Where mI Attaches Across Tenses

Most courses present Turkish yes/no questions as a set of memorized tables: one shape for -yor, another for -DI, another for -mIş, and so on. That makes the system look arbitrary. It is not. A single principle governs every case, and once you hold it in your head you never need the tables again. This page states that principle, proves it against five tenses in one paradigm, and shows exactly why the surface forms vary.

The cross-tense paradigm

Here is the verb gelmek ("to come"), conjugated as a yes/no question in the 1st person singular ("am I / did I / will I...?") across five tenses. Read the bold parts: that is where the person ending lives.

Four of the five tenses put the person ending on mI (muyum, miyim). Only the past tense keeps it on the verb (geldim). That one split is the whole story.

The single principle

Here is the rule that replaces every table:

mI always follows the predicate. The personal ending docks on whichever element the tense's class allows — and it docks exactly once.

Turkish personal endings come in two classes (laid out on personal endings overview):

• Type 1 endings (-Im, -sIn, -Iz, -sInIz...) are mobile clitics. They can sit on the verb or hop onto another host. The continuous, aorist, future, and evidential all use Type 1 endings — so when mI is inserted, the ending is free to climb onto mI. Because mI now sits between the verb and the ending, and mI ends in a vowel, a buffer y appears: mI + (y) + Im → miyim, mI + (y) + Iz → miyiz, and after the u of muyum it rounds to muyum / muyuz.

• Type 2 endings (-m, -n, -k, -nIz...) are bound: they are fused to the -DI past and the -sA conditional and cannot leave the verb. So with these two tenses the person stays put (geldim), and mI has no choice but to follow the already-complete verb.

That is the entire mechanism. The variation you see is not arbitrary; it is a direct consequence of which ending-class the tense selects.

Watching the ending move

It helps to see the person ending physically relocate. Take geliyorsun "you are coming". To question it:

1. The predicate is geliyor; mI must follow it → geliyor mı...
2. The Type 1 ending -sIn is mobile, so it climbs onto mI → geliyor mı-sın.
3. mI harmonizes to the o of -yor → musun.

Result: Geliyor musun? The verb is left person-less; mI carries the person. Now the same verb in the past, geldin "you came":

1. The predicate is geldin, and the -n is a bound Type 2 ending fused to -DI — it cannot move.
2. So mI simply follows the complete verb → geldin mi?

The contrast Geliyor musun? vs Geldin mi? is not two rules. It is one rule meeting two ending-classes.

The full second-person and plural shapes

For reference, here is gelmek as a question in the four "mobile-ending" tenses, across persons, so you can see the mI + person fusion in every cell:

The 3rd person singular (o) has no ending, so mI stands alone (gelir mi?). The 3rd plural keeps -lAr on the verb and mI follows (gelirler mi?). Everywhere else, the person ending is on mI.

The conditional joins the past

The conditional -sA behaves like the past: it takes bound Type 2 endings, so the person stays on the verb and mI follows. "Shall we go?" as a tentative suggestion is gitsek mi? — person on the verb (gitsek), mI trailing. This is the deliberative use of the conditional question, common for proposing things.

Harmony of mI to the preceding vowel

mI always harmonizes to the last vowel before it, which is the last vowel of the bare tense form: geliyor → mu (after o); gelir → mi (after i); gelecek → mi (after e); yapacak → mı (after a); okudun → mu (after u); gördün → mü (after ü). The person ending that follows then harmonizes to mI in turn.

Common mistakes

The continuous uses Type 1 endings; they climb onto mI. Strip -um from the verb and rebuild it as muyum.

The past uses Type 2 endings, which cannot leave the verb: geldim stays whole, mI follows.

mI appears once. The -yim inside miyim is the person ending fused to the single mI, not a second particle.

Once the person ending docks on mI, the two are written as one word (miyim), even though mI is separate from the verb.

The conditional patterns with the past: person stays on the verb (gitsek), mI follows bare.

Key takeaways

• One principle: mI follows the predicate; the person ending docks once, on whatever the tense's ending-class allows.
• -DI and -sA use bound (Type 2) endings → person stays on the verb, mI follows (geldim mi, gitsek mi).
• -(I)yor, -(I)r, -(y)AcAK, -mIş use mobile (Type 1) endings → person climbs onto mI (geliyor muyum, gelir misin, gelecek mi, gelmiş misiniz).
• A buffer y joins mI and a vowel-initial person ending: miyim, muyuz.
• mI harmonizes to the vowel directly before it, then the person ending harmonizes to mI.
• Mark the person exactly once — the most common error is geliyorum mu (person doubled/misplaced).