Eskiden bu ev çok küçüktü.

This house was very small in the past.

Breakdown of Eskiden bu ev çok küçüktü.

• olmak: to be
• çok: very
• bu: this
• ev: the house
• küçük: small
• eskiden: in the past

Questions & Answers about Eskiden bu ev çok küçüktü.

What does eskiden mean, and how does it differ from eski?

• eski is an adjective meaning old (e.g. eski ev = “old house”).
• eskiden is an adverb meaning formerly, in the past (e.g. Eskiden bu ev küçüktü = “This house used to be small”).
• You can’t swap them: eski describes age, eskiden sets a past time frame.

How do we form the past-tense of the adjective küçük to get küçüktü?

• In Turkish, adjectives don’t take a separate “to be” verb in simple tenses. Instead, you attach a past-tense copula suffix -(y)dı to the adjective.
• küçük (small) + -tı/ti/tu/tü (past tense) = küçüktü (was small).
• Because küçük ends in a consonant, you drop the y of -(y)dı and use -tı/ti/tu/tü directly.

Why is the suffix -tü used in küçüktü, and not -dı, -di, or -du?

Turkish past-tense suffix -(y)dı has four forms: -dı, -di, -du, -dü. Two rules decide which form you use:

1. Vowel harmony (front vs. back, rounded vs. unrounded): küçük has ü, a front rounded vowel ⇒ choose -dü.
2. Consonant assimilation: since küçük ends in a voiceless consonant (k), the d in -dü voices to t, giving -tü.
   Result: küçüktü.

Where is the English verb “was” in this Turkish sentence?

There is no separate word for “was.” Turkish uses a copula embedded in the adjective via the past-tense suffix. So küçüktü literally means “small-was.”

Why does çok (“very/much”) come before küçüktü?

çok is an adverb modifying the adjective küçük. In Turkish, adverbs normally precede the word they modify, so you get çok küçüktü (“was very small”), not küçüktü çok.

Can I change the word order of eskiden, bu ev, and çok?

Turkish is fairly flexible, thanks to case endings and context, but some orders sound more natural:

• Default: Eskiden bu ev çok küçüktü.
• Also common: Bu ev eskiden çok küçüktü.
• Possible but stylistically marked: Bu ev çok küçüktü eskiden.
  Keep çok right before küçüktü, and put bu ev before the verb for clarity.

How do I turn this into a question: “Was this house very small in the past?”

Add the question particle -mü right after the verb (harmonized):
Eskiden bu ev çok küçüktü mü?
This literally says “In the past this house was very small—question?”

What’s the difference between eskiden, önceden, and daha önce?

• eskiden = “in former times,” general past state (often distant past).
• önceden = “beforehand,” “previously,” more tied to another reference point or event.
• daha önce = “earlier,” “prior to now,” often in spoken corrections (“I’ve seen it before”).
  They overlap but carry slightly different nuances of time and emphasis.