The Ablative -DAn: From / Out Of / Than | Turkish Grammar

The ablative is the third member of the spatial trio. It is the "from" case — the ending that marks the source a thing moves away from. Its partners are the dative -(y)A (motion toward) and the locative -DA (static at). But the ablative reaches further than "from": it also expresses what something is made of, why something happened, some of a group, and — the use that ambushes every English speaker — the standard of comparison, the "than" in "taller than you."

The form: -DAn

The ablative is written -DAn. Like the locative, it carries a capital D (consonant alternating d / t) and a capital A (vowel e / a), plus a fixed final n. That gives four surface shapes: -den, -dan, -ten, -tan.

The vowel follows two-way harmony: e after a front stem, a after a back stem. The consonant follows hardening: d after a vowel or voiced consonant, t after one of the eight voiceless consonants f, s, t, k, ç, ş, h, p (mnemonic: fıstıkçı şahap).

Stem ends in…	Last vowel	Suffix	Example
voiced sound	front	-den	ev → evden (from home)
voiced sound	back	-dan	okul → okuldan (from school)
voiceless (p)	back	-tan	kitap → kitaptan (from the book)
voiceless (ç)	back	-tan	ağaç → ağaçtan (from the tree)

Sabah evden çıktığımda hava çok soğuktu.

When I left home this morning, it was very cold.

Ağaçtan bir elma düştü, neredeyse kafama geliyordu.

An apple fell from the tree, it nearly hit my head.

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The ablative is the locative's twin: same d/t hardening, same e/a harmony, just a final -n on the end. If you can build kitapta, you can build kitaptan — add the n.

Use 1: source and origin — "from / out of / off"

The core meaning is motion away from a starting point. Verbs of leaving, exiting, coming, getting off, taking out, and being afraid all point back to a source marked with the ablative.

Bu tren Ankara'dan geliyor, biraz rötarlı.

This train is coming from Ankara, it's a bit delayed.

Bir sonraki durakta otobüsten ineceğim.

I'm getting off the bus at the next stop.

Cüzdanımı cebimden çıkardım ama param yoktu.

I took my wallet out of my pocket, but I had no money.

Origin in the sense of where someone is from also uses the ablative: Nerelisin? "Where are you from?" is answered with an ablative-derived adjective, but the plain "I came from Izmir" is İzmir'den geldim. Proper nouns take an apostrophe: Ankara'dan, İzmir'den.

Use 2: material and cause — "made of / because of"

The ablative also answers "out of what?" in two senses: the physical material a thing is made from, and the reason something happens. The logic is the same in both — the result originates from the material or the cause, so it flows "out of" it.

Bu masa tamamen meşeden yapılmış, çok ağır.

This table is made entirely of oak, it's very heavy.

Korkudan yerimden kıpırdayamadım.

I couldn't move from where I stood out of fear. (literally 'from fear')

Yorgunluktan gözlerim kapanıyor.

My eyes are closing from tiredness.

This "cause" ablative is extremely common in everyday speech: soğuktan (from the cold), mutluluktan (out of happiness), açlıktan (from hunger). Whenever English says "out of [an emotion]" or "from [a cause]," reach for the ablative.

Use 3: the partitive — "some of / one of"

To say "some of" or "one of" a larger set, the set goes in the ablative. The image is the same: you take a portion out of a whole.

Bu kurabiyelerden biraz alabilir miyim?

Can I have some of these cookies?

Arkadaşlarımdan biri yarın taşınıyor.

One of my friends is moving tomorrow.

Here kurabiyelerden "from the cookies" and arkadaşlarımdan "from my friends" carry the ablative precisely because you are pulling a part out of the whole group.

Use 4: the standard of comparison — "than"

This is the use no English speaker anticipates, and it is the headline insight of the page. Turkish has no word for "than." To say "X is bigger than Y," you put Y in the ablative and follow it with the adjective. So "taller than you" is literally "you-from tall" — senden uzun. The comparison flows out of the standard, exactly like a source.

Kardeşim benden iki yaş büyük.

My sibling is two years older than me. (literally 'from-me older')

Bu kahve diğerinden çok daha güçlü.

This coffee is much stronger than the other one.

Türkçe öğrenmek sandığımdan kolaymış.

Learning Turkish turned out to be easier than I'd thought.

You can add daha "more" for emphasis (benden daha büyük "even older than me"), but it is optional — the ablative alone already builds the comparison. See comparison with daha for the full pattern. The thing to unlearn is the search for a "than" word: there is none. The ablative is the "than."

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To compare, mark the thing you compare against with the ablative — there is no word for "than." Benden uzun = "taller than me," literally "from-me tall." If you find yourself hunting for a word meaning "than," stop: the case is doing that job.

The comparison ablative explains why the pronoun ablatives are worth drilling: benden (than/from me), senden (than you), ondan (than him), bizden (than us), sizden (than you-pl), onlardan (than them). They appear constantly in everyday comparisons.

Common mistakes

❌ Bu çanta o çanta daha pahalı.

Incorrect — there is no word for 'than'; the standard (o çanta) must take the ablative: o çantadan.

✅ Bu çanta o çantadan daha pahalı.

This bag is more expensive than that one.

❌ Sen daha uzun ben.

Incorrect — the standard of comparison must take the ablative: benden.

✅ Sen benden daha uzunsun.

You're taller than me.

❌ Ağaçdan bir yaprak düştü.

Incorrect — ağaç ends in voiceless ç, so the d hardens to t: ağaçtan.

✅ Ağaçtan bir yaprak düştü.

A leaf fell from the tree.

❌ Korkuda bağırdım.

Incorrect — 'out of fear' is a cause, which takes the ablative, not the locative: korkudan.

✅ Korkudan bağırdım.

I screamed out of fear.

The two errors to watch are (1) hunting for a "than" word in comparisons — there isn't one, the ablative does it — and (2) forgetting the d→t hardening on voiceless stems (kitaptan, ağaçtan, uçaktan, never kitapdan).

Key takeaways

The ablative -DAn has four shapes — -den, -dan, -ten, -tan — by harmony and hardening: evden, okuldan, kitaptan, ağaçtan.
It marks source/origin (Ankara'dan geldim), material/cause (meşeden yapıldı, korkudan), and the partitive (kurabiyelerden biraz).
It is the comparison case: "than X" is just X-ablative, e.g. benden büyük = "older than me." There is no word for "than."
Hardening to t happens after voiceless f s t k ç ş h p; never write kitapdan.
Pronoun ablatives: benden, senden, ondan, bizden, sizden, onlardan. See the full set of ablative uses.

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