do
most of the work in these cases?

2) What makes a Klingon word an invective, rather than just an insult or an
expression of anger? If I confront a Klingon in a bar by calling him a
*nuch*, that's not considered an invective, whereas if I call him a *toDSaH*,
that would be a curse word. But either way, my night is about to get a lot
more exciting. What makes *toDSaH* different from *nuch*? What sort of
unpleasant or taboo ideas do words like *toDSaH*, *jay'*, or *QI'yaH* evoke
in the minds of Klingons that makes those words curse words?

3) I enjoyed Maltz's brief comment where he thought that *taHqeq* was
somehow related to the expression *bItaHrup'a'*. What are some other
etymologies of the known Klingon curses, either real or folk? (Has further
study of the language given any insight into the curses that defied
translation in KCD?) In particular, how did *yIntagh *and *vum *end up
sounding the same as mundane, useful words? Why haven't those mundane words
shifted to synonyms or euphemisms without invective homonyms? (I know the
noun *vum* isn't technically considered a curse word. But one of the
English glosses is "bastard", which is still a curse word in some contexts,
so in my mind it's sort of a Klingon almost-curse. A *mu'qaDHey*, maybe.)

4) This one is more of a vocabulary question, I guess. Is there some sort
of phrase equivalent to "Damn/Screw/F*ck ______!", where the blank can be
filled with "you", "the Federation", "our orders", or whatever else needs
to be condemned? Specifically, something short and derogatory with the
strength of invective, that's sort of a familiar, set formula rather than
something you make up on the spot.
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