Promiser, Promisee, pledged act, Theme · Turkish marking · working claim, revisable
söz vermek is the noun söz plus vermek. Türk Dil Kurumu, Güncel Türkçe Sözlük, files söz as isim. Sense 5 is Bir işi yapacağını kesin olarak vadetme, and the example is O, sözünde duran bir adamdır. The idiom söz vermek is bir işi yapacağını kesinlikle bildirmek. The printed line is Ahmet Muhip Dıranas, İşte biz bugün, seninle buluşmaya söz verdiğimiz yerdeyiz. söz in that line is bare. It has no accusative. Working claim: the noun fills the object slot of vermek. It is a light-verb frame, and the noun is not a second free object beside the pledged act.
The Promiser is nominative. A main-clause subject has no case suffix. Göksel & Kerslake 2005, §12.1.2, on the page after the header 115, as the owe page records it: the subject of a simple sentence or main clause is always non-case-marked. Dıranas prints biz. The relative is verdiğimiz. Neither wears a case suffix. The pronoun may be absent. The person is on the verb.
The pledged act of söz vermek, where the line fills it, is dative. Dıranas prints buluşmaya. That is -mA plus -(y)A. seninle is comitative, the partner of buluşmak. It is not the Promisee. No person in the dative stands in that line. The entry does not carry the government label -e. English promise to V is a to-infinitive, and English promise her a book puts the thing in a bare object. Here the act is dative because söz already sits in the object slot. Göksel & Kerslake 2025 contents title the oblique -mAyA at §24.4.1.3, p. 429, and -mA / -mAK at §8.5.1.2, p. 90. Those section bodies were not opened. The 2005 dative section, §14.3.3.3, is the page headed 158, as the owe page records it.
The Promisee, when a line fills a person, is dative -(y)A. It is not a bare object, and it is not accusative. Birsel Karakoç, TDD/JofEL 2013 Yaz/Summer, example (1a), prints Aynur kardeşine oyun oynamaya söz verdi, glossed “Aynur promised her sibling to play a game.” kardeşine is dative. oynamaya is the same -mAyA as buluşmaya. TDK does not print that person on söz vermek. vadetmek does carry -e. Sense 1, Bir işi yerine getireceğine söz vermek, prints Mehmet Akif Ersoy, Doğacaktır sana vadettiği günler Hakk'ın. sana is the Promisee. The 2025 contents title the dative marker at §14.3.3.3, p. 181. That section body was not opened.
-AcAğInA and -AcAğIm diye are the other content shapes the frame allows. They are unprinted on söz vermek in the entries opened. The definition bir işi yapacağını kesinlikle bildirmek uses yapacağını, future nominalization plus possessive plus accusative. That accusative belongs to bildirmek. It is not the case of the complement of söz vermek. TDK diye, sense 2, is the subordinator “diyerek” anlamıyla fiile bağlayan bir söz. The example is Faruk Nafiz Çamlıbel, Güneş yakmasın diye, a purpose line. It is not a pledge. Göksel & Kerslake 2025 contents title diye at §11.1.1.3, p. 111, and clauses formed with diye at §24.3.1, p. 421. Those bodies were not opened. Sana geleceğime söz verdim and Geleceğim diye söz verdim reuse the dative of sana, the -AcAK shape inside yapacağını, and the subordinator diye. They are constructed.
Control. Working claim, revisable. The dictionaries do not use the word. In the Dıranas line the ones who meet are biz, the ones who promised. seninle meets with them. It is not a Promisee who meets instead of them. Karakoç states the cut. In (1a) the understood subject of oyun oynamaya is Aynur, the matrix subject. The dative sibling does not play. Example (1b) is the same clothes with izin verdi: Aynur kardeşine oyun oynamaya izin verdi, “Aynur allowed her sibling to play a game.” There the sibling plays. Subject control and object control wear one dative and one -mAyA. The verb chooses. English I promised her to leave is the same subject-control cut, and on the English page that combined line is constructed.
vadetmek is the other pledge. TDK gives the headword as one word, etymology Arapça vaʿd + Türkçe etmek, aorist -der. The noun vaat stays two vowels, isim, Arapça vaʿd, Bir işi yerine getirmek için verilen söz, Nâzım Hikmet boş vaatleri. Cambridge Learner’s English–Turkish writes the gloss vaat etmek as two words, under the give-sense of promise. The dictionary verb on this page is the TDK spelling vadetmek. Göksel & Kerslake 2025 contents title nominal-verb compounds at §13.3.2, p. 164. The section body was not opened. The publisher preview that was opened shows et- and ol- fusing with a noun that ends in a geminate, hallet-, sabret-. It does not print vadetmek.
The Theme of vadetmek and the Promisee do not share one case. Sense 1 is labeled -e only. Ersoy’s günler is the head of the relative vadettiği, and it is the subject of doğacaktır. It is not an accusative object of vadetmek. The promiser inside the relative is Hakk. Sense 2 is labeled nsz., Davranışıyla, tutumuyla bir işi yapacağı duygusunu uyandırmak, umudunu vermek. The example does print an object and a dative: Mehmet Kaplan, İlmin tatbikatında başarılar sağlayışı insanoğluna pek çok şey vadediyor. pek çok şey is bare. insanoğluna is dative. The subject is başarılar sağlayışı, not a person who pledges. Göksel & Kerslake 2005 §14.3.3.2, as the owe page records it: the accusative marks the direct object, and some direct objects stay non-case-marked. The 2025 contents title that non-case-marked noun phrase at p. 178 and the accusative marker at p. 180. A specific accusative on vadetmek is unprinted. Bize ödülü vadetti reuses the dative of sana and the accusative pattern. Cambridge’s English line for this give-sense is They promised us a reward, glossed vaat etmek, sözünü vermek; ümit vermek, with no Turkish clause. The constructed line is labelled constructed.
söz etmek is not this pledge. TDK sense 1 is bir şey üzerine konuşmak. Tomris Uyar prints Dilin çağdaş kadın yazara hazırladığı tuzaklardan söz etmişti. tuzaklardan is ablative, the thing mentioned. Sense 2 is bir şeyin dedikodusunu yapmak, with no example. The English look-alike “give word” does not survive. yemin etmek is ant içmek. Abdülhak Şinasi Hisar prints yemin etmenize de hiç hacet yok. etmenize is -mA plus possessive plus dative, and it belongs to hacet yok, not to a complement of the oath. ant içmek is bir şeyi yapmaya veya yapmamaya söz vermek; yemin etmek. Çamlıbel prints Biz ayrı düşmemeye ant içmiştik denizden. düşmemeye is negative -mAyA, the same dative content as buluşmaya. The noun is ant, and the light verb is içmek. denizden is ablative on the embedded act. It is not a Promisee.
Copular coercion. Working claim, revisable. The commitment heads are verbs: vermek and etmek. English promises to be and showed great promise stay on promise. Turkish splits that reading. Cambridge, promise to be sth, glosses ...olacağını vaat etmek; ...sözünü vermek; heyecan verici/iyi gibi görenmek/olacağa benzemek, and the English line is It promises to be a really exciting game. The printed adjective string is görenmek. PASSWORD English–Turkish, on the same page, glosses the signs-of-the-future sense ümit vermek, olacağa benzemek. show promise is glossed ümit vaat etmek; başarı/gelecek göstermek. That ümit vaat etmek is still a verb. TDK umut is the Turkish headword. ümit is labeled Farsça umīd and points at umut. The idiom is umut vermek (veya vadetmek), bir kimsede umut uyandırmak, bir kimseye güven vermek. Ahmet Ümit prints Bana umut vermeye çalışıyor. bana is the dative of vermek. vermeye is the dative complement of çalışıyor. The parenthetical names vadetmek. The example uses vermek. Kaplan’s vadediyor is the same verb-built “holds out” reading, with a bare theme. A state with olmak or -DIr is not that verb. Göksel & Kerslake 2005 §8.3.3, between the pages headed 78 and 84, puts -DIr on a nominal predicate, yırtıcı bir kuştur. The book’s line is not umut. The 2025 contents title the copula at §8.3, p. 81, and -DIr at §8.3.3, p. 83. Those 2025 bodies were not opened. Umut verici olmak and İyi olacağı umut vericidir reuse Cambridge’s verici and the copula. They are constructed. The compare row marks the split: verb-built ümit vaat etmek / vadetmek, state-built olmak / -DIr.
No telicity claim is made. Each mark below is the one the entry prints, or it is labelled constructed.
Where this frame diverges from English promise, and from Spanish prometer, German versprechen, French promettre, Italian promettere, Russian обещать, and Japanese 約束する. English promise her a new car is one bare person and one thing, or to plus the person. Those languages put the Promisee in a dative or in a / à / a, and the act in an infinitive or a finite clause. Japanese splits a one-directional Promisee に from an appointment と, and the clause is quotative と. Turkish söz vermek puts the act in the dative, buluşmaya, because söz is already the object. The Promisee, when filled, is a second dative, not a bare person. vadetmek is the goods frame: dative person, and a bare theme in the Kaplan line. English promise to be stays on the verb. Turkish keeps a verb, ümit vaat etmek / vadetmek, and also builds a state with olmak / -DIr. söz etmek will not translate promise.