Breakdown of Sular sokakta birikmekle kalmayıp dükkânlara girdi.
su
water
sokak
street
kalmak
to stay / to be left / to remain (in a state)
girmek
to enter
dükkân
shop
birikmek
to accumulate (intransitive)
Questions & Answers about Sular sokakta birikmekle kalmayıp dükkânlara girdi.
How does birikmekle kalmayıp translate to "didn't just accumulate"?
This is a formal structure that means "not only... but also...". It is formed by combining the infinitive verb birikmek (to accumulate) with the instrumental ending -le (with), followed by kalmayıp (not staying/remaining). Literally, it translates to "not remaining with accumulating." It is used to show that a situation didn't just stop at one action, but escalated to another.
Why is sular plural when the English translation says "The water"?
In Turkish, uncountable nouns like water (su) are often pluralized to describe a massive, overwhelming quantity, such as floodwaters or heavy rain runoff. While English naturally translates this as the singular "the water," using sular emphasizes the large volume of water in the streets.
Why is dükkânlara in the dative case rather than the locative?
The verb girmek (to enter) requires the dative case (-a/-e) because it focuses on the direction of motion towards a destination. Even though in English we might think of the water being "in" the shops, Turkish grammar treats entering as a movement "to" the shops (dükkânlara).
How do we know the first action happened in the past if birikmekle kalmayıp has no tense ending?
The -(y)ıp suffix is a linking converb (meaning "and") that does not carry its own tense or person. Instead, it acts like a bridge and borrows the tense from the main verb at the end of the sentence. Because girdi (entered) is in the past tense, we automatically know that the accumulating also happened in the past.
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