[Tlhingan-hol] More new words from Maltz

[Felix Malmenbeck]

Indeed, part of me feels like a QemjIq should be a hollow space with a single, narrow opening that you could by pouring cement into it if you were allowed to rotate it however you wished (like the hollow of a tree: if you're allowed to lay the tree down horizontally, you could fill it with cement).

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From: qurgh lungqIj [qurgh at wizage.net]
Sent: Tuesday, January 31, 2012 19:46
To: tlhingan-hol at kli.org
Subject: Re: [Tlhingan-hol] More new words from Maltz

I think we need to ask Marc what he was thinking when he said "fillable". :)

Number 1 in your suggestion is very fillable IMO, as you can fill it by pouring cement into it, while you can't pour cement into a qung (as it would simply pour out the other side). qung, on the other hand, can be patched by covering it with another material (some of which goes into the hole), but patching a QemjIq would simply give it a roof.

I see it as a qung being a hole in something that you can look through and see things on the other side, while a QemjIq doesn't have another side. If I use a spade, I can dig a QemjIq in the ground, but I can also punch a qung in a wall with it (if I could somehow dig all the way through the planet and out the other side, I'd have a qung). QemjIq = hole, depression, empty pond, drained lake, opening of a volcano, etc; qung = hole, puncture, gap, tear in the knee of my pants, bullet hole, etc.

As for a bottle's mouth, I don't see that as qung or QemjIq, as the bottle is made that shape. If I drilled a hole into the bottle, that would be a qung (just as I have to drill holes into a flute to make it make music, but the holes at either end are not qung).

qurgh

On Tue, Jan 31, 2012 at 11:32 AM, Felix Malmenbeck <felixm at kth.se<mailto:felixm at kth.se>> wrote:
Very true. However, I suspect the comment about QemjIqmey being fillable and qungmey not was a bit of a misdtatement; after all, one can fill most small qungmey with a bit of lam Dogh.

I suspect the distinction is about one of two things:

1) Topology: Depressions(holes with "dead ends")  are QemjIqmey, true holes are qungmey.
2) The depth of the material: Much like the way 'ab refers to "longish, skinnyish things", perhaps qungmey refer to punctures in "membranish, sheetlike things"; things with depths that are small compared to width and length.

2) strikes me as being the more natural distinction to make, alrhough I personally prefer 1).
Neither 1) nor 2) satisfies Okrand's non-fillability criterion, however.

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