Before the Language
The Story of Klingon
Course 1 · Chapter 1 · Before the Language
Klingon is one of the best known invented languages, but it did not arrive with the Klingons. For years the species spoke English on screen. This chapter follows the language's earliest traces, from a name in a 1960s episode to a few shouted words in 1979, and ends where the next chapter begins: with a linguist being asked to do the job properly.
Klingons Who Spoke English
The Klingons first appeared in the original Star Trek series in the 1960s. In all their appearances before 1979 they spoke English, even to each other. The language itself is first mentioned in the episode "The Trouble with Tribbles" (1967), in which a Klingon character pronounces the name as "Klingonee", but it is not heard until the first film.
1979: The First Klingon Sounds
The language was heard for the first time in Star Trek: The Motion Picture (1979). According to Wikipedia's account, the actor James Doohan (who played Scotty) and the producer Jon Povill devised the language's basic sound and about a dozen words. Doohan recorded the lines he had written on tape, and the actor Mark Lenard, who spoke them on screen, wrote them out in a form he found useful for learning them.
A second source describes the scene differently: viewers heard "guttural shouts" from the crew of a doomed Klingon ship, and only the subtitles carried the meaning. The actors, it says, "put emotion into what were then meaningless sounds." Both descriptions agree on the main point: in 1979 there was a sound, and a few words, but not yet a language.
| When | What the Klingons spoke | Who shaped it |
|---|---|---|
| 1960s | English, even among themselves; the language is only mentioned ("Klingonee", 1967) | Television writers |
| 1979 | A few shouted words, with subtitles | James Doohan and Jon Povill; spoken by Mark Lenard |
| 1984 | A structured language, built to order | Marc Okrand (Chapter 2) |
Why Not Leave It as Gibberish?
For Star Trek III: The Search for Spock (1984), the director Leonard Nimoy and the writer-producer Harve Bennett wanted the Klingons to speak a structured language rather than "random gibberish". That decision is what the whole later story rests on. It turned a few noises into a task: someone had to build a language that sounded alien, that actors could say, and that would be consistent from one film to the next. The producers asked a linguist, Marc Okrand, who had earlier written four lines of Vulcan dialogue for Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan.
The Constraint
Whatever Okrand built had to fit the sounds and words already heard in 1979. The language had to grow from that small seed instead of replacing it.
The Goal
A language that sounds as alien as the Klingons look, but that actors can pronounce on set.
The Result
A grammar and dictionary, and eventually a community of learners. That is the rest of this course.
Sources for This Chapter
- Wikipedia, "Klingon language" (history and origins section).
- The Klingon Language Institute, "Development and Use of the Klingon Language" (kli.org).
Hands-On Exercises
Make a timeline with three entries (1967, 1979, 1984) saying what the Klingons spoke in each and who shaped it.
The chapter gives two different descriptions of the 1979 scene. Say what each stresses and what they agree on.
Explain why "random gibberish" was a problem for the producers of the third film, and name the three requirements the new language had to meet.
Quick Reference
- 1960s: Klingons speak English on television; the language is mentioned in 1967 ("Klingonee").
- 1979: a sound and about a dozen words by James Doohan and Jon Povill, spoken by Mark Lenard.
- 1984: the third film commissions a structured language from Marc Okrand.
- Constraint: sound alien, be pronounceable, stay consistent with 1979.