[tlhIngan Hol] jIH Daq DopDaq

SuStel sustel at trimboli.name
Wed Mar 10 09:14:25 PST 2021


On 3/10/2021 11:33 AM, Will Martin wrote:
> It’s also good to remember that in all of this, any time we add {-Daq} 
> to a noun, we are talking about the location where something happens. 
> We are not talking about the location of a noun independent of any 
> verb, as a sentence fragment.

Untrue. *DujDaq* means /ship (as a location)/ whether or not something 
is happening at the ship.

*naDev* means the location known as /here./

Locatives are locatives whether they're in sentences or not.

Would you object to a book or chapter title *DujmajDaq*/on our ship/ or 
*SermanyuQDaq*/on Sherman's Planet?/ I wouldn't: they're perfectly 
sensible locatives.


> This goes back to the “cat in the hat” problem. Klingon doesn’t have a 
> mechanism for using {-Daq} to refer to the location of a noun, except 
> through the location referring to the action of a verb.

The cat-in-the-hat problem is not a problem of referring to the location 
of a noun; it's a problem simply of syntax. Nouns with Type 5 suffixes 
on them are not allowed to modify other nouns in the noun-noun 
construction. There's no /conceptual/ reason why they can't. It's 
strictly a rule of syntax. *meHDaq quS* makes perfect sense as 
/on-the-bridge chair./ It's just not an allowed syntax.

Your statement isn't even true as a technicality. I can easily use 
locatives without using verbs: *meHDaq 'oH HoD quS'e'*/The captain's 
chair is on the bridge./ No verb there. There's no difference in syntax 
between *meHDaq 'oH HoD quS'e'* and *vIqraq 'oH HoD quS'e'.* Both 
sentences link the captain's chair with another noun. The locative has 
no special verbal significance.


> {Dung} is a noun that can be a subject or an object of a verb. 
> {DungDaq} is a locative for the action of a verb. Attempts to use 
> {DungDaq} as a subject or object would indeed be an edge case of 
> grammar, probably without canon to back it up. It would, at the very 
> least, be highly uncommon, though in poetry, all bets are off.

Nonsense. Locatives can be used as the objects of verbs if the verb 
imparts a locative sense to its object. *DungDaq vIjaH* /I go to the 
area /is a legal, if redundant, sentence, and the locative is the object 
of the verb. The locative /has/ to be the object of the verb. If I said 
*DungDaq jIjaH,* it would mean I'm in the area above and going 
somewhere, which is not what I wanted to say.

-- 
SuStel
http://trimboli.name

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.kli.org/pipermail/tlhingan-hol-kli.org/attachments/20210310/a6a913df/attachment-0015.htm>


More information about the tlhIngan-Hol mailing list