[Tlhingan-hol] Klingon Word of the Day: Hoj (unreal clauses)

[Anthony Appleyard]

Context is an unreliable servant. As I wrote a few times before, we need an irrealis particle, here represented by #: 

Duj leghpu' X :: if X has seen the ship (he may or may not have seen it)

Duj # leghpu' X :: if X had seen the ship (and I know that he has not seen, e.g. it because he was elsewhere).

----Original message----
>From : robyn at flyingstart.ca
Date : 04/03/2016 - 22:28 (GMTST)
To : tlhIngan-Hol at kli.org
Subject : Re: [Tlhingan-hol] Klingon Word of the Day: Hoj

Irrealis was the word Marc gave to it, when presented with "If I'd known you were coming I'd have baked a cake." 

> -----Original Message-----
> ...
> > Certainly Klingon currently lacks the tools to express what English
> > does with "Had it been so, then ..."  or "Were it thus, then ..." but
> > there are English speakers who don't use that grammar and they get by,
> > showing that context can do the job. At a session with Mac two
> > qep'a'mey ago the lack of an irrealis was mentioned to Marc and he
> > appreciated what was being asked and thought about it, but hasn't
> > returned with any solution.