The Fish Strikes Back

An Exercise in Etymological Re-enactment and Aquatic Karma

The study of language is eternally replete with revelations. Today, our sights are trained upon the Turkish adjectival suffix -cıl (in all its phonetic protean glory: -çıl, -cil, -çil, -cul, -çul, -cül, -çül). Its repertoire of employment is impressively diverse:

1. Faunal gastronomic predilections:
   • ot (“grass”) + -çul = herbivorous,
   • et (“meat”) + -çil = carnivorous,
   • hep (“all”) + -çil = omnivorous—
     or geographical domicile:
   • dağ (“mountain”) + -cıl = mountain-dwelling, alpine.
2. Psychological profiles:
   • ben (“I”) + -cil = egoistic, selfish,
   • ev (“house”) + -cil = domestic, home-loving,
   • insan (“human”) + -cıl = humane, compassionate.
3. Terminal outcomes:
   • ölüm (“death”) + -cül = fatal, lethal,
   • ak (“white”) + -çıl = whitened, bleached.

This suffix is genuinely Turkic and rather ancient, though not quite Proto-Turkic. It cunningly evolved from the amalgamation of two independent Proto-Turkic building blocks: -cı and -l.

The first element (possessing potential Mongolic roots) is intimately familiar to anyone who ever opened a Turkish grammar book on day one. It continues to churn out professions and roles with the relentless efficiency of an industrial assembly line:

• ayakkabı (“shoe”) + -cı = shoemaker,
• balık (“fish”) + -çı = fisherman,
• futbol (“football”) + -cu = footballer.

The second element lies in ambush for students somewhat later in the curriculum, presiding over the passive voice:

• kesmek (“to cut”) — kesilmek (“to be cut, severed, etc.”).

Now, let us apply a modicum of elementary arithmetic and weld the ‘active agent’ directly to the ‘passive recipient’. In the rigorous logic of the ancient Turks, this gives rise to a delightful existential reversal. If balıkçı denotes a fisherman (that is, one who torments the fish), then balıkçıl (a heron) translates literally as ‘one who has been fished’ or ‘one upon whom fish have inadvertently wreaked their administrative will.’

It is a profound pity, surely, that modern textbooks maintain a stony silence regarding the fact that a heron is merely a fisherman suffering from severe occupational deformation, weighed down by the karmic burden of the catch. Yet, grant us this: the conceptual framework is quite exquisite. You fondly imagined yourself to be a proud apex predator, only for linguistics to gently whisper that within this particular trophic chain, you happen to be the receiving end.