Word
Efektleri gösterimden önce bitirebilirlerdi.
Meaning
They could have finished the effects before the screening.
Part of speech
sentence
Pronunciation
Course
Breakdown of Efektleri gösterimden önce bitirebilirlerdi.
önce
before / first / firstly
bitirmek
to finish (something)
gösterim
screening
efekt
special effect
Questions & Answers about Efektleri gösterimden önce bitirebilirlerdi.
How does bitirebilirlerdi break down to give the counterfactual meaning?
The stem bitir- (finish) takes the ability suffix -ebil. Then we add the aorist -ir and the past tense -di. Combining the ability suffix with the aorist past (-ebil + -irdi) creates the counterfactual past ability, meaning someone 'could have' done something, but didn't.
Why is the plural marker -ler placed before -di in bitirebilirlerdi?
In compound verbs (verbs with two tense or aspect markers), the plural suffix can go either after the first tense marker (-ir-ler-di) or at the very end (-ir-di-ler). Both bitirebilirlerdi and bitirebilirdiler are perfectly correct, but placing -ler before the final past suffix is much more common in everyday Turkish.
Why is the ablative case used in gösterimden?
Because of the word önce (before). When used as a postposition to mean 'before [a noun]', önce always requires that preceding noun to take the ablative case (-den/-dan).
Why does efektleri have the accusative suffix -i at the end?