Bort - 2015-12-12
So I guess they decided early on that the Klingon language wouldn't have a verb for "to be", which is where the Hamlet monologue requires a substitution ("to continue"). Thing is, I can't find a really good essay about it, but if you dig deep enough into the roots of our English verb "to be", you find that its various forms come from pre-existing roots for concepts like "to dwell" and "to move". So it looks like some time after Proto-Indo-European started getting around, various peoples started seeing the need to describe existing as an abstract concept, and did their best with what they had.
"Hey Og, I think we need a new word for what you and I are doing."
"What, talking?"
"No, that thing we do and every other person does, but people who are dead don't do."
"You mean like hunt? Breathe? Move?"
"No! Trees do it, rocks do it, but airborne fish don't do it."
"Um ... float?"
It probably took them a while to figure this out.
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