[tlhIngan Hol] About colors

[Felix Malmenbeck]

> It's easier if you can visualize the spectrum.
> https://75.52.166.42/tlhIngan/color.jpg

You can find it at http://klingonska.org/ref/color.html along with a number of canonical color descriptions (a few years out of date, unfortunately).

> for yellow, but it looks ambiguous... Could't it indicate light blue
> or light green as well?

It has been used to describe light blue, in the Talk Now! Learn Klingon software by EuroTalk:

http://klingonska.org/canon/2011-09-30-tnk.txt

I'd probably lean towards the "yellowish tinge" interpretation most of the time, because that descriptions seems more thought-through, and thus probably more reflective of MO's intentions.

That being said, human color words can be both vague and overlapping, as well; I've sat many times with color charts for purple, violet, purpure, and magenta, trying to figure out which one is best to describe the shade I'm thinking of.
English has a fairly rich assortment of color words, giving it a higher "resolution", in some sense. Other languages have fewer; Ova-Himba, for example, has four, much like the Klingon SuD, Doq, qIj and chIS.

http://theconversation.com/languages-dont-all-have-the-same-number-of-terms-for-colors-scientists-have-a-new-theory-why-84117
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Color_term#Cultural_differences

That being said, in most languages you can clarify things through comparisons (indeed, many color terms are just compounds of a more basic color term and whatever you're comparing it to). This includes Klingon:

Doq; beqpuj rur.
= "It's Doq like beqpuj."
~ "It's orange."

Doqbogh rItlh 'ej beqpuj rurbogh
= "a dye that's Doq and resembles beqpuj"
~ "an orange dye"

Doq; nIb beqpuj.
= "It's Doq exactly like beqpuj."
~ "It's bekpuj-orange."

I've been thinking it might be interesting for this year's wishlist to ask for useful, culturally relevant exemplars of different colors. Not specific ones, like "What's the word for (green) emeralds?", but more like ... "What might a Klingon use to describe something that is emerald green?".

//loghaD

________________________________________
From: tlhIngan-Hol <tlhingan-hol-bounces at lists.kli.org> on behalf of DloraH <seruq at bellsouth.net>
Sent: Saturday, February 16, 2019 14:36
To: tlhingan-hol at lists.kli.org
Cc: tlhingan-hol at kli.org
Subject: Re: [tlhIngan Hol] About colors

On Sat, 16 Feb 2019 10:26:30 +0100
Luciano Montanaro <mikelima at gmail.com> wrote:

> ...
> An odd thing for me was that SuDqu' means green; I expected to be a
> color at the opposite end of the spectrum, and to indicate blue.
> ...

It's easier if you can visualize the spectrum.
https://75.52.166.42/tlhIngan/color.jpg
(You need a browser that allows you to accept certificate errors. ie:
Firefox)

If you can't get the link to work, I think someone has a copy of it on
one of the Klingon database type websites, but I am not at home, so I
don't have all my links.

In the spectrum, under each general color you have the ..'ej.., the
-qu', and then the bare verb.


- DloraH
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