A1 · Alphabet and pronunciation · about 6 minutes
Four-way vowel harmony: i, ı, ü or u
endings with four forms
Many endings have four forms, and the last vowel picks one of them.
Do you know this already?
“New to me”: the explanation first, then practice. “Test myself”: 3 short questions – get at least two right and you go straight to the harder exercises.
Words you will need4
They appear in this topic’s examples and exercises and are new at this point on the learning path.
- doktordoctor
- sütmilk
- küçüksmall, little; younger
- uzakfar, distant
Understand
RememberFront or back, rounded or spread — the last vowel passes both on to the ending.
- Signal words
- mi
- mı
- mü
- mu
- -im
The form
The patterns at a glance
Each row first says when or what the pattern is used for, then gives an example in Turkish.
question marker
| after e, i: i | ev mi, evim, öğretmenim |
| after a, ı: ı | kız mı, kızım, Almanım |
| after ö, ü: ü | göz mü, gözüm, Türküm |
| after o, u: u | okul mu, okulum, doktorum |
The rules one by one
The form this topic is about
After e and i comes i.
Bu senin evin mi?Is this your house?
After a and ı comes ı.
Bu çay mı?Is this tea?
After ö and ü comes ü.
Ben Türküm.I am Turkish.
After o and u comes u.
Bu okul mu?Is this the school?
Example sentences
Ben doktorum.I am a doctor.
Sen Alman mısın?Are you German?
Bu süt mü?Is this milk?
6 more example sentences
Evim küçük ama güzel.My house is small but nice.
Kızım okulda.My daughter is at school.
Gözüm ağrıyor.My eye hurts.
Okulum çok yakın.My school is very close.
Kahve mi içiyorsun?Are you drinking coffee?
Biz öğrenciyiz.We are students.
The trap English speakers fall into
Watch out
Because you first learn mi in its basic form, it tends to stay as i. But the particle follows the word right before it — not the subject and not the whole sentence. In Hava soğuk mu? “Is it cold?” what counts is the u of soğuk.
Quick check
A warm-up: 2 questions, answered straight away. They do not count towards your progress.
Practise
8 exercises on this topic. Your answers are checked in the browser; none of them leaves your device.
Now write it yourself8 sentences on this topic, typed and checked instantly.
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Next on the path: 7 · Assimilation: -de or -teBack to the learning path
The full explanation
Read it all · about 1 min
Other endings have not two versions but four: with i, ı, ü or u (büyük ünlü uyumu, “great vowel harmony”). The question particle mi is the best-known example. Turkish asks a yes–no question not by changing the word order as in “Is this a house?”, but by adding mi after the word in question: ev mi, kız mı, göz mü, okul mu.
The rule has two steps. First, as with e and a: front or back? Then: rounded lips or spread? After e and i comes i, after a and ı comes ı, after ö and ü comes ü, after o and u comes u. Your lips do in the ending what they did on the last vowel.
This pattern is used by “my” (evim, kızım, gözüm, okulum), by “I am” (öğretmenim, doktorum), by the accusative, the genitive and the past in -di. In the exercise hints the ending is given with i; the last vowel tells you which of the four to write.
A closer look
Two questions to one vowel
Two-way harmony only asks: front or back? Four-way harmony also asks: rounded or spread? That is why it has four versions. If you are sure of the two-way kind, all you need to watch for the four-way kind is your lips: with ö, ü, o and u they are rounded, and then so is the ending.
Worth knowing2
Worth knowing
Compared with English
English changes the vowel inside a word in a few irregular cases: “foot – feet”, “man – men”, “sing – sang”. Turkish never changes the stem; it always changes the ending, and by a fixed rule.
Bu kitap mı, defter mi?Is this a book or an exercise book?
Worth knowing
Four pairs to remember
e and i give i, a and ı give ı, ö and ü give ü, o and u give u. If one vowel of a pair comes last in the word, the ending has the second one.
Evim, kızım, gözüm, okulum.My house, my daughter, my eye, my school.