Language guide

Turkish Names: Meanings, Origins & Traditions

Turkish names are recorded here in the modern Turkish Latin alphabet, which replaced the Arabic-based Ottoman script in 1928. Because Ottoman Turkish absorbed a large Arabic and Persian vocabulary, many familiar Turkish names, such as Elif or Emir, go back to Arabic or Persian words, while others, such as Arslan or Aynur, contain native Turkic elements. Each entry states which of these applies, based on the cited sources.

Türkçe

Oghuz branch of the Turkic language family

Published names: 7961
Scripts in our data: Latin
ISO 639-1: tr

Browse Turkish names

422 names · page 8 of 18

Erdoğ
“rising man”
From Turkic · Turkish
Unisex2 syllablesEditorial
Erdoğan
“brave falcon”
From Turkic · Turkish
Boy3 syllablesEditorial
Erdoğdu
“a hero is born”
From Turkic · Turkish
Boy3 syllablesEditorial
Erdoğmuş
“born a hero”
From Turkic · Turkish
Boy3 syllablesEditorial
Erdöl
“descendant of heroes”
From Turkic · Turkish
Boy2 syllablesEditorial
Erdölek
“good and clever man”
From Turkic · Turkish
Boy3 syllablesEditorial
Erdönmez
“man who keeps his word”
From Turkic · Turkish
Boy3 syllablesEditorial
Erdur
“stand firm, man”
From Turkic · Turkish
Boy2 syllablesEditorial
Erduran
“enduring man”
From Turkic · Turkish
Boy3 syllablesEditorial
Erdurdu
“the man has stayed”
From Turkic · Turkish
Boy3 syllablesEditorial
Erdurmuş
“man who has stood firm”
From Turkic · Turkish
Boy3 syllablesEditorial
Erdursun
“may the man endure”
From Turkic · Turkish
Unisex3 syllablesEditorial
Erduru
“pure man”
From Turkic · Turkish
Boy3 syllablesEditorial
Erek
“aim; goal”
From Turkic · Turkish
Boy2 syllablesEditorial
Ereken
“sowing man”
From Turkic · Turkish
Boy3 syllablesEditorial

Erel
“man's hand, strong hand”
From Turkic · Turkish
Unisex2 syllablesEditorial
Eren
“young man, male, noble person”
Turkish, Uyghur
Unisex2 syllablesDocumented
Erenalp
“sage hero”
From Turkic · Turkish
Boy3 syllablesEditorial
Erenay
“synonym of ermiş + moon”
From Proto-Turkic · Turkish
Boy3 syllablesLikely
Erencan
“sage soul”
From Turkic and Persian · Turkish
Boy3 syllablesEditorial
Erendemir
“sage iron”
From Turkic · Turkish
Boy4 syllablesEditorial
Erendiz
“Jupiter (the planet)”
Turkish
Unisex3 syllablesEditorial
Erenel
“sage hand”
From Turkic · Turkish
Boy3 syllablesEditorial
Erengüç
“sage power”
From Turkic · Turkish
Unisex3 syllablesEditorial

How Turkish names are written

Modern Turkish uses a 29-letter Latin alphabet introduced in 1928. Letters such as ç, ğ, ı, İ, ö, ş and ü matter for spelling: Gülnur and Gulnur are different spellings, and the dotless ı is a separate letter from i. Search on this site ignores these marks, but entries always show the documented spelling.

Where Turkish names come from

A name used in Turkish is not automatically Turkish in origin. Here is how the documented origins of the Turkish names published so far break down (a name with elements from two languages counts under both):

Turkic
4158
Arabic
2170
Persian
1209
Greek
42
Mongolic
39
Hebrew
28
French
14

Counted from 7961 published entries. Each name page explains its own etymology with sources.

Turkish names by meaning

Turkish belongs to the Oghuz branch of the Turkic languages, together with Azerbaijani and Turkmen. Related languages share many words, but a name is listed under a language only when it is documented there.

Other languages: Uyghur · Kazakh · Kyrgyz · Uzbek · Tatar · Bashkir · Tajik

References for this page

Wikipedia contributors. Turkic languages. Wikimedia Foundation, revision 1377797900. Accessed 2026-10-28. Licence: CC BY-SA 4.0.
Wikipedia contributors. Turkish alphabet. Wikimedia Foundation, revision 1381762599. Accessed 2026-10-28. Licence: CC BY-SA 4.0.