Magyar Bagoly: March 2022

Friday, March 25, 2022

Word order in questions

Word order in questions:

Questions with question words

In Hungarian, if the question has a question word (who, what, where, when, why, how...), then that word should be placed immediately in front of the verb.

It's a good idea to start a question with a question word, but it is not necessary.

Examples:

Mi van a város fölött? - What is above the city?
A város fölött mi van?
Ki sétál a régi házak között? - Who is walking between the old houses?
A régi házak között ki sétál?

The question word should come immediately before the verb, it is always in focus, except...

Exceptions:

When a question word is a part of a "block", like How many cars? How much water? - Then put this "block" before the verb.

Hány autót lát Péter? - How many cars does Péter see?

Mennyi víz van a pohárban? - How much water is in the glass?

Milyen gyakran voltál Angliában? - How often were you in England?

Note:
This word order is pretty close to the English word order.
Look at the English word order in What is above the city? or How much water is in the glass? The verb comes after the question word, or the "block" with the question word.
So just copy the English word order. :)

Exception 2:

miért (why) does not have to be right before the verb.

Miért dolgozol? - Why are you working?

Miért nem dolgozol? - Why aren't you working?

Miért te dolgozol? - Why is it you who is working?

Miért nem az Egyesült Államok 42. elnökének a felesége lett a 45. elnök? Why not the wife of the 42nd president of the US became the 45th president?

Yes-no questions:

The previous complicated rules were for questions with question words.
But making a yes-no question is much simpler: just take a statement and add a question mark. You can keep the same word order as it was in the statement.
In speech, change the intonation.

Gyakran vagy a kocsmában. You are often at the pub.
Gyakran vagy a kocsmában? Are you often at the pub?

Piros az alma. The apple is red.
Piros az alma? Is the apple red?

Monday, March 21, 2022

Accusative nouns

[This is taken from the Duolingo Hungarian Tips and Notes]

Objects and the accusative case

In Hungarian, a direct object (the accusative ) is marked by a suffix -t . A noun like fiú ’boy’ becomes fiút when it is the direct object .

In English, direct objects generally follow the subject and the verb, as in

The girl sees a boy.

where a boy is the direct object, the girl is the subject, and sees is the verb or predicate.

But why do we need that -t (the accusative case)? In Hungarian, word order can be freer than in English. It's a clue for what is the direct object.

A lány lát egy fiút.

Or with a different word order, but the same meaning:

Egy fiút lát a lány.

The subject is a lány which does not have a case ending (we say it is “nominative”). The verb is lát and egy fiút is the direct object, with its accusative -t.

If a word ends in a vowel, this -t is simply added :

fiú -> fiút
nő -> nőt

But words ending in -a and -e become -á and -é before they get the -t. (Do you remember szálloda -> szállodában? It's the same rule.)

If a word ends in a consonant, we usually have to add a vowel before the -t, -ot / -at / -et / -öt . Which vowel is determined by vowel harmony - as with verbs! Words with front vowels in them get a front vowel before the -t, words with back vowels get a back vowel.

back vowels	front vowels
a, á	e, é,
o, ó	i, í,
u, ú	ö, ő
	ü, ű

For back vowels usually the accusative ending is -ot:
sajt ‘cheese’ -> sajtot
narancs ‘orange’ -> narancsot
A few words, that you have to memorize, take -at:
ház ‘house’ -> házat
toll ‘pen’ -> tollat
For front vowels the accusative is usually an -et:
szék ’chair’ -> széket
zöldség ’vegetable’ -> zöldséget
But, words which have ö / ő / ü / ű in the last syllable get -öt:
gyümölcs ’fruit’ -> gyümölcsöt
főnök ’boss’, ‘manager’ -> főnököt

When a word ends in -r / -l / -n / -ny / -s / -sz / -z / -j / -ly , we simply add the -t :

bor ’wine’ -> bort
lány ’girl’ -> lányt

The verbs iszik and eszik

inni ‘to drink’ and enni ‘to eat’ are two -ik verbs with slightly different conjugations :

	iszik	eszik
(én)	iszom !	eszem !
(te)	iszol	eszel
(ő) / (ön)	iszik	eszik

! In some dialects, instead of iszom we say iszok and instead of eszem we say eszek.

Every verb ending in -zik, -szik, -sik conjugates like this :

To get the stem , you have to remove the ending -ik
1st person singular is the stem + -om / -em / -öm
2nd person singular is the stem + -ol / -el / -öl
3rd person singular is the stem + -ik, the form in a dictionary
In the plural they are conjugated the same way as any other verb (you will learn plurals soon).

A note on word order

In sentences with a subject, a verb and an object, Hungarian has a very flexible word order. All of the following can be used in certain contexts:

Péter lát egy házat.
Péter egy házat lát.
Egy házat lát Péter.
Egy házat Péter lát.

While they all mean ‘Péter sees a house.’, each sentence conveys slightly different information with respect to which element is in focus - or stressed. A focused phrase appears right in front of the verb in Hungarian and it often represents new information or contrast.

The first sentence with Péter above, for example, would be a valid answer to a question like ‘Who sees a house?’ but the second sentence stresses 'house ' because egy házat ‘a house’ immediately precedes the verb and is therefore in focus.

This can be very tricky, but English has similar restrictions! If you have the question

What does Péter see?

the question word is in focus and asks for new information. In the reply, the answer to what will also be new information and in focus. In English you can say,