Turkish Passive Voice (Mood) in Past

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Watch this lesson to learn the Turkish Passive Voice in the Past Tense. Be sure to download the Course PDF and follow along with all the lessons.

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Positive – Past Simple

For the second part of the Passive Voice topic, let’s learn how to make Passive Voice sentences in the Past Simple tense. Just like with other tenses, we add the passive voice suffix to the ending of the verb root followed by the past simple suffix.

Be sure to follow the below chart and Vowel Harmony when adding the Passive Voice suffix:

After consonants “b,c,ç,d,f,g,ğ,h,j,k, l,m,n,p,r,s,ş,t,v,y,z”	“-il/-ıl/-ul/-ül”
After vowels “a,ı,o,u,e,i,ö,ü”	“-n”
After the consonant “l”	“-in/-ın/-un/-ün”

Let’s first see how Passive Voice words are made in the Past Simple tense:

Bitirdi Finished	Bitirildi Was Finished
Pişirdi Cooked	Pişirildi Was Cooked
Anlattı Told	Anlatıldı Was Told
Buldu Found	Bulundu Was Found
Oynadı Played	Oynatıldı Was Played
Bildi Knew	Bilindi Was Known
Çaldı Stole	Çalındı Was Stolen

Next, let’s see some sentence examples:

• Cep telefonu faturamı babam ödedi.
• My father payed my cell phone bill.

• Cep telefonu faturam (babam tarafından) ödendi.
• My cell phone bill was payed (by my father).

• Paketinizi az önce kurye teslim etti.
• The courier delivered your package just now.

• Paketiniz (kurye tarafından) teslim edildi.
• Your package was delivered (by the courier).

• Polis mücevher hırsızını yakaladı.
• The police caught the jewelry thief.

• Mücevher hırsızı (polis tarafından) yakalandı.
• The jewelry thief was caught (by the police).

As you can see from the example sentences, the “agent” that does in action in the second example is expressed with a postposition “tarafından” which means “by” in English. Look at the personal pronouns in passive voice below:

Benim	tarafımdan	by me
Senin	tarafından	by you
Onun	tarafından	by he/she/it
Bizim	tarafımızdan	by us
Sizin	tarafınızdan	by you
Onların	tarafından	by them

Negations – Past Simple

If you want to make negative passive voice sentences for the past simple tense, you add the “medi/madı” negative past simple suffix instead of the positive one:

• Bu kitabı kimse satın almadı.
• No one bought this book.

• Bu kitap satın alınmadı.
• This book wasn’t bought.

• Polis kazazedeleri kurtaramadı.
• Police couldn’t save the disaster victims.

• Kazazedeler (polis tarafından) kurtarılamadı.
• The disaster victims couldn’t be saved (by the police).

• ÖSS, üniversite sınavı sonuçlarını henüz açıklamadı.
• The ÖSS hasn’t announced the university exam results yet.

• Üniversite sınavı sonuçları henüz açıklanmadı.
• The university exam results haven’t been announced yet.

Most of the time, Passive Voice sentences in the past simple tense can be translated into the Present Perfect tense in English. We can also include Modal Verbs like “can/could” like in the second sentence by adding the “can” suffix “-a/-e” after the Passive Voice suffix. This can also be done for other tenses too.

Questions – Past Simple

Making passive voice questions for the past simple tense is the same as other tenses. We use the question particle “-mi/-mı/-mu/-mü” after the passive voice suffix to make passive voice questions for the past simple tense:

• Elektrik faturası ödendi mi?
• Was the electricity bill paid?

• Evet, babam tarafından ödendi.
• Yes, it was paid by my father.

• Haberlerdeki hırsız tutuklanmadı mı?
• Wasn’t the thief on TV arrested?

• Hayır, henüz tutuklanmadı.
• No, he wasn’t arrested yet.

• Uzay’da yeni bir gezegen keşfedildi mi?
• Was a new planet discovered in space?

• Evet, yüzlerce yeni gezegen keşfedildi.
• Yes, hundreds of new planets were discovered.

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