Author Archives: hunlang

Negation – Ne / Se, Sem / Nehogy / Soha

NE

It’s a negative word for imperative mood. Equivalent: DON’T

Ne mondj ilyet! – Don’t say such things!

Ne hagyják a tárcájukat a kocsiban, uraim!
Don’t leave your wallets in your cars, gentlemen!

Ne velem üvölts, üvölts az anyáddal!
Don’t roar at me. Roar at your mother!

Double negation again:

Ne csinálj semmit! / Semmit ne csinálj!
Don’t do anything!

SE, SEM

Equivalent: NOR, NEITHER, EITHER

Én sem tudom. – I don’t know, either.
Még ők se értik! – Even they don’t get it!

Semmit sem láttunk a tömegtől.
We didn’t see anything because of the crowd.

Egy percig sem habozik. – She doesn’t hesitate for a moment.

If you want to say ’neither, either’, then ’sem, se’ stays a single negation. Another example:

A fene se tudja! – The hell knows! (literally: Not even the hell knows!)

NEHOGY, HOGY…NE

Equivalent: lest, so that…don’t. You see you have two possibilities in Hungarian. These words are used in sentences expressing a purpose!

Vigyél kabátot, nehogy megfázz!
Take your jacket lest you catch a cold.

Vigyél kabátot, hogy meg ne fázz!
Take your jacket so that you don’t catch a cold.

Watch how they’re used. ’Nehogy’ is followed by full phrasal verbs, the verbal prefix stays with its verb! However, ’hogy…ne’ makes phrasal verbs split apart and verbal prefixes to precede ’ne’!

Use whichever you want to. One is heard as often as the other.

SOHA

Equivalent: NEVER. Used with double negation only unless it forms its own sentence!

Soha nem bántottalak. – I’ve never hurt you.

Soha semmit nem mondasz nekem.
You never tell me anything.

-Hallottál valaha ilyenről? –Soha. >Soha is the sentence itself.
-Have you ever heard about such a thing? –Never.

Another possibility: soha nem = sohasem

Sohasem bántottalak. – I’ve never hurt you.

Negation – Nincs, Nincsen

NINCS

This negative word is used if something doesn’t exist or something is not to be found somewhere. It also has a plural form: nincsenek. Equivalent:

SING: nincs, nincsen = there is no / there isn’t any
PLUR: nincsenek = there are no / there aren’t any
POSSESSION: nincs, nincsenek = have no / don’t have any

For explanation, watch the examples:

Nincs/Nincsen házam.
I have no house. I don’t have a house.

A tárcám nincs a széken.
My wallet is not on the chair.

Nincsenek könyveink.
We have no books. We don’t have any books.

A fiúk nincsenek az osztályban.
The boys are not in the classroom.

Note that nincs, nincsenek are only irregular in present tense.

Present tense: nincs/nincsen, nincsenek
Past tense: nem volt, nem voltak
Future tense: nem lesz, nem lesznek
Conditional: nem volna/lenne, nem lett volna, nem volnának/lennének, nem lettek volna
Imperative: ne legyen / ne legyenek

Nem volt házam.
I had no house. I didn’t have a house.

A tárcám nem lesz a széken.
My wallet will not be on the chair.

Nem voltak könyveink.
We had no books. We didn’t have any books.

A fiúk nem lesznek az osztályban.
The boys won’t be in the classroom.

Double negation is possible with nincs, too:

Nincs egy vasam se. – I haven’t got a red cent. / I’m broke.

Sometimes you can use single negation with sincs which is a combination of se + nincs!

Fogalmam sincs. – I have no idea.

Még tiszta zoknim sincs!
I don’t even have a pair of clean socks!

Nincs also expresses the English NONE:

-Van kerti törpétek? –Nincsen.
-Do you have any garden gnomes? -No, we have none.

-Van kerti törpétek? –Egy sincs.
-Do you have any garden gnomes? -No, we have none.

egy sincs/egy sincsen = none, not a single one

Negation and Affirmation – Tagadás és igenlés

NO AND YES – NEM ÉS IGEN

English offers more possibilities depending on what you want your future wife to do: buzz off or stay with you!

-Honey, did you buy a ring for me?
–No, I didn’t. / Yes, I did.

-Honey, are you aware of my mom coming tonight?
–No, I’m not. / Yes, I am.

-Honey, have you picked up my mom yet?
-No, I haven’t. / Yes, I have.

I won’t write an example for all tenses. I guess you’ve got my point. Let’s just summarize the English yes/no answers, all right? Here’s a summary table:

YES > NO
am / are / is > am not / aren’t / isn’t
do / does / did > don’t / doesn’t / didn’t
have / has / had > haven’t / hasn’t / hadn’t
will / would > won’t / wouldn’t
can / could > can’t / couldn’t
may / might > may not / might not
should > shouldn’t
shall > shan’t

Hungarian yes and no is much simpler. You answer: yes or no :). As opposed to English, it is not impolite to answer yes or no. But if you want, you can add the verb (rarely used) or the verbal prefix (if there’s one), but only with yes answers!

yes = igen
no = nem

So the sentences about your wife in Hungarian:

-Drágám, vettél gyűrűt nekem?
-Nem, (nem vettem). / Igen, (vettem).

-Drágám, tudod, hogy anyám ma este jön?
-Nem, (nem tudom). / Igen, (tudom).

-Drágám, elhoztad anyámat?
-Nem, (nem hoztam el). / Igen, el.

About saying yes, it’s enough to know that much. About saying no, we have yet to learn a thing or two.

NEM

Unlike English, Hungarian makes a wide use of double negation! But first let’s see the use of nem!

It can deny a whole sentence:
Nem tudom, miért tette. – I see not why he did that.

It can deny a specific segment in a sentence:
Nem a fiú csókolta meg a lányt, hanem a lány a fiút.
Not the boy kissed the girl, but the girl kissed the boy.

’NEM’ PRECEDES THE WORD IT REFERS TO!

The above-mentioned negations are single negations. Double negation is when two words are used to express some kind of negation. Double negation in English would be:

I don’t have no money.

But this Hungarian method is grammatically correct and must be used with ’nothing’ = semmi. Think of the last English sentence with don’t…anything and there will be no problem.

Semmit nem tudok.
I know nothing.
I don’t know anything.

It’s all the same which solution you use. Again, topic-prominent aspect. You think ’semmit’ is more important? Then begin the sentence with it. It’s not that important? Don’t begin the sentence with it. Now let’s see more examples. Watch where nem is in the sentence and what it denies:

Nem vagyunk orvosok. – We aren’t doctors.
>Being a doctor is not our profession.

Nem orvosok vagyunk. – We are not doctors.
>We’re not doctors but lawyers, actors, politicians…

Nem látok a sötétben. – I can’t see in the dark.
Nem a sötétben látok. – It’s not in the dark where I can see.
(I can see in the light.)

Nem a fiú megcsókolta a lányt.
Not the boy kissed the girl.

Nem a lányt csókolta meg a fiú.
The boy didn’t kiss the girl (but someone else).
It’s not the girl (whom) the boy kissed.

Nem csókolta meg a lányt a fiú.
The boy didn’t kiss the girl (or anybody).

Nem ismerek senkit a teremben.
Senkit nem ismerek a teremben.
I don’t know anybody in the room.

Next time we’ll take a look at: NINCS

Word Order – Double Question

So this time it’s about DOUBLE QUESTION. At least in Hungarian. Take a look at this to understand what I mean:

Mit mondtál, hova megy?
Where did you say he’s going?

First let’s translate the Hungarian sentence literally:

What did you say, where is he going?

As you see there are two question words Mit? (What?) and Hova? (Where?), while the English sentence is satisfied with one question word Where?

That would be the rule: If you ask what a person said/heard… about a second person and you’re interested in what the second person does, you need two question words in Hungarian. The first question is usually: Mit? Hogy? Note that Mit? is accusative case.

More examples with literal translations:

Mit mondtak, mikor érkezünk meg?
When did they say we’ll arrive?
What did they say, when will we arrive?

Mit gondolsz, ki vagy te?
Who do you think you are?
What do you think, who are you?

Mit hallottál, hogyan halt meg a nő?
How did you hear the woman died?
What did you hear, how did the woman die?

Hogy mondtátok, mit követtem el?
What did you say I committed?
How/What did you say, what did I commit?

Mit hittél, honnan került elő?
Where did you think he came up from?
What did you believe, where did he come up from?

Mit mondott, milyen színű a ház?
What color did he say the house is?
What did he say, what color is the house?

Mit képzeltél, melyik felnőtt bárba engednek be?
Which adult bar did you think they’ll let you in?
What did you think, which adult bar will they let you in?

Mit láttak, kinek adta a tolvaj a szajrét?
Who did they see the thief gave the swag to?
What did they see, who did the thief give the swag?

Of course, a language always offers mor possibilities to express something in a different way. The sentences above can be said like this with no double question:

Mikorra mondták, hogy megérkezünk?
Kinek gondolod magad?
Hogy hallottad, hogy a nő meghalt?
Mit mondtatok, hogy elkövettem?
Honnan hitted, hogy előkerült?
Milyen színűnek mondta a házat?
Melyik felnőtt bárba képzelte, hogy beengedik?
Kinek láttad, hogy a tolvaj átadja a szajrét?

If you take my advice, you should use Kinek gondolod magad? without hesitation. However, even if the other sentences are valid, the ones with double questions sound more like Hungarian. Just like English sentences with one question sound more like English.

All right. The next topic will be NEGATION. See ya! 🙂

Word Order – with and without Question Words

QUESTION WITH A QUESTION WORD

If there is a question word, it’s easy to see we have to deal with a question :). You don’t even need to rise your voice. The word order doesn’t change.

–Mit főzöl? -Pörköltet (főzök).
–What are you cooking? -(I’m cooking) stew.

–Miért nem voltál a bulin? -Mert beteg voltam.
–Why weren’t you at the party? -Because I was ill.

Let’s see these sentences without question words:

-Főzöl? -Igen, (főzök).
-Are you cooking? -Yes, I am (cooking).

-Nem voltál a bulin? -Nem, (nem voltam).
-Weren’t you at the party? -No, I wasn’t.

As you see, all you have to do is to put the question word at the beginning of the sentence. Without a question word, it is a yes or no sentence.

If the question word is ’embedded’ in a sentence, English uses direct word order again! Hungarian doesn’t deal with this because there is no inversion for the sake of a question in the first place.

Hány embert láttál a bankban?
How many people did you see in the bank?

Mondd el, hány embert láttál a bankban!
Tell me how many people you saw in the bank.

Next time we’ll take a look at the question words for one more time and we learn how to form questions like these:

Where did you say he went?
Who do you think you are?

Why are these kind of questions worth of more explanation? You’ll see next time. Bye! 🙂

Word Order – Unalterable Rules

UNALTERABLE RULES

The definite/indefinite articles precede the noun:
a vaj – the butter
az iskola – the school
egy lány – a girl

The demonstrative pronouns ez, az are followed by the definite articles a, az in constructions like:
ez a ház – this house
az az ember – that man

Adverbs of manner usually precede the verb they refer to:
Vidáman futkos. – It’s running happily.
Kiválóan énekel. – She’s excellent at singing.
Literally: She sings excellently.

Adverbs of state/condition take a position at the beginning of the sentence:
Nyilván nem jön. – Obviously he won’t come.
Összességében jó gyerek. – All in all, he’s a good child.

The negative word nem precedes the word it refers to:
Nem tudom. – I don’t know
Ő nem a könyvet olvassa. – He’s not reading the book.

The conjunctions is, se follow the word they refer to:
én is/én se – me too/me neither

Accusative and dative pronouns follow the verb if unstressed:
Látom őt. – I see him.
Adok neki egy könyvet. – I give him a book.

Accusative and dative pronouns precede the verb if stressed:
Őt látom. – I see him (not them).
Neki adok egy könyvet. – I give him a book (not them).

Dative pronouns precede impersonal verbs and impersonal contructions (kell, szabad, könnyű, lehetetlen…), but are not mandatory to say:
(Nekem) fel kell kelnem. – I must get up.
(Neked) tilos oda menned. – You must not go over there.
(Nekik) könnyű hazudni. – It’s easy for them to lie.

Word Order – Rearranging

REARRANGING AND REARRANGING AND REARRANGING

Now let’s create a longer sentence with adverbs and things like that, and see how many ways there are to rearrange it in order to suit our need for emphasis. We won’t go through all possibilities. That’s impossible! English uses verbal stress on more important parts of the sentence or there’s another solution: it is…that… I also indicate the words of primary and secondary importance.

Az egér vidáman futkos a padláson egész nap.
The mouse is running happily on the loft all day.

Az egér a padláson futkos vidáman egész nap.
The mouse is running happily on the loft all day.

Az egér futkos a padláson vidáman egész nap.
The mouse is running happily on the loft all day.

Az egér egész nap a padláson futkos vidáman.
The mouse is running happily on the loft all day.

More rearranging:

Vidáman futkos az egér a padláson egész nap.
It is a happy way the mouse is running on the loft all day.

Egész nap vidáman futkos az egér a padláson.
It is all day that the mouse is running happily on the loft.

A padláson futkos vidáman az egér egész nap.
It is the loft where the mouse is running happily all day.

Futkos vidáman az egér a padláson egész nap.
It is running what the mouse is doing happily on the loft all day.

You see there’s actually not much you can mess up in a Hungarian sentence. If you put a word somewhere else, that alone doesn’t make the sentence unintelligible. However, that doesn’t mean there are no rules. So far we’ve been talking about the topic prominent point of view, not rules! And what are the rules? Basically, the same rules any other language has in a way or another.

These are rules you can’t change under any condition!

We’ll discuss them in the next entry. But now let’s see another sentence.

The boy is embracing the girl slowly.

A fiú lassan átkarolja a lányt.
A fiú átkarolja lassan a lányt.
A fiú átkarolja a lányt lassan.
A lányt átkarolja lassan a fiú.
A lányt lassan átkarolja  a fiú.
A lányt a fiú lassan átkarolja.
Lassan átkarolja a fiú a lányt.
Lassan karolja át a fiú a lányt!*
Lassan átkarolja a lányt a fiú.
Átkarolja a fiú lassan a lányt.
Átkarolja a lányt lassan a fiú.
Átkarolja lassan a fiú a lányt.
Átkarolja lassan a lányt a fiú.

These sentences are all possibilities for that one English sentence above. What you see in these sentences is NOT RULES. It is topic-prominent aspect meaning you choose how to speak. You think the verb is more important? Put the verb at the beginning of the sentence. You think the adverb lassan/slowly is not really important? Put it at the end of the sentence if you want.

As I said, English uses verbal emphasis or the construction: it is…that/who…

The sentence marked with an * is an exclamation, so the prefix of the phrasal verb goes after the verb.

Word Order – Direct Word Order, Direct Question

I’d like to drop a note right here at the beginning. You surely know that certain types of word order are described for each language. For example, English is a SVO language. Japanese is SOV. Now what category does Hungarian belong to? Generally speaking one might say that Hungarian is an SVO, an SOV and also OVS language. The problem with Hungarian is that you can’t really put it in a drawer with a label saying: This is a language like this or a language like that.

If Ireally want to be honest to you, I should say this:

HUNGARIAN DOES NOT UNDERGO ANY KNOWN CATEGORY FOR WORD ORDER!

In fact, Hungarian sentences are influenced by the information itself and not by a syntactical rule. It means that, theoretically, you can begin and finish the sentence with any part of speech. Of course, there are unalterable rules like: adjectives precede nouns, articles precede nouns, and so on…

So basically there is no strict word order. While English has to put words in a specific order to express the right thing, Hungarian gives a damn to Germanic sentence structure and could be rather parallelled with the Indo-European word order. Don’t take this Indo-European thing literally! I’m just trying to say that the Hungarian word order is way looser than anything you know. Yeah, that’s what the topic-prominent aspect gives you: Headache! 🙂

Let’s get started with some basic rules about creating sentences. There are rules in spite of the freedom for expressing yourself.

DIRECT WORD ORDER, YES OR NO

S = subject; V = verb; O = object; A = adverb

Let’s pretend there is a usual formula for standard Hungarian sentences:

SVO or SOV or SAV or AVS

These possibilities include the topic-prominent aspect already. See some examples for them:

SVO: Péter nézi a tévét. – Peter is watching tv.
SOV: Péter tévét néz. – Peter is watching tv.
SAV: Péter Londonba megy. – Peter is going to London.

It would be quite difficult to explain the difference between the first two sentences. Actually, both mean the same thing without emphasing anything. It is because ’tévét néz’ is an expression used like you see it. However, if I say ’a tévét nézi’, adding the definite article to it, that’s an emphasis on ’a tévét’. He’s watching tv and not something else.

The third sentence could be rearranged like this:

Londonba megy Péter.

You see the subject goes to the end of the sentence! Now it is more important that Peter is going specifically to London (not somewhere else), than the subject (Peter) itself.

You could put emphasis on the verb, too:

Megy Péter Londonba, nem úszik.
Peter is going to London and not swimming!

DIRECT QUESTION?

That is correct. If you can form a valid Hungarian sentence in an indicative way, you’ve already created the interrogative sentence, too. How’s that possible? It’s simple. Hungarian does not change word order for such interrogative sentences. Expressing your will of asking or stating something is indicated by your intonation. Intonation for questions wants the speakers to rise their voice a little bit. That’s how we do it!

S+V+O: -Péter nézi a tévét? –Igen.
-Is Peter watching tv? –Yes, he is.

S+O+V: -Péter tévét néz? –Nem.
-Is Peter watching tv? –No, he isn’t.

S+A+V: -Péter Londonba megy? –Talán.
-Is Peter going to London? –Maybe.

It’s the same sentence structure. The difference in the writing is the question mark replacing the period. For Hungarian people it’s all the same! 🙂

More next time. See ya!

Numerals – Suffixes -os, -as, -es, -ös and Decimal

NUMBERS WITH -OS, -AS, -ES, -ÖS

Hungarian numbers can take the suffixes -os, -as, -es, -ös.

Question word: Hányas? – What number?

–Hányast kaptál? –Kettest.
–What mark did you get? –D.

A hármas számú versenyző győzött.
The winner is the contestant no. 3.

Distributive numbers can only be formed after fitting numbers with -os, -as, -es, -ös: hatosával, nyolcasával, négyesével, ötösével. If we add these suffixes to multiplicative numbers, they become adjectives:

hatszoros győztes
six time winner

„Háromszoros hurrá a királynak!”
’Three hurrahs for the king!’

ötös lottó
Hungarian lottery with five numbers to hit

ötös bankjegy – fiver
a kettes szám – no. two
a hetes szám – no. seven

Kérem, fáradjon a nyolcas ablakhoz!
Please go to window no. 8.

Numbers with -os, -as, -es, -ös can be made plural: egyesek, kettesek, hármasok, négyesek, ötösök, hatosok, hetesek, nyolcasok, kilencesek, tízesek, etc. You can put them in plural when you count your coins:

Hat huszasom, két százasom és tizenöt ötvenesem van. – I’ve got six twenty, two hundred and fifteen fifty forint coins.

DECIMAL NUMBERS – TIZEDES SZÁMOK

Hungarian decimal numbers are written with a comma (vessző) instead of a point. When saying them, you use the word egész! Besides, you don’t just say the numbers one after the other. You have to refer them in a specific way.

1,9 egy egész kilenctized
3,56 három egész ötvenhatszázad
8,123 nyolc egész százhuszonháromezred

1.9 one point nine
3.56 three point five six
8.123 eight point one two three

Numerals – Fractions, Distributive, Multiplicative

FRACTIONS – TÖRT SZÁMOK

Fractions are numbers expressing a specific part of the whole. Hungarian fractions are formed with the suffix -d, which can have a link vowel if needed. So the suffixes in details are:

-AD, -OD, -ED, -ÖD

/1 egyed
/2 ketted
/3 harmad
/4 negyed
/5 ötöd
/6 hatod
/7 heted
/8 nyolcad
/9 kilenced
/10 tized
/100 század
/1000 ezred

AGAIN, CAREFULLY WITH THESE NUMBERS!

három > harmad
négy > negyed
hét > heted
tíz > tized
húsz > huszad
ezer > ezred

Examples:

½ egy ketted = one and a half
2/3 két harmad = two-thirds
¾ három negyed = three-quarters
6/9 hat kilenced = six-ninths

Question words: Hányad? Hányad része?

DISTRIBUTIVE NUMBERS

Hungarian distributive numbers are expressed with the suffixes -VAL, -VEL or -NKÉNT. If you’re all for cases, the suffix -nként marks the DISTRIBUTIVE CASE. Question word: Hányasával?

egyesével > one by one
kettesével > two at a time
százával > hundreds of
ezrével > thousands of

Hármasával vehettek az ebédből.
You can take from the lunch three at a time.

Százával, sőt ezrével tiltakoztak az emberek.
Hundreds, even thousands of people were protesting.

MULTIPLICATIVE NUMBERS

Hungarian multiplicative numbers are formed with the suffixes: -SZOR, -SZER, -SZÖR. English equivalent: times.

Question word: Hányszor? Milyen gyakran? – How many times? How often?

egyszer > once
kétszer > twice
háromszor > three times
négyszer > four times
sokszor > many times
kevésszer > a few times

Ha csak egyszer érteném, amit mondasz!
If I understood just once what you say!

Kétszer mentem a piacra.
I went to the market twice.

Tízszer mondtam el neki, hogy figyeljen oda.
I’ve told him ten times to pay attention.

Már sokszor figyelmeztettelek.
I’ve warned you many times.