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

7,961 names · page 69 of 332

Bozlak
“a folk-song melody of central and southern Anatolia”
From Turkic · Turkish
Boy2 syllablesEditorial
Bozok
“Grey Arrow”
Turkish
Boy2 syllablesDocumented
Bozokay
“grey Okay”
From Turkic · Turkish
Boy3 syllablesEditorial
Boztaş
“grey stone”
From Turkic · Turkish
Unisex2 syllablesEditorial
Boztepe
“grey hill”
From Turkic · Turkish
Boy3 syllablesEditorial
Boztimur
“grey iron”
From Turkic · Turkish
Boy3 syllablesEditorial
Bozyel
“rain-bringing southerly wind”
From Turkic · Turkish
Unisex2 syllablesEditorial
Bozyiğit
“grey brave youth”
From Turkic · Turkish
Boy3 syllablesEditorial
Bucak
“hidden or remote corner; sandy, bushy riverbank; mountain peak”
From Turkic · Turkish
Unisex2 syllablesEditorial
Budak
“shoot, the emerging stem and embryonic leaves of a new plant”
From Uzbek · Turkish
Boy2 syllablesLikely
Budun
“people, nation”
From Turkic · Turkish
Boy2 syllablesEditorial
Budunalp
“hero of the people”
From Turkic · Turkish
Boy3 syllablesEditorial
Buğday
“wheat”
From Turkic · Turkish
Girl2 syllablesEditorial
Büğdüz
“knot in a tree; resinous heartwood of pine”
From Turkic · Turkish
Boy2 syllablesEditorial
Büge
“dam or weir on a stream; also wise, learned; dragon (as in Büke)”
From Turkic · Turkish
Unisex2 syllablesEditorial

Büget
“pool; deep part of a lake; puddle”
Turkish
Boy2 syllablesEditorial
Buğra
“male camel”
Turkish
Boy2 syllablesDocumented
Buğrahan
“camel-stallion khan”
From Turkic · Turkish
Boy3 syllablesEditorial
Bugül
“this rose”
From Turkic and Persian · Turkish
Unisex2 syllablesEditorial
Bük
“thicket by a stream or plain; bramble; river bend; dense woodland”
From Turkic · Turkish
Unisex1 syllableEditorial
Bukay
“thicket moon”
From Turkic · Turkish
Boy2 syllablesEditorial
Buke
“wise, learned; dragon”
From Turkic · Turkish, Kazakh
Boy2 syllablesEditorial
Buket
“bouquet”
From French · Turkish
Girl2 syllablesEditorial
Büklüm
“curl, coil, fold”
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.