Heyelan tehlikeli.

A landslide is dangerous.

Breakdown of Heyelan tehlikeli.

• olmak: to be
• tehlikeli: dangerous
• heyelan: the landslide

Questions & Answers about Heyelan tehlikeli.

What does heyelan mean in English and what part of speech is it?

Heyelan is a noun meaning landslide.

Why is there no word for “is” in heyelan tehlikeli? Where’s the verb “to be”?

In Turkish, the present‐tense copula (equivalent to “is/are”) is usually omitted. A statement like heyelan tehlikeli literally reads “landslide dangerous,” but it means “the landslide is dangerous.”

What kind of word is tehlikeli, and how is it formed?

Tehlikeli is an adjective meaning dangerous. It comes from the noun tehlike (“danger”) plus the suffix -li, which turns a noun into an adjective meaning “having” or “full of” that noun.

Can I make the copula explicit in this sentence?

Yes. You can add the suffix -dir (more formal or written style) to the predicate adjective:
• heyelan tehlikelidir – “the landslide is dangerous.”
In everyday speech, though, you usually drop -dir: heyelan tehlikeli.

How do I turn heyelan tehlikeli into a question (“Is the landslide dangerous?”)?

Add the question particle mi right after the adjective (with the correct vowel for harmony, here mi):
• Heyelan tehlikeli mi?
The particle mi doesn’t change form further here because it follows a vowel-ending word.

Why isn’t there an indefinite article (“a/an”) before heyelan?

Turkish doesn’t have a direct equivalent of the English indefinite article a/an. A bare noun can be indefinite or generic. If you really want to stress “a,” you can use bir (“one”), but it’s not required:
• Bir heyelan tehlikeli would translate as “A landslide is dangerous,” but most speakers simply say heyelan tehlikeli.

What’s the word order in heyelan tehlikeli, and could I say tehlikeli heyelan instead?

As a full sentence, Turkish uses Subject + Predicate Adjective, so heyelan tehlikeli means “the landslide is dangerous.”
If you swap them (tehlikeli heyelan), you get an attributive adjective + noun phrase, i.e. “dangerous landslide,” not a complete sentence.

Why doesn’t heyelan have any case ending here?

In a nominal sentence (one without a verb) where the noun is the subject in the nominative case, Turkish uses no suffix. Unmarked means nominative.

Where is the word stress in heyelan tehlikeli?

Turkish generally stresses the last syllable of a word. So you pronounce it:
• heyelan → he-ye-LAN
• tehlikeli → teh-li-ke-LI