[tlhIngan Hol] meaning of {DIn} (was Re: Is DIn the opposite of qa'rI' ?)

[Lieven L. Litaer]

Am 03.04.2019 um 07:36 schrieb De'vID:
> How do people understand the antecedents of "there" and "it" in the last
> sentence? "If there's a door [[there]], [[it]]'s referred to by the
> usual word for door, {lojmIt}."

I understand it as:
"If there's a door [[there at the open entryway called DIn]], [[that
door]] is referred to by the usual word for door, {lojmIt}."

 > The KLI New Klingon Words list says this:
 > {DIn} n. Open entryway (to corridor, tunnel, conduit, Jeffries tube,
 > branch of sewer) [This is the open entryway of any enclosed space
 > longer than wide in which people might find themselves. If there is
 > a door that closes, this is not a {DIn}. It is merely a {lojmIt}.]
 >
 > This seems to be an interpretation which has added something to the
 > original. In the original, it just says "a door", not "a door that
 > closes".

Yes, I see it the same way. The original text does not say anything
about closing, but also does not say anything that it is called {lojmIt}
INSTEAD OF {DIn}. It says that if there is a door at the DIn, that is
called lojmIt.

> What do other people think? Or is there additional evidence that
> supports the interpretation given in the New Words List?

What I think can be made clear with an image:
I see a tunnel going into a mountain. The {qa'rI'} of that tunnel ends
in the middle of the rock. It's definitely a closed end with no way out.
(And I think it cannot have a door, otherwise Okrand would have said so)
The other side, the entrance of the tunnel, is open, of course. The
connection between the open space and the mountain. It's called {DIn}.
This {DIn} can of course have a door, and that's called lojmIt.

Used in a phrase, you would say
{DInDaq lojmIt tu'lu'.}
"There's a door at the entryway (of the tunnel)."

By the way, I can add something from the point of view of an architect:
When you construct a building, you first build the walls. There's a big
hole in the wall where you can walk into the room. You would not call
that a door, it's just a big gap in the wall; parallel to the tunnel,
you may call it {DIn}. When you add the movable thing that closes the
hole, that's the {lojmIt}.

Talking about images - I've made aquick drawing showing what I think the
words mean. See it at
http://www.klingonisch.de/mIllogh/tunnelwords.png

--
Lieven L. Litaer
aka the "Klingon Teacher from Germany"
http://www.klingonisch.de
http://www.klingonwiki.net/En/StarTrekDiscovery