Since there is no grammatical way to differentiate between the word {latlh} and someone whose parents decided to name them that, I’d probably presume the more common word than the name for which we have no evidence anyone is called. Sufficient context, or a more explicitly worded expression might make the exception more obvious. This isn’t really a language issue. I’m sure that in most, if not all languages, you’d have the same issue. We’ve been through this as a community. One of our former Beginner Grammarians took on the name {pagh}. He expanded our perspective of potential meanings for all sentences describing nobody, or the actions no one committed. And yet, the language survived. pItlh charghwI’ ‘utlh (ghaH, ghaH, -Daj)

On Apr 11, 2022, at 7:51 AM, mayqel qunen'oS <mihkoun@gmail.com> wrote:

There's a chancellor who goes by the names of ghawran, torgh, valQIS, and several other names as well.

I want to say "they call the chancellor as ghawran, torgh, valQIS, and by several other names".

So I write:

QangvaD ghawran, torgh, valQIS, latlhmey je luponglu'

Or perhaps:

QangvaD ghawran, torgh, valQIS, latlh pongmey je luponglu'

Are the above two klingon sentences correct? Or do these sentences actually say that "they call the chancellor ghawran, torgh, valQIS, and they call him {latlhmey}/{latlh pongmey} as well"?

Does the presence of the {latlhmey}/{latlh pongmey} in the "name slot" of the {XvaD Y ponglu'} construction necessarily mean that they are to be understood as actual names, instead of normal words?

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