[tlhIngan Hol] {neHHa'} not only

[De'vID]

Since {chaH neH wovmoHlu'be'} was quoted in another post, I guess I'll post
this now.

I have a bunch of posts saved up with information learned during the
revision process of the paq'batlh. There was a rule on the mailing list
about not publishing the contents of things containing Klingon until
they're released, to allow people to discover things on their own (in other
words, to prevent spoilers) and to incentivise people to purchase the item
so publishers make a profit and in turn have an incentive to create more
Klingon products. But that doesn't really apply here, since the paq'batlh
isn't sold for profit, it's already been published and many of the things
which needed correction are well-known (and potential fixes discussed on
the mailing list), and the messages I have from Dr. Okrand contain more
information than found in the book itself (as they reveal the thought
process behind the edits). When the 2ed edition is published, I hope that
people will download it and see the results of these discussions, in
context, for themselves.

I had held off posting these messages while the revision was ongoing
because things could be changed still, but since everything is nearly
final, I also don't want to withhold information from the community. Also,
maybe people will notice errors that I've missed or things that would be
nice to clarify before the final version is published (like the questions
about {mej}).

Anyway, here's the discussion about {chaH neH wovmoHlu'be'}.

De'vID:
(p. 119, line 7) {chaH neH wovmoHlu'be'}

This is supposed to mean "The sun shone not on them only" (i.e., the sun
shone on them, and also on others). Someone misread it as "only on them did
the light not shine", i.e, "the light shone on others, but not on them". Is
that a possible meaning, or is the sentence ambiguous? The question here is
the scope of the negation suffix {-be'}.

MO:
>>> The misreading is understandable; the sentence isn’t constructed
clearly.

Better: {chaH neHHa’ wovmoH jul} “the sun lit up not only them”

(end of message)

We previously saw {neHHa'} in 2017, when Dr. Okrand accepted the sentence
{tlhIngan Hol neHHa' vIjatlh} as valid, and translated it into English as
"I speak not only Klingon". But that Klingon sentence did not originate
from him, and so some people don't consider it a "canon" example even
though he okayed it. We now have a Klingon sentence using {neHHa'} that he
composed himself.

-- 
De'vID
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