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

581 names · page 22 of 25

Günkan
“sun khan”
From Turkic · Turkish
Unisex2 syllablesEditorial
Günkaya
“sun rock”
From Turkic · Turkish
Boy2 syllablesEditorial
Günkurt
“sun wolf”
From Turkic · Turkish
Boy2 syllablesEditorial
Günkut
“sun blessing”
Turkish
Unisex2 syllablesEditorial
Günkutan
“blessed sun”
From Turkic · Turkish
Boy3 syllablesEditorial
Günkutlu
“blessed sun”
From Turkic · Turkish
Boy3 syllablesEditorial
Günmutlu
“happy day”
From Turkic · Turkish
Boy3 syllablesEditorial
Günnar
“sun pomegranate”
From Turkic and Persian · Turkish
Girl2 syllablesEditorial
Günnaz
“sun charm”
From Persian and Turkic · Turkish
Girl2 syllablesEditorial
Günnur
“sunlight”
From Turkic and Arabic · Turkish
Unisex2 syllablesEditorial
Günol
“be the sun”
From Turkic · Turkish
Boy2 syllablesEditorial
Günşah
“sun shah”
From Turkic and Persian · Turkish
Unisex2 syllablesEditorial
Günsar
“embracing the sun”
From Turkic · Turkish
Boy2 syllablesEditorial
Günsav
“word of the sun”
From Turkic · Turkish
Unisex2 syllablesEditorial
Günsel
“flood of daylight”
From Turkic · Turkish
Unisex2 syllablesEditorial

Günseli
“flood of light”
From Turkic · Turkish
Girl3 syllablesEditorial
Günşen
“cheerful day”
Turkish
Unisex2 syllablesEditorial
Günser
“shine, scatter light”
From Turkic · Turkish
Unisex2 syllablesEditorial
Günsu
“day + water”
From Proto-Turkic · Turkish
Girl2 syllablesLikely
Güntan
“sun dawn”
Turkish
Unisex2 syllablesEditorial
Güntekin
“sun prince”
From Turkic · Turkish
Boy3 syllablesEditorial
Günten
“body of the sun”
From Turkic and Persian · Turkish
Girl2 syllablesEditorial
Güntimur
“sun iron”
From Turkic · Turkish
Unisex3 syllablesEditorial
Güntöre
“sun law”
From Turkic · Turkish
Boy3 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.