Ottoman Turkish

Ottoman Turkish was the standardized register of the Turkish language in the Ottoman Empire. It borrowed extensively, in all aspects, from Persian and Arabic. It was written in the Ottoman Turkish alphabet. Ottoman Turkish was largely unintelligible to rural Turks, who continued to use kaba Türkçe, which used far fewer foreign loanwords and is the basis of the modern standard. The Tanzimât era saw the application of the term "Ottoman" when referring to the language ; Modern Turkish uses the same terms when referring to the language of that era. More generically, the Turkish language was called تركجه or تركی "Turkish".

History

Historically, Ottoman Turkish was transformed in three eras:

اسكی عثمانلی توركچه‌سی : the version of Ottoman Turkish used until the 16th century. It was almost identical with the Turkish used by Seljuk empire and Anatolian beyliks and was often regarded as part of اسكی آناطولی توركچه‌سی.
اورتا عثمانلی توركچه‌سی or : the language of poetry and administration from the 16th century until Tanzimat.
یڭی عثمانلی توركچه‌سی : the version shaped from the 1850s to the 20th century under the influence of journalism and Western-oriented literature.
Language reform

In 1928, following the fall of the Ottoman Empire after World War I and the establishment of the Republic of Turkey, widespread language reforms instituted by Mustafa Kemal Atatürk saw the replacement of many Persian and Arabic origin loanwords in the language with their Turkish equivalents. One of the main supporters of the reform was the Turkish nationalist Ziya Gökalp. It also saw the replacement of the Perso-Arabic script with the extended Latin alphabet. The changes were meant to encourage the growth of a new variety of written Turkish that more closely reflected the spoken vernacular and to foster a new variety of spoken Turkish that reinforced Turkey's new national identity as being a post-Ottoman state.
See the list of replaced loanwords in Turkish for more examples of Ottoman Turkish words and their modern Turkish counterparts. Two examples of Arabic and two of Persian loanwords are found below.

English	Ottoman	Modern Turkish
obligatory	واجب	zorunlu
hardship	مشكل	güçlük
city	شهر	kent
province	ولایت	il
war	حرب	savaş

Legacy

Historically speaking, Ottoman Turkish is the predecessor of modern Turkish. However, the standard Turkish of today is essentially Türkiye Türkçesi as written in the Latin alphabet and with an abundance of neologisms added, which means there are now far fewer loan words from other languages, and Ottoman Turkish was not instantly transformed into the Turkish of today. At first, it was only the script that was changed, and while some households continued to use the Arabic system in private, most of the Turkish population was illiterate at the time, making the switch to the Latin alphabet much easier. Then, loan words were taken out, and new words fitting the growing amount of technology were introduced. Until the 1960s, Ottoman Turkish was at least partially intelligible with the Turkish of that day. One major difference between Ottoman Turkish and modern Turkish is the latter's abandonment of compound word formation according to Arabic and Persian grammar rules. The usage of such phrases still exists in modern Turkish but only to a very limited extent and usually in specialist contexts; for example, the Persian-derived genitive construction تقدیر الهی is used, as opposed to the normative modern Turkish construction, ilâhî takdîr.
In 2014, Turkey's Education Council decided that Ottoman Turkish should be taught in Islamic high schools and as an elective in other schools, a decision backed by President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, who said the language should be taught in schools so younger generations do not lose touch with their cultural heritage.

Writing system

Most Ottoman Turkish was written in the Ottoman Turkish alphabet, a variant of the Perso-Arabic script. The Armenian, Greek and Rashi script of Hebrew were sometimes used by Armenians, Greeks and Jews.

Grammar

The actual grammar of Ottoman Turkish is not different from the grammar of modern Turkish. The focus of this section is on the Ottoman orthography; the conventions surrounding how the orthography interacted and dealt with grammatical morphemes related to conjugations, cases, pronouns, etc.

Cases

Nominative and Indefinite accusative/objective: -∅, no suffix. گول göl 'the lake' 'a lake', چوربا 'soup', گیجه 'night'; طاوشان گترمش 'he/she brought a rabbit'.
Genitive: suffix ڭ/نڭ. پاشانڭ 'of the pasha'; كتابڭ 'of the book'.
Definite accusative: suffix ی : طاوشانی گترمش 'he/she brought the rabbit'. The variant suffix does not occur in Ottoman Turkish orthography, although it's pronounced with the vowel harmony. Thus, گولی 'the lake' vs. Modern Turkish gölü.
Dative: suffix ه : اوه 'to the house'.
Locative: suffix ده : مكتبده 'at school', قفسده 'in cage', باشده 'at a/the start', شهرده 'in town'. The variant suffix used in Modern Turkish does not occur.
Ablative: suffix دن : ادمدن 'from the man'.
Instrumental: suffix or postposition ایله. Generally not counted as a grammatical case in modern grammars.

The table below lists nouns with a variety of phonological features that come into play when taking case suffixes; it includes a typical singular and plural noun, containing back and front vowels, words that end with the letter ـه , words that end in a ـت sound, and words that end in either ـق or ـك. These words are to serve as references, to observe orthographic conventions:

Which vowels are written using the 4 letters: Aleph ا, Waw و, He ه, and Yodh ی, and which are not.
When words or morphemes are connected to each other, and when they are separated with the use of Zero-width non-joiner.
When a final letter is softened when followed by a vowel sound, and when not; both in Ottoman orthography and in modern Latin orthography.
When harmony of vowel roundness exists in spoken pronunciation and modern Latin orthography, but not in Ottoman orthography.
When the letters ڭ and ن are used.
Possessives

Table below shows the suffixes for creating possessed nouns. Each of these possessed nouns, in turn, take case suffixes as shown above.
For third person possessed nouns, that end in a vowel, when it comes to taking case suffixes, a letter ـنـ comes after the possessive suffix. For singular endings, the final vowel ـی is removed in all instances. For plural endings, if the letter succeeding the additional ـنـ is a vowel, the final vowel ـی is kept; otherwise it is removed.

	Nom	Acc	Dat	Loc	Abl	Gen
his/her book	كتابی	كتابنی	كتابنه	كتابنده	كتابندن	كتابنڭ
his/her book	kitabı	kitabını	kitabına	kitabında	kitabından	kitabının
his/her books	كتابلری	كتابلرینی	كتابلرینه	كتابلرنده	كتابلرندن	كتابلرینڭ
his/her books	kitapları	kitaplarını	kitaplarına	kitaplarında	kitaplarından	kitaplarının
his/her maternal aunt	تیزه‌سی	تیزه‌‌سنی	تیزه‌‌سنه	تیزه‌‌سنده	تیزه‌‌سندن	تیزه‌‌سنڭ
his/her maternal aunt	teyzesi	teyzesini	teyzesine	teyzesinde	teyzesinden	teyzesinin
his/her maternal aunts	تیزه‌لری	تیزه‌لرینی	تیزه‌لرینه	تیزه‌لرنده	تیزه‌لرندن	تیزه‌لرینڭ
his/her maternal aunts	teyzeleri	teyzelerini	teyzelerine	teyzelerinde	teyzelerinden	teyzelerinin

Verbs

Below table shows the positive conjugation for two sample verbs آچمق açmak and سولمك sevilmek. The first verb is the active verb, and the other has been modified to form a passive verb. The first contains back vowels, the second front vowels; both containing non-rounded vowels.

Negation and complex verbs

Below table shows the conjugation of a negative verb, and a positive complex verb expressing ability. In Turkish, complex verbs can be constructed by adding a variety of suffixes to the base root of a verb. The two verbs are یازممق yazmamaq and سوه‌بلمك sevebilmek.

Compound verbs

Another common category of verbs in Turkish, is compound verbs. This consists of adding a Persian or Arabic active or passive participle to a neuter verb, to do or to become. For example, note the following two verbs:

راضی اولمق razı olmaq ;
قتل ایتمك katletmek ; تشكر ایتمك teşekkür etmek ;
ایو اولنمق iyi olunmak.

Below table shows some sample conjugations of these two verbs. The conjugation of the verb "etmek" is not straightforward, because the root of the verb ends in a . This sound transforms into a when followed by a vowel sound. This is reflected in conventions of Ottoman orthography as well.

'to be' and 'not to be' Verbs

In Turkish, there is a verb representing to be, but it is a defective verb. It does not have an infinitive or several other tenses. It is usually a suffix.
Negative verb to be is created with the use of the word دگل değil, followed by the appropriate conjugation of the to be verb; or optionally used as a standalone for 3rd person.

بن ایشجی دگلم / ben işçi değilim: 'I am not a worker'
او چفتجی دگلدر / o çiftçi değildir: 'he is not a farmer'
او چفتجی دگل / o çiftçi değil: 'he is not a farmer'
اگر كندم ایچون حاضر دگلسیدم / eğer kendim için hazır değilseydim.: 'if I'm not ready for myself'