Star Trek: Picard

side view of t-shirt

letter analysis

Sex Pistols Logo
Star Trek: Picard is a TV series of 2020 based on
Star Trek with Jean-Luc
Picard from
Star Trek: The Next Generation in the main character. It is broadcasted on CBS All Access (now known as
Paramount+) and appears one day later worldwide on Amazon Prime.
There were no Klingons in the show and no Klingon was spoken, but there are some appearances.
Season 1: Klingon T-Shirt
In episode 7 ("Nepenthe") at about 54:44 Kestra (played by Lulu Wilson) is wearing a T-shirt with clearly recognized Klingons plus two words. Those words are not relevant to the story. The phrase is not entirely visible. The words are all written in Okrand's
romanized spelling. The first line shows
HIchmey "handguns" and the second line starts with
nga-, but due to the camera angle, the second part is blurred. It can't be more than one syllable though.
Analysis of the letters
In one angle, the top part of some letters is partially visible. Since there are only few words starting with
nga- that would make sense in this combination, it is quite sure that this means
HIchmey nga'chuq.
Analysis of the meaning
If the intended meaning was to say "f**k handguns" - maybe because Klingons prefer to use blades - it is grammatically incorrect. The
subject of
nga'chuq are the parties doing it with each other, and it should follow the verb. If a literal translation was intended, the verb
ngagh mate with would have been more appropriate.
The more likely interpretation is that this is an easter egg on the music group "Sex Pistols", as the verb
nga'chuq is defined as "sex, perform sex" and a second definition of
HIch (in addition to "handgun") is "pistol". Even then, the phrase still is ungrammatical and reads like "pistols, they have sex." Even in correct word order, the result "pistols are having sex" is surely not what was intended. This is a simply word-by-word dictionary translation.
On his
Instagram acccount, showrunner Michael Chabon confirmed this, saying it was "Roughly translated: "Sex Phasers." A popular Klingon trash band".
Note that "phaser" is
pu' and "phaser pistol" is
pu'HIch. This may have been shortened deliberately.
T-shirt
Several online-stores sell a T-shirt with the above logo seen in Picard. Most of them use the same layout which includes a bad grammatical error, which can only be seen by Klingon experts. A grammatically correct version is available at the webstore of the
German Klingon Institute, accessible through
this link 
(German).
Season 3
End credits
On the background of season 3 end credits, schematics of a Klingon ship appear with several parts named. The names first appear in
pIqaD and then in English. The used
Klingon font is
HaSta.
Parts in brackets were not shown clearly and contain guesses.
Klingon |
English |
bI'rel [...] |
B'REL CLASS BIRD OF PREY |
Se' [lISwI'] |
Frequency Conditioner |
Se' lISwI' yIb |
Frequency Conditioner Inlet |
yu'egh chungwI' cha' |
Secondary Waveform Accelerator |
yu'egh meqHoD 'och |
Waveform Bypass Conduit |
SIlwI' tat [noch] |
Diverter Ion Sensor |
botjan [HoS SIlwI'] |
Shield Energy Diverter |
'otlh [... Qorwagh] |
Photon Spill Window |
meqHoD and
SIl were not known canonical words at the time the series was broadcasted. It's unknown whether they were invented by the series production team or given to them by Okrand.
Background Poster

ghe'tor QI'tu'
In episode 5 of season 3 (at 11:46), some
Klingon letters were seen in a background image. The words are clearly to read as
geztor qiztuz. This is
transcribed as
ghe'tor and
QI'tu', meaning "netherworld" and "paradise".
See also
References
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