Breakdown of Martılar göl kenarındaki kayalıklardan havalanıyor.
-dan
from
-daki
on
kenar
the edge
göl
the lake
Questions & Answers about Martılar göl kenarındaki kayalıklardan havalanıyor.
What does the suffix -daki in göl kenarındaki mean and how is it formed?
The -daki ending is a combination of the locative case suffix -de (meaning “at/in/on”) plus the relative-adjective suffix -ki (meaning “which is”). When you attach -de + ki to göl kenarı (“lakeside”), you get göl kenarındaki, literally “that which is at the lakeside.” It turns göl kenarı into a descriptor for whatever follows.
Why isn’t göl in the genitive case (i.e. gölün kenarı) before adding -daki?
Göl kenarı can function as a compound noun (“lakeside”) without any genitive or possessive markers. In compounds like this, Turkish often drops the genitive suffix -ün/-ın and the possessive -ı/-i. Once you have the compound göl kenarı, you treat it as one unit and then add -daki to kenar directly.
I see an n before -daki: why is it kenarındaki rather than kenar'daki or kenarıdaki?
In Turkish, when a noun ends in a vowel (here kenarı), and you attach suffixes that start with a vowel (here ki), you insert a buffer consonant n to avoid a vowel clash. So kenarı + ki becomes kenarı + n + daki → kenarındaki.
What case is -lardan in kayalıklardan, and what is its role here?