On Feb 18, 2019, at 09:15, mayqel qunenoS <mihkoun@gmail.com> wrote:

When it comes to klingon, which of the following is the correct choice ?

{qatlh choQaHmeH vIghro'lIj vIje'nIS ?}
{choQaHmeH qatlh vIghro'lIj vIje'nIS ?}

Interesting question. Both of those Klingon sentences make sense to me. I think that {qatlh} should go at the head of the whole sentence as usual, since the -meH clause is just a clause rather than a stand-alone sentence itself; and qatlh in the middle just looks… odd… to me intuitively.

Except I would expect the qatlh to go at the beginning of the clause of which it is a part, not the sentence as a whole. I see subordinate and purpose clauses as less closely connected to the main clause, and not actually a part of it — they're different clauses.

Imagine you instead asked, Why do I need to feed your cat if I help you?

qaQaHchugh, qatlh vIghro'lIj vIje'nIS?
qatlh vIghro'lIj vIje'nIS, qaQaHchugh?

I think mayqel's comprehension problem comes from the fact that he uses parenthetical phrases a lot, and he's trying to do it here.

qatlh — qaQaHmeH — vIghro'lIj vIje'nIS?

As a bit of extemporaneous explanation this would be just fine, but do too much of that and your high school teachers will start marking you off for poor style.

-- 
SuStel
http://trimboli.name