[Tlhingan-hol] Aspect, etc

[SuStel]

On 12/2/2015 6:49 AM, lojmIt tI'wI' nuv wrote:
> On Dec 2, 2015, at 4:50 AM, De'vID <de.vid.jonpin at gmail.com> wrote:
>> {'opHu' targh vIHoH} "some day in the past, I killed a targ".
 >
> ... which is pretty much indistinguishable in meaning to {targh
> vIHoHpu'.}
>
> But uglier. Approximate, but not inaccurate. How Terran.

(A) It's not the same.
(B) That was rude.

More on (A). {-pu'} doesn't mean "before now" or even "before the time 
context." It means "completed action." "Before the time context" would 
be past tense, and as we know Klingon verbs do not express tense. 
"Completed" is an aspect and does not say whether an action happened 
before, at, or after the time context.

Frankly, both versions are a bit wrong. {'opHu' targh vIHoH} describes 
an action that is not completed, as if I spent the day killing several 
targs, or torturing one targ to death. {targh vIHoHpu'} describes the 
completed killing of one or more targs, but doesn't say anything at all 
about when this took place, past, present, or future.

If I want to express the idea that several days ago I killed a targ and 
it was a completed action, that would be {'op Hu' targh vIHoHpu'}.

(C) Inaccurate but not approximate is a cute line in Power Klingon, but 
to be intentionally imprecise because of this line is ridiculous. To 
criticize someone's language because of this line is unhelpful.

-- 
SuStel
http://www.trimboli.name/