-лия

Bulgarian

Etymology

Grammaticalization of the Turkish adjectival marker Turkish -li/-lü (when appended to stems with front root vowel), -lı/-lu (when appended to stems with back root vowel). Encountered only with Ottoman Turkish loanwords.

Morphologically, the suffix is declined as feminine, however, semantically, the derived terms are interpreted as masculine.

Suffix

-лия • (-lija) m

1. Forms nouns depicting possessor of quality or attribute:
   • късмет (kǎsmet, “fortune, fate”) → късметлия (kǎsmetlija, “lucky one”) (cf. Turkish kısmetli (“fortunate, fateful”))
   • кибрит (kibrit, “match (for making fire)”) → кибритлия (kibritlija, “volatile, passionate, easily irritable one”)
   • махмурлук (mahmurluk, “hangover”) → махмурлия (mahmurlija, “one with hangover”)
   • мустак (mustak, “moustache”) → мустаклия (mustaklija, “one with moustache”)
2. Forms nouns depicting member of group or place of origin:
   • Осман (Osman, “Ottoman”) → османлия (osmanlija, “member of Ottoman ruling class”) (historical)
   • dialectal даг (dag, “highlands”) → даалия (daalija, “one who hides in the mountains; outlaw, highwayman”) (cf. Turkish dağlı (“mountaineer, highlander”))

Inflection

Inflection of -лия

	singular	plural
indefinite	-лия	-лии
definite	-лията	-лиите
vocative form	-лийо	-лии

Alternative forms

• -лийка f (-lijka)
• -лийче n (-lijče) — diminutive

Related terms

• -шия (-šija, “pertaining to”) (from Turkish -şu)
• -чия (-čija), -джия (-džija, “denoting profession or occupation”) (from Turkish -çi, -ci)