[Tlhingan-hol] grammatical constructions not in the main sources?

De'vID de.vid.jonpin at gmail.com
Tue Feb 23 10:47:47 PST 2016


A recent thread revealed that even some experienced speakers don't
recall the variants on the comparative ({law'}/{puS}) construction,
covered in HolQeD 13.1.

What other grammatical constructions (or extensions thereof) are there
which are not found in the "main" or "major" Klingon sources (TKD,
KGT, TKW)?

One obvious one that I can think of is the "prefix trick". But it's
fairly easy to figure out, if you encounter such a sentence. (Even if
you believed that it's not grammatical because it appears to
contradict TKD, it'd still be obvious to you what the writer meant if
you encountered {taj qanob}.)

Another one is the "verbs of speaking", and how to use them. Again,
though, if you encountered {jIjatlhpu', tlhIngan jIH}, it's fairly
easy to figure out what the writer meant, even though you might be
tempted to write *{tlhIngan jIH 'e' vIjatlh} or something.

Yet another one is how to use {-Daq} (and also {-vo'}) with "movement"
verbs. Like, what does {DujDaq chegh} mean? If you wrote {yuQDaq
jIleng} when you meant {yuQ vIleng}, well, probably people will still
understand you in many contexts.

Oh, and let's not forget {-moH} and the formation of so-called
"ditransitive" verbs. That one is probably harder for someone
encountering such a sentence for the first time to wrap their head
around.

Are there any others?

It seems that, with the exception of extended {law'}/{puS}, most of
the other constructions are actually somewhat common, at least as far
as this mailing list is concerned. That is, they occur with some
frequency in longer messages, like Qov's or QeS's stories. I guess
this is because while it's common for story characters to speak, or to
move from one place to another, or to perform an action involving two
objects or cause such an action to happen, it's comparatively (!) more
rare to use a comparative construct. And it's even rarer to use a
variant of such a construct (one thing is less X than something else,
in a disparaging way).

These "new" grammatical constructions should be in a FAQ or wiki.
Beginners are very unlikely to encounter them otherwise.

-- 
De'vID



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