On Thu, 20 May 2021 at 23:03, Steven Boozer <sboozer@uchicago.edu> wrote:
A German pun seems appropriate for the qepHom. De’vID, have either you or Lieven kept a list of German puns in tlhIngan Hol? I’ve know of a couple but I imagine you both will have noticed more.
No, I haven't kept a list specifically of puns made from German words. There is one word which I was so sure was a German pun, but which Dr. Okrand has said is a completely unintentional coincidence: {Durghang} "lock". Locked doors often have a sign that says "kein Durchgang" (no passage) in German. (But maybe he saw a lot of these signs and subconsciously made the association.) A related word there is {bot} "prevent, block, prohibit", which might be from German "verboten". Another word which might be from a German verb is {Such}, which has the same meaning as German "besuchen". {pa'logh} "never" might be inspired by the German "damals" ("da" = "there", "mals" = "times"). The similarity of {chur} to "Schur" (related to the English word "shear") as in "Schurwolle" (virgin wool), which is considered uncomfortable, might be just a coincidence. The similarity of {nIyma'} to German "niemand" seems to be a coincidence, as it's actually based on someone's name. The affirmative answer {HIja'} seems to be composed of the affirmative answers in Japanese (hai) and German (ja). -- De'vID