Turkish: A Comprehensive Grammar

discussion of assumptions (modalized statements) in 21.4.1.4. For modal adverbs used in
questions see 19.5.
(ii) Adverbials indicating the speaker’s attitude towards the situation described by a
statement:
inşallah ‘God willing’, ‘hopefully’, ‘I hope’
umarım ‘I hope’
Adverbial constructions 195
Allahtan/bereket versin ‘fortunately’
çok şükür ‘thank goodness’, ‘fortunately’
iyi ki ‘it’s good (that…)’, ‘thank goodness’
maalesef/ne yazık ki ‘unfortunately’
tabii (ki)/doğal olarak ‘of course’, ‘naturally’
(33) Ambülans çabuk geldi çok şükür.
‘Fortunately the ambulance came quickly.’
(iii) Politeness strategies:
This type of modal adverbial is used in order to mitigate the chance of a remark
causing offence.
doğrusu/doğrusunu isterseniz, ‘to be honest’, ‘to tell you the truth’
affedersiniz ‘if you’ll pardon the expression’
deyim yerindeyse ‘if the expression is acceptable’,
‘if I can put it that way’
(34) Doğrusunu isterseniz ben hiçbir zaman Osman’ı o mevkiye layık
görmemiştim.
‘To be honest, I had never regarded Osman as worthy of that office.’
(iv) The modal adverb meğer(se):
meğer (or meğerse) can be added to a sentence evidentially marked by -mIş or -(y)mIş
in order to indicate that the statement expresses a revision of the speaker’s earlier belief
about a situation in the light of new information, new observation or new experience. The
nearest English equivalent is usually ‘it turns/turned out that…’.
(35) Anahtar palto-m-un ceb-in-de-ymiş
key coat-1SG.POSS-GEN pocket-3SG.POSS-LOC-EV.COP meğerse.
it.turns.out
‘It turned out that the key was in the pocket of my coat.’
16.4 CIRCUMSTANTIAL ADVERBIALS
In comparison with the class of modal adverbials, which consists of a limited range of
expressions, the class of circumstantial adverbials is open. In addition to an inventory of