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Re: Gender in Old Klingon?

From:Nik Taylor <fortytwo@...>
Date:Friday, July 2, 1999, 0:56
Fakaltin=E1tas na<Terrence Donnelly>:
> However, gender is > still very operative in modern Klingon. The distinction is not > between sex, but sentience:
Ah yes, you have a point there.
> -Du' may be a remnant of the dual number, but now > refers to any number of body parts.
You know, now that I think about it, that IS a rather obvious theory - body parts frequently come in pairs.
> note that it is the sentience of the possessed, and not the > possessor, that determines the proper suffix.
In much the same way as the number of the possessed, not the possessor, determines Spanish mi/mis, etc.
> So far as the -Du' suffix is concerned, I like to think this > shows something of the Klingon mind-set: body parts are very > important to them! They make a distinction between parts that > are living (with -Du') or detatched and dead (with -mey).
OH! That makes a lot of sense, Okrand merely said that using -mey with body parts implies "scattered", and if body parts are scattered, they must be separated from the body, thus dead, thus inanimate! Perhaps at one time the suffixes were: Singular Dual Plural Animate -' -Du' -pu' Inanimate -j ? -mey (I theorize -' and -j based on the possessive suffixes wI'/wij, li'/lij, ma'/maj, ra'/raj The use of -mey with animates, tho, is a bit puzzling. Perhaps it was an extension of the use with body parts, which subsequently became archaic (but surviving in poetry) --=20 "If all Printers were determin'd not to print any thing till they were sure it would offend no body, there would be very little printed" - Benjamin Franklin http://members.tripod.com/~Nik_Taylor/Conlang/W.html http://members.tripod.com/~Nik_Taylor/Books.html ICQ #: 18656696 AIM screen-name: NikTailor