The Difference between Definite and Indefinite Conjugation

I’m trying to give you the simplest explanation ever. Here it is:

Definite conjugation: I see the tree. – Látom a fát.

Indefinite conjugation: I see a tree. – Látok egy fát.

The definite conjugation requires verbs conjugated with the definite suffixes, while the indefinite conjugation requires verbs conjugated with the indefinite suffixes. And what’s the difference?

If you talk about a specific/definite thing/person, you conjugate the verb with the definite suffixes. If you talk about an indefinite/unknown thing/person, you conjugate the verb with the indefinite suffixes.

Here’s the key to know when you should use one or the other:

DEFINITE AND INDEFINITE ARTICLES!

Take a look at the definite example: Látom a fát. You see the definite article, which means I see a definite tree. I know exactly what tree I’m talking about.

Take a look at the indefinite example: Látok egy fát. You see the indefinite article, which means I see a tree of some sort. I don’t know what tree it is. I’ve never seen it before.

NOTE! Purely intransitive verbs cannot be conjugated with the definite suffixes. Such verbs express existence or motion: van (to be), megy (to go), jön (to come)…

It is a vital grammatical rule because you can’t avoid using it!

WHAT IF THERE IS NO DEFINITE OR INDEFINITE ARTICLE IN THE SENTENCE?

USE THE INDEFINITE CONJUGATION IN THESE CASES:

– If there is no article at all, apply the indefinite conjugation.

– Indefinite numerals and indefinite pronouns also cause the verb to be conjugated with the indefinite suffixes.

– This rule is also visible if the noun is plural: Fákat látok. – I see trees. It is because the indefinite article is not used in the plural. If it is expressed with néhány (some), that’s no problem because it is an indefinite numeral!

USE THE DEFINITE CONJUGATION IN THESE CASES:

– The demonstrative pronouns require the verb to be conjugated with the definite suffixes given the fact that those pronouns refer to something specific/definite.

– Proper names (John, David, Bugs Bunny…) also need the definite conjugation since names already refer to a specific/definite person.

More examples:

Nézem a lányt. – I‘m watching the girl.
Nézek egy lányt. – I‘m watching a girl.

Azt a lányt nézik. – They‘re watching that girl.
Sok lányt néznek. – They‘re watching a lot of girls.

A fiúkat szereti. – She loves the boys.
Fiúkat szeret. – She loves boys.
Néhány fiút szeret. – She loves some boys.
Sehány fiút nem szeret. – She doesn’t love any boys.

NOTE! The nouns in such sentences are in the accusative case because follow/precede a transitive verb! (Remember the accusative case: Látom a folyót.)

Besides, different pieces of information in a conversation may allude to something determined or undetermined and then the answer has to agree with it.

In the following examples, the stress is on the verb. What is important is whether I’m watching the/a girl or I’m doing something else with her. To makes things simple, I’ll use the Present Simple Tense in English.

-Nézed a lányt? -Igen, nézem (őt).
-Do you watch the girl? -Yes, I watch her.

-Nézel egy lányt? -Igen, nézek (egyet).
-Do you watch a girl? -Yes, I watch one.

Next time, we’ll finally get to how to conjugate verbs. Bye now! 🙂

Verbs and Tenses

All right. We’ll be discussing verbs and tenses from now on. It is an extensive topic, so maybe I’ll come up with some other topic between present and past, conditional and imperative, and so on…

V E R B S

Verbs are words expressing action, occurrence, state of being.

The Hungarian word is: ige.

Characteristics of Hungarian verbs:

– Hungarian verbs are high or deep-vowel words. (or mixed which is finally high or deep)

– There are two tenses: present, past

– The future tense is paraphrased like in English, but more often it is simply expressed with present tense. Because of that, it is not really considered a different tense.

– There is only one present, one past and one future tense.

– There are three moods: indicative, imperative, present/past conditional

SUMMARY:

Indicative mood: present, past, future
Imperative mood: present
Conditional mood: present, past

– Hungarian verbs have a definite and indefinite conjugation system.

– Suffixes are attached to the verb in all numbers/persons, therefore it is unnecessary to use the personal pronouns unless for putting emphasis on the person.

– Verbs are transitive, intransitive, impersonal.

– The Hungarian infinitive form can be conjugated when teaming up with an impersonal verb.

-The Hungarian verbal nouns are: infinitive, present/past participle and future participle

I N F I N I T I V E – FŐNÉVI IGENÉV

English verbs can be put in the infinitive form like this:

to be, to dream

Hungarian verbs also have an infinitive form indicated by the suffix: -ni. Examples:

lenni (to be), álmodni (to dream), ülni (to sit), repülni (to fly), örülni (to be delighted), állni (to stand)

Verbs ending in two consonants take the infinitive with a link vowel. The link vowels are: a for deep, e for high. Examples:

hall > hallani (to hear)
ment > menteni (to save)
mond > mondani (to say)
gyűjt > gyűjteni (to collect)

It is important to mention that entries in a dictionary give Hungarian verbs in the 3rd PS indefinite conjugation form. Logically enough, since this form has no suffix to it, so it can be considered the basic form of the verb.

And there are only a few verbs with an irregular infinitive form. These are the so-called -nni verbs. You already know: lenni. Let’s the others.

menni (to go), jönni (to come), enni (to eat), inni (to drink)
tenni (to put), venni (to buy), hinni (to believe), vinni (to bring)

Next time I’ll explain the difference between definite and indefinite conjugation. Digest so much for now. 🙂

Bye.

More about Comments

Just a few words about it.

I’ve just checked the ‘comment’ section and there are 162 spam messages. Spam comments are blocked, so if you wrote a comment and the system thought it was spam, I will never see it.

I’m discussing this because a visitor had a problem like that.

So if I happened not to answer a comment, that’s the reason behind it and not my laziness. 🙂

So much for spam comments.

Vocabulary – Cities and Inhabitants

Vocabulary:

city, town – város
inhabitant – lakos

And here are the cities:

Budapest > budapesti (Budapest)
Róma > római (Rome)
Berlin > berlini (Berlin)
Zágráb > zágrábi (Zagreb)
Prága > prágai (Prague)
Stockholm > stockholmi
Helsinki > helsinki
Madrid > madridi
Moszkva > moszkvai (Moscow)
Atén > aténi (Athens)
Varsó > varsói (Warsaw)
Ankara > ankarai
Dublin > dublini
Párizs > párizsi (Paris)
London > londoni
Lisszabon >lisszaboni (Lisbon)
Oslo > osloi
Koppenhága > koppenhágai (Copenhagen)
Bécs > bécsi (Vienna)
Pozsony > pozsonyi (Bratislava)
Bukarest > bukaresti (Bucharest)
Brazíliaváros > brazil (Brasília)
Újdelhi > újdelhi lakos (New Delhi)
Brüsszel > brüsszeli (Brussels)
Peking > pekingi (Beijing)
Tokió > tokiói (Tokyo)
Washington > washingtoni
Mexikóváros > mexikói (Mexico City)
Ottawa > ottawai
Bagdad > bagdadi (Baghdad)
Teherán > teheráni (Tehran)

You see it’s the same as for countries. You need the suffix -i to form the inhabitant from the city: Budapest > budapesti. And remember to write folk names and inhabitants of a city with lowercase!

ONE MORE THING! If you talk about a country or city expressed with more words, then you refer to the inhabitants with the suffix -beli!

Amerikai Egyesült Államok (United States of America) > egyesült-államokbeli (stateside)
Mexikóváros (Mexico City) > mexikóvárosbeli (Mexican)

But you can also just say: amerikai, mexikói

Next time more about Hungary. How the territory is divided and so on… Bye now.

Best wishes, László

Vocabulary – The Four Cardinal Points and Continents

Before learning some cities, let’s take a look at the “Hungarian compass” as well as continents.

THE FOUR CARDINAL POINTS = A NÉGY ÉGTÁJ

észak – north > északi – northern
dél – south > déli – southern
kelet – east > keleti – eastern
nyugat – west > nyugati – western

As you see, you can make adjectives by adding an -i suffix to them: észak > északi = north > northern

észak-kelet(i) > north-east(ern)
észak-nyugat(i) > north-west(ern)
dél-kelet(i) > south-east(ern)
dél-nyugat(i) > south-west(ern)

And so on…

C O N T I N E N T S

continent – kontinens OR szárazföld (literally: dryland)

Európa – Europe > európai – European
Amerika – America > amerikai – American
Afrika – Africa > afrikai – African
Ázsia – Asia > ázsiai – Asian
Ausztrália – Australia > ausztráliai – Australian
Északi-sark – North Pole
Déli-sark – South Pole

Arktisz – Arctic
Antarktisz – Antarctic

Északi-sark and Déli-sark can be made adjectives like this: északi-sarki, déli-sarki

You see it’s all the same in Hungarian: you add the adjectival suffix -i and you must not use capital letters when the suffix -i is added: Észak > északi, Amerika > amerikai

So much for today. Bye now.

Vocabulary – Nationalities

Vocabulary:

nation – nemzet
national – nemzeti
nationality – nemzetiség
nationalities – nemzetiségek

Now let’s see the nationality names for the countries I wrote about in the previous entry.

NOTE! If you see a country name with the word ország in it, you already know the nationality: Magyarország = magyar + ország. So Hungarian is magyar.

IMPORTANT! Hungarian people write nationalities with lowercase (small letters all the way).

Magyarország > magyar (Hungarian)
Olaszország > olasz (Italian)
Spanyolország > spanyol (Spanish)
Németország > német (German)
Franciaország > francia (French)
Finnország > finn (Finn)
Horvátország > horvát (Croat)
Törökország > török (Turkish)
Oroszország > orosz (Russian)
Csehország > cseh (Bohemian)
Svédország > svéd (Swede)
Görögország > görög (Greek)
Lengyelország > lengyel (Pole, Polish)
Írország > ír (Irish)

Norvégia > norvég (Norwegian)
Ausztria > osztrák (Austrian)
Ausztrália > ausztráliai (Australian)
Portugál > portugál (Portuguese)
Szlovákia > szlovák (Slovak)
Szlovénia > szlovén (Sloven)
Bulgária > bolgár (Bulgarian)
Hollandia > holland (Dutch)
Brazília > brazil (Brazilian)
Anglia /Nagy Britannia > angol / brit (English / British)
Dánia > dán (Danish)
Románia > román (Rumanian)

Mexikó > mexikói (Mexican)
Japán > japán (Japanese)
Kína > kínai (Chinese)
Amerikai Egyesült Államok > amerikai (American)
Kanada > kanadai (Canadian)
Irak > iraki (Iraqi)
Irán > iráni (Iranian)

And I forgot: Svájc (Switzerland) > svájci (Swiss)

Hungarian makes the folk name plural in this case:

The Hungarian eat goulash. – A magyarok gulyást esznek.
The Italian talk much. – Az olaszok sokat beszélnek.
The Japanese are respectful. – A japánok tisztelettudóak.

And the nationality names above are adjectives and nouns at the same time. So as adjective:

Italian food is tasty. – Az olasz ételek finomak.
Japanese cars are small. – A japán autók kicsik.
Finnish education is outstanding. – A finn oktatás kiváló.

Vocabulary – Countries

The word for country is: ORSZÁG. Mainly European countries are expressed with the nationality and the word ‘country’ in Hungarian. The rest of the countries are recognizable, too. Countries are written with capital letters.

Magyarország – Hungary
Olaszország – Italy
Spanyolország – Spain
Németország – Germany
Franciaország – France
Finnország – Finland
Horvátország – Croatia
Törökország – Turkey
Oroszország – Russia
Csehország – Czech Republic
Svédország – Sweden
Görögország – Greece
Lengyelország – Poland
Írország – Ireland

Norvégia – Norway
Ausztria – Austria
Ausztrália – Australia
Portugália – Portugal
Szlovákia – Slovakia
Szlovénia – Slovenia
Bulgária – Bulgaria
Hollandia – Holland
Brazília – Brazil
Nagy Britannia  / Anglia – England
Dánia – Danmark
Románia – Romania

Mexikó – Mexico
Japán – Japan
Kína – China
Amerikai Egyesült Államok – United States of America
Kanada – Canada
Irak – Iraq
Irán – Iran

About Comments

Hardly has this blog been running for a couple of weeks, the silly spam comments not related to the content of the blog have already appeared. My rule as the responsible guy for this blog is simple. I delete every comment that smells like “non-related topic” (yes, even those advertising viagra!) immediately.

Any other comments about Hungarian are welcome and I’ll answer each of your questions you might have.

Thank you for your understanding,

The Blog Boss 🙂

How are you? – Hogy vagy?

Hogy? – How?
you are – vagy
You (Sir) are – van/vannak

–Hogy vagy? / How are you?
-Jól vagyok, köszönöm. És te? /I’m fine, thanks. How about you?
-Megvagyok. / So so.

-Hogy vagy? / How are you?
-Rosszul. Egész nap fáj a fejem. / I feel unwell. I have a headache all day.

-Hogy van (Ön)? / How are you (sir)?
-Kiválóan, köszönöm. / I’m feeling great. Thank you.

NOTE! If you call someone sir/Mr./Ms. the substantive verb is in 3rd PS or 3rd PP!!!

–Hogy vannak, uraim? / How are you, gentlemen?
–Fantasztikusan. / We feel fantastic.

Introduction and Saying hello – Bemutatkozás és köszönés

Since you can pronounce words now (right?), let’s start with basic things.

INTRODUCTION

Vocabulary:

név – name
én – I
engem – me (accusative)
te – you (singular)
téged – you (accusative singular)
Mi? – What?
Hogy? – How?
hív – to call
Engem …-nak/-nek hívnak – My name is…

Three guys talk:

-Szia! én Péter vagyok. Te ki vagy? – Hi! I’m Peter. Who are you?
-Szia! én Ádám vagyok. és téged hogy hívnak? – Hi! I’m Adam. And what’s your name?
-Sziasztok! Engem Gábornak hívnak. – Hi guys! My name is Gábor.

Note! You can also ask: Mi a neved? – What’s your name?

-The literal meaning of ”Hogy hívnak?” is How are you called?
-Watch the verb hív carefully. It requires accusative pronouns and the name needs the dative suffixes! That is: ACCUSATIVE PRONOUN + NAME + -NAK/-NEK + HÍVNAK

But you can just say: NAME + VAGYOK (Péter vagyok.) = I’M + NAME (I’m Peter.)

And you can answer:

Örülök. / Örülök a találkozásnak. / Örülök, hogy megsimertelek. / Örvendek. – Nice to meet you.
Részemről a szerencse – The pleasure is mine. (somewhat literally: Luck is on my side.)

Well, just say Örülök! 🙂

SAYING HELLO

General greetings:

Jó reggelt! – Good morning!
Jó napot! – Good day! Good afternoon!
Jó estét! – Good night!
Jó éjszakát! – Good evening!

Take care and make these nouns (reggel and so on) accusative because the entire greetings are: Jó reggelt kívánok! – I wish you a good morning! And so on…I wish you something, it’s accusative in Hungarian.

Informal: to friends, family and so on…

Szia! – is for saying hello when you meet someone and saying goodbye, as well. Equivalent: Hi! Hello! Furthermore, You pronounce it like See  ya! 🙂

Sziasztok! – is the same as Szia! but it is used if you say hello or goodbye to more than one person. Equivalent: Hi guys!

Üdvözöllek! – is Welcome! or Greetings! The short form for it is: Üdv!

Isten hozott! – is also Welcome! but its literal meaning is ”God brought you!”. If God brought you, I welcome you or something like that is the secret meaning :).

Isten veled! – Bye! Goodbye! Literal meaning is ”May God be with you”! Obviously the one saying this wishes God to be with on your journey. Not really used anymore. It’s more like Szia!

We have a huge amount of slang words for saying Hi! :):):) Only a few of them: Csá! Pá! Cső! Szióka!

Formal or semi-formal: teacher, stranger, someone above you in rank…

Jó napot! – general greeting during the day.

Üdvözlöm! – I welcome you! I greet you! Remember Üdvözöllek!

Isten hozta! – Welcome! Remember Isten hozott!

Isten vele/Önnel! – Good-bye! Not so much in use anymore. Rather Viszontlátásra!

Viszontlátásra! – is saying Good-bye! The short form for it is: Viszlát! You can use it in shops, post-office and so on…

More expressions:

Formal: A közeli viszontlátásra! – See you soon/later!
Informal: Akkor legközelebb! – See you soon/later!

Formal: A holnapi viszontlátásra! – See you tomorrow!
Informal: Akkor holnap (találkozunk!) – See you tomorrow!

üdvözöl valakit – greet someone (needs accusative)
Várj, ne menj! Előbb üdvözlöm! – Wait. Don’t go. I’ll greet her first. (than you can go)
Üdvözlünk titeket! – We greet you (pl)!

köszön valakinek –  say hello to someone (needs dative case)
Köszönök neki, jó? – I’ll say hello to her, okay?

Saying ”Thank you!” for something

megköszön – to thank — NOTE! Hungarian says I thank you (indirect object – dative case) something (accusative case) —- Köszönöm neked a virágot! – Thank you for the flowers!

Köszönöm! – Thank you.
Nagyon (szépen) köszönöm! – Thank you very much (indeed).
Ezer köszönet! – literal meaning: A thousand thanks!

Kösz! – Thanks! or you can say Köszi! as well.

Kösz(önöm) a segítséged! – Thank you for your help.

hála valaminek/valakinek – thanks to something/someone (needs dative case -nak, -nek)
Hála Istennek! – Thank god!
Hála a Péternek, itthon vagyok. – Thanks to Peter, I’m home. (maybe he took me home)

Remember!

Köszönöm a…+ Accusative case = Thank you for…
Hála valaminek/valakinek = Thanks to something/someone