# Ottoman Turkish: Term of endearment for a little boy



## lyrwriter

Hello!

So I am well aware that the Turkish language has changed a great deal in the past 100 years (and acquired an entirely new alphabet) and that this may be a futile question to ask here. However, I am wondering if anyone happens to know some terms of endearment that might have been used for a little boy back during the Ottoman era, sometime around 1900. (Background: This is for a novel, and the characters are from a wealthy İstanbullu family.) A few specific questions:



In this era, would an older brother still address his little brother as _kardeş_? (Older brother is 12, little brother is 4.)
How might the parents address their sons?
How might a servant (a maid in charge of taking care of the boys, for example) address the 4-year-old?

Any help or insight is much appreciated.  Teşekkür ederiz!


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## tekgozlusoytari

1- Yep, probably "kardeş, kardeşim". I dont know anything else.
2 - "oğlum", "evladım" (also for girls), 

     "mahdum"  benim mahdumum. (benim oğlum) (this used for other people, for example a man give a knockdown to his son to people "mahdumum hasan")
3- I guess "küçük bey"


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## dilandlanguage

for daughter--- kerime

kardeş=birader
sister=hemşire


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## lyrwriter

Teşekkür ederiz! A couple follow-up questions, if you have the time:

*tekgozlusoytari*---Do you think a servant would _always _address the little boy as "küçük bey"? Or would s/he ever address him by his name? Or would s/he address him by his name with a title attached to it? (For instance: in an upper-class English household during this era, a little boy would be referred to---and addressed---as "Master [name]" or "Young Master [Name]". Thus, a little boy named George might be called "Young Master George".)

*dilandlanguage*---I just want to be sure I understand what you're saying: are you suggesting "birader" as a synonym for "kardeş"? Or are you saying that a speaker of Osmanlıca would say "birader" instead of "kardeş"?

Thank you again for the help!


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## dilandlanguage

they are synonym but    -birader (persian origin ,like brother in english)- would be better than -kardeş- in a wealthy family.


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## gkhnrsz

you can realize! brother - birader


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## Rallino

I'm just guessing here, but do you guys think that _*Aga*_ (with a hard g) was possibly used as a vocative?


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