Vowel Harmony is an original and essential characteristic of the Turkish language. It is a matter of logic, it is smooth to the tongue and sweet to the ear. In the previous lesson, I had explained that Turkish was a language of endings. Now, we’re going to harmonize the vowels of theses endings to the last vowel of the stem word.
There are 2 groups of vowels:
- back vowels = a ı o u
- front vowels = e i ö ü
All the vowels of a word’s endings must belong to the same vowel group of the last vowel of that word.
Example : for the word sevgili (lover), let’s add 1 ending to it : sevgili+ler (lovers).
The vowels of this ending is e = it belongs to the same vowel group of the last vowel of that word, i.e.: i.
Let’s study the ending meaning MY :
- when the word ends with a vowel, whatever vowel, just add an M. (see lesson 2)
ex : araba =car ; arabam = my car
ütü= iron ; ütüm= my iron
- when the word ends with a consonant, we have to add a vowel before the M so that we can read the word more easily. Look at the last vowel of the word and harmonize the ending’s vowel accordingly:
ex :
at=horse ; atım=my cheval
kız=daughter ; kızım= my daughter
el=hand ; elim= my hand
diz=knee ; dizim= my knee
kol=arm ; kolum= my arm
duş=shower ; duşum= my shower
süt=milk ; sütüm= my milk
göz=eye ; gözüm= my eye
To sum it up :
a/ı > ı
e/i > i
ö/ü > ü
o/u > u
The ending MY belongs to the endings that work with the –i type vowel harmony. (where you can choose between i, ı, u and ü).
(We’ll see later –e type vowel harmony (easier), where you can choose between e and a).
Is all that clear enough ???
Exercise : follow the examples by adding the correct ending meaning MY:
Eş (spouse) = eşim (my spouse)
Pencere(window) = pencerem
Ev (house) =
Aşk (love) =
Dost (friend) =
Nişanlı (fiancé) =
Kardeş (brother) =
Öğretmen (teacher) =
Öğrenci (student) =
Kuş (bird) =
Çöp (small piece of wood) =
Duvar (wall) =
Hayat (life) =
Söz (word) =
iş (work) =
krem (creme)=
lokma (mouthful) =
düğün (wedding) =
pantolon (trousers)=
ceket (jacket)=
diş (tooth) =
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