You will link two nouns, the owner and the thing owned, so that you can say whose bag, house or key something is.
The idea
A noun owner takes the genitive and the thing owned takes a possessive ending: Ali'nin evi (Ali's house), kapının anahtarı (the key to the door). The genitive is -in, -ın, -un or -ün after a consonant and -nin, -nın, -nun or -nün after a vowel; the ending on the owned noun is -i after a consonant and -si after a vowel, again following harmony. Many nouns soften before a vowel: kitap becomes kitabın, çocuk becomes çocuğun, kapak becomes kapağı. A pronoun owner may be dropped (sınıfımız), but a named owner stays. If the owned noun already carries a possessive ending, the genitive is the -nin type: kedisinin.
| Last vowel | Genitive | Example |
|---|---|---|
| a, ı | -ın / -nın | kızın / kapının |
| e, i | -in / -nin | evin / kedinin |
| o, u | -un / -nun | okulun / kutunun |
| ö, ü | -ün / -nün | gözün / ütünün |
Examples
- Öğretmenin çantası masada.The teacher's bag is on the table.
- Kapının anahtarı nerede?Where is the key to the door?
- Annemin arkadaşı bugün geliyor.My mother's friend is coming today.
- Ali'nin bahçesi çok büyük.Ali's garden is very big.
- Şehrin merkezi kalabalık.The city centre is crowded.
- Çocuğun montu sandalyede.The child's coat is on the chair.
- Defterin kapağı eski.The cover of the notebook is old.
- Bizim sınıfımız küçük.Our classroom is small.
- arabamınof my cararabam-im / -ım / -um / -üm / -m: myın-in / -ın / -un / -ün: of, ’s (the genitive)
- kedisininof his or her catkedisi-i / -si: his, her, itsnin-in / -ın / -un / -ün: of, ’s (the genitive)
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Watch out
Do not mark only the owner: Ali'nin ev is wrong, Turkish needs Ali'nin evi. English 's marks one word, so learners leave the ending off the owned noun. Marking only the owned noun, as in Ali evi, does not say that Ali owns it either.
Try it yourself
Put kapı (door) in the genitive: Where is the key to the door?
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kapının
kapının: kapı ends in the vowel ı, so the genitive takes the buffer n and becomes -nın, with a back vowel.
Put çocuk (child) in the genitive: The child's coat is on the chair.
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çocuğun
çocuğun: çocuk ends in k, which softens to ğ before a vowel, and the last vowel u gives -un.
Add the ending for the owned thing to araba (car): Ali's car is red.
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arabası
arabası: araba ends in a vowel, so the owned noun takes -sı (last vowel a gives ı), and the owner Ali'nin is already marked.
Add the ending for the owned thing to kapak (cover): The cover of the notebook is blue.
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kapağı
kapağı: the owned noun is marked even though defterin already is; kapak softens k to ğ and takes -ı after a.
Practice round
Answer questions, then rebuild Turkish sentences and words where available. We keep your score.
Put kapı (door) in the genitive: Where is the key to the door?
Put çocuk (child) in the genitive: The child's coat is on the chair.
Add the ending for the owned thing to araba (car): Ali's car is red.
Add the ending for the owned thing to kapak (cover): The cover of the notebook is blue.
Tap the words in the right order.
Tap the words in the right order.
Tap the words in the right order.
Tap the parts in order to build this word: of my car
Tap the parts in order to build this word: of his or her cat
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Write four sentences about things that belong to people you know, such as a friend's bag or the teacher's key. Underline the genitive and the possessive ending in each one.