[tlhIngan Hol] Klingon Word of the Day: tlhIm (noun)

[Steven Boozer]

Klingon word: tlhIm
Part of speech: noun
Definition: carpet, rug, blanket, fabric wall hanging
Source: Marc Okrand, Email 01/09/2012
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rav vel tlhIm 
the carpet covers the floor (Lieven < MO, 1/09/2012)

rav velmeH tlhIm lo' 
lay a carpet ("use a carpet to cover the floor") (Lieven < MO, 1/09/2012)

(Lieven < MO, 1/09/2012):  A carpet or a rug is {tlhIm}.  When you lay a carpet, you don't use the verb {mutlh} ["construct, assemble, put together, manufacture"]; the appropriate verb is {vel} (cover, coat, mask). [ ... ] The person who lays the carpet is a {velwI'} (literally "coverer, coater, masker"). You might think that the {velwI'} is the carpet itself. That would make sense, but it doesn't work that way. Maltz commented that Klingon rugs are primarily decorative. The idea of a fabric floor covering being thick or soft was just bizarre to him. If you did say {tlhIm mutlh} ("he/she assembled a carpet"), that would mean there were pieces of fabric (or squares of carpet?) that got put together (sewn together?) to make a carpet or rug. {tlhIm} is commonly used for a fabric wall hanging (that might, for example, have a picture of the Klingon emblem on it). If a piece of cloth is displayed at the end of a pole, it is considered a {joqwI'} ("flag"); a {tlhIm} covers some sort of surface. Finally, {tlhIm} can also mean "blanket." Maltz said that Klingons generally don't use blankets (he certainly doesn't), but he's seen them and, if you have to call them something, {tlhIm} is it.

(qep'a' 2019):   [{weSjech} "fabric, cloth, textile"] can be used for textiles or fabric in clothing, sheets, towels, and so on, but generally not for carpets or rugs (except for thin ones)." [For that use] {paSrIq} "fabric used in carpets and rugs" [not for clothing] 

(st.klingon 3/23/1998):  Thus {DIrmey} "skins" and {veDDIrmey} "pelts" are not (or, perhaps better, are no longer) body parts, but rather are materials from which things (clothing or blankets, for example) may be made.

SEE ALSO:
no' DIr 		ancestor hanging [a wall ornament] (n)

notron 		curtain, drape (n)
  -  "{notron} is curtain, drape, but it can also be used for things like a door or gate that opens and closes vertically, like a portcullis." (MO to DeSdu', 1/28/2020)  

HuS 		hang (v)
tlhep 		be suspended, dangling (v)
  -  "{HuS} takes an object. If your shoes are hanging on a wall it's because somebody hung them there. [ ... ] And there's another word: {tlhep} 'be suspended, be dangling'. Use {HuS} if, for example, you hang your coat on a hook on the wall or hang sheets on a clothesline to dry. But if, say, you see a spider dangling at the bottom of one of those silk threads that spiders extrude, use {tlhep}. Or if you see a pair of shoes tied together by the laces and, for whatever reason, they're hanging by the tied-together laces from an overhead power wire, use {tlhep}." (MO to Lieven, re Hamletmachine)

TREK NOTES:
Janeway refers to "the shroud of Kahless (VOY "One Small Step").

The captain's bed in the captured BOP quarters was padded with fur blankets (ENT "Cold Station 12" & "The Augments"). 

--
Voragh
Ca'Non Master of the Klingons