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

368 names · page 12 of 16

Doğukan
“khan of the east”
From Turkic · Turkish
Boy3 syllablesEditorial
Doğuş
“birth, rise”
From Turkic · Turkish
Boy2 syllablesEditorial
Dolan
“wander (command form of dolanmak); filled”
From Turkic · Turkish, Kazakh
Boy2 syllablesEditorial
Dolaner
“roaming man”
From Turkic · Turkish
Boy3 syllablesEditorial
Dölaslan
“of lion-strong stock”
From Turkic · Turkish
Unisex3 syllablesEditorial
Dolay
“surroundings, vicinity; border; foothills”
From Turkic · Turkish
Boy2 syllablesEditorial
Dölek
“dignified and well-mannered; alert; skilled; honest”
From Turkic · Turkish
Boy2 syllablesEditorial
Dölen
“calm, peaceful person”
From Turkic · Turkish
Unisex2 syllablesEditorial
Dolun
“variant of Tolun: full moon”
From Turkic · Turkish
Unisex2 syllablesEditorial
Dolunay
“full moon”
From Turkic · Turkish
Unisex3 syllablesDocumented
Domaniç
“a mound or slope; a district in western Turkey”
Turkish
Boy3 syllablesEditorial
Domurcuk
“bud”
From Turkic · Turkish
Girl3 syllablesEditorial
Donat
“donut”
From English · Turkish
Boy2 syllablesLikely
Döndü
“she has returned”
From Turkic · Turkish
Girl2 syllablesEditorial
Döne
“name hoping the next child will be a boy; a return visit”
From Turkic · Turkish
Girl2 syllablesEditorial

Dönmez
“steadfast, one who keeps his word”
From Turkic · Turkish
Boy2 syllablesEditorial
Dönmezcan
“unwavering soul”
From Turkic and Persian · Turkish
Boy3 syllablesEditorial
Dönmezer
“man who keeps his word”
From Turkic · Turkish
Boy3 syllablesEditorial
Dönmezsoy
“unwavering lineage”
From Turkic · Turkish
Boy3 syllablesEditorial
Dönmeztekin
“unwavering prince”
From Turkic · Turkish
Boy4 syllablesEditorial
Dönü
“repentance; return”
From Turkic · Turkish
Unisex2 syllablesEditorial
Dönüş
“return”
From Ottoman Turkish · Turkish
Girl2 syllablesLikely
Dora
“mountain summit; the top or highest point of something”
From Turkic · Turkish
Boy2 syllablesEditorial
Dorak
“hilltop, highest point, summit”
From Turkic · Turkish
Unisex2 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.