Word
Onun soyu nereye kadar gidiyor acaba?
Meaning
I wonder how far back his lineage goes?
Part of speech
sentence
Pronunciation
Course
Breakdown of Onun soyu nereye kadar gidiyor acaba?
o
that / he / she / it
gitmek
to go
nereye
where to
kadar
as ... as; until, up to
Questions & Answers about Onun soyu nereye kadar gidiyor acaba?
Why is acaba placed at the very end of the sentence here?
While acaba often appears at the beginning of a sentence, it is very common and natural in spoken Turkish to put it at the end. Placing it at the end gives it an afterthought feel, similar to saying 'How far back does his lineage go, I wonder?'.
There is no mi question particle here. Does acaba make it a question?
The sentence is a question because of the question word nereye (to where). Acaba doesn't create the question; it just softens it. If there were no question word like nereye, you would need the mi particle along with acaba.
Doesn't kadar usually mean 'until'? How does nereye kadar mean 'how far back'?
Kadar means 'until' or 'as far as'. Combined with nereye (to where), the phrase literally means 'as far as where' or 'up to where'. In English, when talking about history or a family tree, we say 'how far back', but Turkish uses the spatial metaphor 'up to where' (nereye kadar).
What is the base word for soyu?
The base word is soy, which means ancestry, lineage, or family line. The -u is the 3rd person possessive suffix, linking it to onun (his/her). Together, onun soyu means 'his lineage'.