[Tlhingan-hol] "I have kept my word of honor"

[Steven Boozer]

Voragh:
>> I've just noticed a new idiom used in the {paq'batlh}: 
>> {lay' 'ej batlh pab} "keep one's word of honor":
>>
>>    jIlay'ta' 'ej batlh jIpabta' vaj choDanIS
>>    I have kept my word of honor, And so should you, 
>>     (PB 150-151, 186-187)
>>
>>    qotarvaD lay'ta' 'ej batlh pab qeylIS
>>    Kahless kept his word of honor to Kotar (PB 184-85)

SuStel:
> Is this really an idiom? {lay' 'ej batlh pab} "promise and follow the
> rules honorably." The English is idiomatic, but I don't think the
> Klingon is. It seems quite literal.

A stock phrase then, if not an idiom.  But if it's literal, to which rules is the poet referring?   {jIlay'ta' 'ej batlh jIpabta'} "I have promised and I have followed the rules honorably" to my ear implies that the promise has been made honorably (and in the proper form for such things {batlh pab}), not that the promise was necessarily fulfilled.  Or is that what {-ta'} "accomplished, done" implies?  

  This suffix is similar to {-pu'}, but it is used when an activity 
  was deliberately undertaken, the implication being that someone
  set out to do something and in fact did it. English translations
  seldom reveal the distinction.  [TKD 41]

The question is which activity was "deliberately undertaken":  making the promise or actually keeping the promise?  And wouldn't the latter be ?{lay'chu'ta'}?

I'm guessing that in {pab} "follow (rules)" the parenthesis is an example, i.e. "follow (rules, traditions, customary practice, etc.}.  Examples:

  qorDu' lurDechmeyna' pab tlhInganpu' 
  With strong [Klingon] family traditions... S13

  batlh ghob yIpab 
  Adhere to virtue honorably. 
  ["The Klingon verb in the expression, {pab}, is here translated "adhere",
    but it is also used to mean "follow", in the sense of following rules,
    suggesting perhaps that, though not officially laws, virtues should be
    followed as if they were." (TKW 47)]

Interestingly, someone mentioned in passing that {'Ip pab} is translated "keep a promise" in the {paq'batlh} (p.59-60).  (Could someone supply the entire verse so we can see the context?)  There is also the antonym {bIv} "break (rules)" but I have no examples of this verb recorded.  

AFAIK our only other example of {lay'} "promise" is:

  not lay'Ha' tlhIngan 
  No Klingon ever breaks his word. TKW


--
Voragh
Ca'Non Master of the Klingons