Turkish: A Comprehensive Grammar

Turkish: A comprehensive grammar 416
fall-IMPF-P.COP
‘[When we came out of the plane] it was snowing.’
Virtually synonymous with the above two forms is -DIğI sırada ‘at the time (that…)’.
For the restricted use of future-tense marking in temporal converbs see 26.2.3 (iv).
(iii) -(y)ken ‘while’, ‘as’, ‘when’ is usually attached to the aorist suffix or to a subject
complement, although other tense/aspect markings are possible, as explained in 26.2.3
(ii) above. The combination -(A/I)rken, as also the combination of -(y)ken with a nonverbal
predicate, expresses a situation that is ongoing. The temporal relationship between
the two clauses may be of two kinds, according to whether the predicate of the
superordinate clause is perfective or imperfective:
(a) If the superordinate clause has a perfective predicate, it expresses an event
which takes place (and is completed) during the period of continuance of the
situation in the clause marked by -(y)ken:
(94) [Orman-da dolaş-ır-ken] bir tilki gör-dü-m.
forest-LOC walk.about-AOR-CV a fox see-PF-1SG
‘[While walking in the forest] I saw a fox.’
(95) Ahmet o kitabı [öğrenci-yken] oku-muş.
student- CV read-EV/PF
‘It seems Ahmet read that book [when he was a student].’
(b) If the superordinate clause has an imperfective predicate, it expresses a
situation which is ongoing during the period of continuance of the situation in the
clause marked by -(y)ken:
(96) [Sen ormanda onu ararken] Bahri burada-ydı.
here-P.COP
‘[While you were looking for him in the forest], Bahri was here.’
(97) [Adana’dayken] Şule ile sık sık görüş-ür-dü-k.
see.each.other-AOR-P.COP-1PL
‘[When (I was/we were) in Adana] I/we used to see Şule often.’
(iv) The juxtaposition of the positive and negative aorist stems of the same verb in the
converb -(A/I)r…-mAz gives the meaning ‘as soon as’:
(98) [Su kayna-r kayna-maz] altını kıs.
boil-AOR boil-NEG.AOR
‘[As soon as the water boils] turn down the heat (under it).’
-DIğI gibi (see 26.3.1, 26.3.8) also sometimes occurs in the temporal sense of ‘as soon
as’. Another near synonym is -DIğI anda ‘at the moment that’.
(v) The forms ↓-(y)AlI (beri) and -DIğIndAn beri ‘since’ are the equivalents of
postpositional phrases with beri ‘since’, discussed in 17.2.3, and the tense/aspect marking
of the superordinate clause (if finite) has the same pattern as described there.
(99) [Kocası ↓öl-eli (beri)/öl-düğ-ün-den beri] ablasının yanında
die-CV since/die-CV-3SG.POSS-ABL since
kal-ıyor.