Breakdown of Köpekleri bu mamayla besler misin?
bu
this
köpek
dog
ile
with / by / and (linking nouns)
mi
question particle (mı/mi/mu/mü)
mama
pet food
beslemek
to feed
Questions & Answers about Köpekleri bu mamayla besler misin?
Why do we use the aorist form besler misin here instead of the future tense for "Will you?"
In Turkish, polite requests are normally made using the aorist tense (the simple present tense) plus the question particle. While besler misin literally looks like "Do you feed?", it is the standard, polite way to ask "Would you feed?" or "Will you feed?" Using the future tense here would sound like you are just predicting the future rather than making a request.
Why does "this pet food" have the ending -yla (mamayla)?
The verb beslemek (to feed) is constructed differently in Turkish than in English. In Turkish, you feed someone or something with food. The food gets the "with" ending -la or -le (from the word ile). We are asking to feed the dogs with this pet food.
Where does the -y- come from in mamayla?
The word for pet food (or baby food) is mama. Because it ends in a vowel, we must add the buffer letter -y- before attaching the vowel-starting suffix -la (which comes from ile). This makes it smooth to pronounce as mamayla.
Why is there an -i at the end of köpekleri?
The dogs are the direct object receiving the action of being fed. Because you are talking about specific dogs ("the dogs") and not just dogs in general, you must add the specific direct object (accusative) case suffix -i to the plural word köpekler.
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