Klingon Grammar Addenda
Key:
Spoken by Okrand
| Inferred from canon |
Accepted usage
- Most quantity words appear to behave like numbers and come
before the noun: Hoch X
(Note: Hoch X
plus singular noun = "each X"; plus plural noun = "all the
Xs") [HQ5:2 p.11], 'op
X "some Xs" [S7], latlh
X "(an)other X/Xs" [S31], bID X "half an X, a half X" [BoP]
| It's also possible that these are not so much numbers as
examples of the Genitive use of the NN construction (or more
likely, numbers themselves fall under the Genitive NN
principle). |
- When Hoch follows
the noun, it appears to refer to the entirety of the noun, eg
nIn Hoch natlhlu'pu'
"All the fuel is used up" [KGT p.155]
- The quantity word HochHom
appears to come after the noun [S15]
| It could be that HochHom is like Hoch, and that used before the noun
would mean "most of the Xs", but after the noun means "most of the
given X". |
- Number phrases with vatlhvI' are considered numbers and
come before the noun, eg. cha'maH vagh
vatlhvI' Hong "One quarter impulse power". [ST5;
KLI: S. Boozer, 5/21/99, "Re: vatlhvI'"]
- Type 5 noun suffixes come after a noun + ordinal number
or noun + number label phrase: Duj
wejDIchDaq "In the third ship"; Duj wejDaq "in Ship No. 3" [HQ5:1 p.17]
[[ ST5: nImbuS wejDaq 'ejDo' 'entepray'
ngeH lu'pu' "The starship Enterprise has been
dispatched to Nimbus III." ]]
- One can use Ha' to
form the opposite of some adverbs, eg. Do'Ha' [HQ4:4 p.11; KGT p.148]
- Time stamps simply come at the head of the sentence,
and require no special marking. They can be combined to convey more
precise times, eg. DISvam "this year", wej Hu' "3 days ago", DaHjaj po "this
morning" [MSN 6/30/97]
- Duration stamps must be rendered by verb phrases, eg.
qaStaHvIS wej rep "for
three hours", nI'taHvIS
poH "for a long time" [KLI: D. Trimboli,
11/5/98, "Re: KLBC yu'wI'"; KLI: M. Shoulson, 7/28/97, "Re: KLBC + And
now, the news"]
- Ordinals may be used as a kind of time stamp indicating
number of distinct events, eg. wa'DIch
tlhIngan Dujmey luleghlu'pu'bogh... "Klingon ships
seen for the first time..." [S15]
| This interpretation is not completely accepted. Note the difference
between this and forms with logh, eg. cha'DIch maghom "We meet for the
second time" (a count of events) vs. cha'logh maghom "We meet twice" (a
count of frequency). Neither of these forms indicate the succession
of events, for which Klingon appears to use no markers:
bogh tlhInganpu', SuvwI'pu' moj,
Hegh "(First) Klingons are born, (second) become
warriors, (and then) die." [TKW p.5] |
- Names can be stated in a couple of ways: XvaD Y ponglu' "X is called Y" [S27];
and X 'oH pongwIj'e' "X
is my name" [FAQ]
| The word ponglu' is
not actually part of the Skybox text, but it is widely assumed to be
the appropriate verb for this phrase. |
- The full form of address for a Klingon is
wo'rIv, mogh puqloD, martaq
tuq "Worf, son of Mogh, of the House of Martok".
Except in the most formal circumstances, it is proper to address a
Klingon by the first name only. [KGT p.197; MSN 9/8/97]
- Titles follow names, eg. tlha'a HoD "Captain Klaa"
[KGT p.5]
- Geographical regions seem to follow this same formula, eg.
Sa'Qej Sep "Sakrej
Region" [KGT p.16]
©1999 Terrence Donnelly
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