tarihler

Tarihler is a Turkish word that means dates. It is the plural form of tarih, which in Turkish can refer to a specific calendar date or to history as the record of past events. Therefore tarihler can indicate multiple calendar dates or multiple historical periods, depending on context. The term is common in journalism, education, archiving, and data management.

Etymology and meaning: Tarih derives from the Arabic taʿrīkh, meaning date, chronology, or history, and entered Turkish through Ottoman Turkish. The plural suffix -ler yields tarihler, used for both the date sense and the historical sense.

Usage: In everyday Turkish, dates are typically written in the day-month-year order (gün.ay.yıl). In phrases, tarihler may refer to specific days, deadlines, or schedules, or to various historical eras when used in a historical or archival context. In computing and data work, tarihler can refer to fields or values that store date information (tarih verileri, date data). The meaning is determined by surrounding words; for example, “tarihler” in a list of events can mean calendar dates, while in a history text it can mean different time periods.

See also: tarih, takvim, zaman.