On 2/19/2020 1:30 AM, De'vID wrote:
Someone (Visirius) posted this about ablaut reduplication on the Klingon Discord recently and it seems relevant to {vIqraq}: https://www.rd.com/culture/ablaut-reduplication/
Does Klingon also follow this pattern? That is, are there words that sound like *{vaqrIq} instead? The only one that comes to mind is {raS'IS} (which is not *{rIS'aS}).
I don't know about this particular rule, but I do know that Okrand has given such things thought. We have the words *Dung*/area above/ and *bIng*/area below,/ which sound exactly backwards to an English-speaker's ear (which tends to have front-vowels for /up/ and back-vowels for /down/). I believe Okrand confirmed — though I cannot cite a source; it may have been a conversation at a qep'a' — that he did this intentionally. It's also possible that Okrand doesn't know about ablaut reduplication and lets his English bias bleed into Klingon. -- SuStel http://trimboli.name