[tlhIngan Hol] Klingon Word of the Day: 'o'megh

[Steven Boozer]

Klingon word: 	'o'megh
Part of speech: 	noun
Definition: 	end (of a song)
Source: 	HQ:v12n2p9
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(HQ 12.2:8-9):   Generally, one expresses the end of a stretch of time by using a verb rather than a noun. That is, one says when the month ends rather than at the end of the month. The verb for this kind of end is {Dor}. … When an event over which one has some control ends (one can't cause a month to end), a different verb is used: {van}. This would apply to such things as voyages, battles, plays, operas, stories, and songs. Here, the event (the voyage, the song) doesn't end; the participant in the event or the perpetrator of the event ends it. … Note that the voyage and the song cannot end themselves. Someone has to end them. … 
    There is a difference between the end of the performance of a song or opera or play, indicated by making use of the verbs {van} and {ghang}, and the ending, or final portion, of a song or opera or play itself. For an opera, play, story, speech, and so on, the final portion is its {bertlham}. This word usually refers to the last aria or other musical portion in an opera, last speech in a play, last sentence or so of a story or an address ... For a song—but only for a song—the final portion is its {'o'megh}. Parallel to {bertlham}, {'o'megh} is the final phrase or so of the song, one that brings the song to a definite conclusion.   All songs have endings ({'o'meghmey}), some more elaborate or stirring than others. (Maltz noted that there are Federation songs with {'o'meghmey} he has never heard, and he finds this disconcerting. He said that performers of these songs just sort of fade away before the song has ended properly. He referred to the ending of such a song as its {'o'meghqoq} "so-called ending." 

(HQ 12.2:8-9):  For an opera, play, story, speech, and so on, the final portion is its {bertlham} … The {bertlham} of a well-known work is often well-known itself, as is its beginning ({bI'reS}). … To begin to sing a song is to {lIH} (literally, "introduce") the song, and that portion of the song that comes at the beginning—-a portion that is often so familiar that listeners know what song it is after hearing just that short portion—-is the {namtun).

PUNS: 	
1)  omega (last letter of Greek alphabet)
2)  Bertram is the hero of Shakespeare's play "All's Well That Ends Well"
3)  "Name That Tune" (U.S. TV show)
4)  *Be-reshit* (i.e. Hebrew name for the Book of Genesis)

TREK TRIVIA:
JADZIA:  Not every relationship has to end like a Klingon opera.
WORF:   No. Just the ones that are important.
  -- [DS9 “Let He Who is Without Sin…”]

SEE ALSO:
bom  			song,  chant (n)
namtun  		familiar beginning of a song (n)
ghe'naQ 		opera (n)
   ghe'naQ nIt  		   grand opera (n)
bertlham  		end (of opera, play, story, speech, etc.) (n)
   bertlham taymey 	   epilogue (n) 
bI'reS  			beginning (of opera, play, story, speech, etc.)
   bI'reS taymey 		   prologue (n) 

--
Voragh, Ca'Non Master of the Klingons
    Please contribute relevant vocabulary or notes from the last 
    year or two. I’ve fallen woefully behind in updating my files.