Hungarian language

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Hungarian magyar
Pronunciation:	IPA: [ˈmɒɟɒr̪]
Spoken in:	Hungary and areas in Romania, Slovakia, Serbia, Ukraine, Croatia, Austria, and Slovenia
Total speakers:	13 million
Ranking:	57
Language family:	Uralic  Finno-Ugric   Ugric    Hungarian
Writing system:	Latin alphabet (Hungarian variant)
Official status
Official language of:	Hungary, European Union, Slovenia (regional language), Serbia (regional language), Austria (regional language), Various localities in Romania, Some official rights in Ukraine, Croatia and Slovakia
Regulated by:	Research Institute for Linguistics of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences
Language codes
ISO 639-1:	hu
ISO 639-2:	hun
ISO 639-3:	hun
Note: This page may contain IPA phonetic symbols in Unicode. See IPA chart for English for an English-​based pronunciation key.

Hungarian language
Alphabet, including ő ű and cs dz dzs gy ly ny sz ty zs
Phonetics and phonology
Vowel harmony
Grammar   Noun phrases   Verbs
T-V distinction
Regulatory body
Hungarian name
Language history
Hungarian pronunciation of English • Old Hungarian script • English words from Hungarian
edit

Hungarian (magyar nyelv listen (help·info)) is a Finno-Ugric language, and more specifically a Ugric language, unrelated to the other languages of Central Europe. As one of the small number of modern European languages which do not belong to the Indo-European language family, it has always been of great interest to linguists. It is spoken in Hungary and by the Hungarian minorities in seven neighbouring countries. The Hungarian name for the language is magyar [ˈmɒɟɒr̪].

There are about 13 million native speakers, of whom 9.5-10 million live in modern-day Hungary. Some two million speakers live in areas that were part of the Kingdom of Hungary before World War I. Of these, the largest group live in Romania, where there are approximately 1.4 million Hungarians (see Hungarian minority in Romania). Hungarian-speaking people are also to be found in Slovakia, Serbia, Ukraine, Croatia, Austria, and Slovenia, as well as about a million people scattered in other parts of the world (see Geographic distribution).

Contents 1 Classification 1.1 Sound correspondences 2 Geographic distribution 2.1 Official status 2.2 Dialects 3 Phonology 4 Grammar 4.1 Suffixes 4.2 Prefixes 4.3 Definite and indefinite conjugations 5 Lexicon 5.1 Word formation 5.1.1 Compounds 5.2 Noteworthy lexical items 5.2.1 Two words for "red" 5.2.2 Kinship terms 5.2.3 Extremely long words 6 Writing system 7 Name order 8 Vocabulary examples 9 Controversy over origins 10 See also 11 Bibliography 11.1 Books for learning Hungarian 11.2 Hungarian grammar books 12 References 13 External links 13.1 Linguistic chapters from the Encyclopaedia Humana Hungarica (1–5) 13.2 Dictionaries 13.3 Online Language Courses 13.4 More links for learners

[edit] Classification

Main article: History of Hungarian

The beginning of the history of Hungarian language as such (and so the proto-Hungarian period) is set to 1000 B.C., when – according to current scientific understanding – it separated from its closest relatives, the Ob-Ugric languages.

Hungarian is a member of the Ugric languages, a sub-group of the Finno-Ugric language family, which in turn is a branch of the Uralic languages. Connections between the Ugric and Finnic languages were noticed in the 1670s and established, along with the entire Uralic family, in 1717, although the classification of Hungarian continued to be a matter of political controversy into the 18th and even 19th centuries. Today the Uralic family is considered one of the best demonstrated large language families, along with Indo-European and Austronesian.

[edit] Sound correspondences

There are numerous regular sound correspondences between Hungarian and the other Ugric languages. For example, Hungarian á corresponds to Khanty o in certain positions, and Hungarian h corresponds to Khanty x, while Hungarian final z corresponds to Khanty final t. For example, Hungarian ház "house" vs. Khanty xot "house", and Hungarian száz "hundred" vs. Khanty sot "hundred".

The distance between the Ugric and Finnic languages is greater, but the correspondences are also regular. The relationship is most obvious when comparing all the Ugric languages with all the Finnic languages, for then individual idiosyncrasies are averaged out, but here we will just compare Hungarian with Finnish and Estonian.

• Hungarian [f] corresponds to Finnish and Estonian [p] (just like English [f] in father corresponds to Latin [p] in pater):

Hungarian	Finnish	Estonian	meaning
fa	puu	puu	tree
fél	pelätä	pelgama	to fear
fészek	pesä	pesa	nest

• Hungarian [k] corresponds to Finnish and Estonian [k] before front vowels:

Hungarian	Finnish	Estonian	meaning
könny	kyynel	küünistama	tear
kéz	käsi	käsi	hand, arm
kő	kivi	kivi	stone

• Hungarian [h] corresponds to Finnish and Estonian [k] before back vowels (just like English [h] in hound corresponds to Latin [k] in canis)

Hungarian	Finnish	Estonian	meaning
hal	kala	kala	fish
ház	kota	koda	house (Hung.), hut (Finn. and Est.)
húgy	kusi	kusi	urine

• Hungarian [t] corresponds to Finnish and Estonian [t] at the beginning of a word:

Hungarian	Finnish	Estonian	meaning
tél	talvi	talv	winter
tud	tuntea	teadma, tundma	to know
tavasz	touko	teki (derived from 'tekkima')	spring

• In the middle of words (note that due to the loss of the word final vocals in the Old-Hungarian language these are now at the end of the words) Hungarian [z] corresponds to Finnish [t] (which can alterate with [s]) and Estonian [d] or [t] (which is also able to alterate with [s]):

Hungarian	Finnish	Estonian	meaning
ház	kota	koda	house (Hung.), hut (Finn.)
kéz	käsi : käte-	käsi : käte-	hand, arm
fazék	pata	pada	pot

This is just a sample. Even in the small number of words above, other regular sound correspondences can be seen, such as Hungarian [l] corresponding to Finnish and Estonian [l].

[edit] Geographic distribution

Hungarian is spoken in the following countries as a mother tongue:

Country	Speakers
Hungary	9.5-10 million (census 2001)
Romania (mainly Transylvania)	1,443,970 (census 2002)
Slovakia	520,528 (census 2001)
Serbia (mainly Vojvodina)	293,299 (census 2002)
Ukraine (mainly Zakarpattia)	149,400 (census 2001)
United States	117,973 (census 2000)
Canada	75,555 (census 2001)
Israel	70,000
Austria (mainly Burgenland)	22,000
Croatia	16,500
Slovenia	9,240
Total	12-13 million

Source: National censuses, Ethnologue

About a million more Hungarian speakers live in Argentina, Australia, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, the Czech Republic, Finland, France, Germany, The Netherlands, Italy, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, the United States, Venezuela, and in other parts of the world.

[edit] Official status

Hungarian is the official language of Hungary (Hungarian: Magyarország), and thus an official language of the European Union (Hungarian: Európai Unió).

Hungarian is also one of the official languages of Vojvodina (Hungarian: Vajdaság) and an official language of three municipalities in Slovenia: Hodoš (Hungarian: Hódos), Dobrovnik (Hungarian: Dobronák) and Lendava (Hungarian: Lendva), along with Slovene.

Hungarian is officially recognized as a minority or regional language in Austria, Croatia, Romania and Slovakia.

In Romania and Slovakia, it is an official language at local level in all communes, towns and municipalities with an ethnic-Hungarian population of over 20%.

[edit] Dialects

The dialects of Hungarian identified by Ethnologue are: Alföld, West Danube, Danube-Tisza, King's Pass Hungarian, Northeast Hungarian, Northwest Hungarian, Székely and West Hungarian. These dialects are, for the most part, mutually intelligible. The Hungarian Csángó dialect, which is not listed by Ethnologue, is spoken mostly in Bacău County, Romania. The Csángó minority group has been largely isolated from other Hungarians, and they therefore preserved a dialect closely resembling medieval Hungarian.

[edit] Phonology

Main article: Hungarian phonology

Hungarian has 14 vowel phonemes and 25 consonant phonemes. The vowel phonemes can be grouped as pairs of long and short vowels, e.g. o and ó. Most of these pairs have a similar pronunciation, only varying in their duration; the pairs <a>/<á> and <e>/<é> differ both in closedness and length, however.

Consonant length is also distinctive in Hungarian. Most of the consonant phonemes can occur geminate.

The sound voiced palatal plosive /ɟ/, written <gy>, is unlike any in English. It occurs in the name of the country, "Magyarország" (Hungary), pronounced /ˈmɒɟɒrorsaːg/.

Primary stress is always on the first syllable of a word, as with its cousin Finnish and neighboring languages, Slovak (Standard dialect) and Czech. There is sometimes secondary stress on other syllables, especially in compounds, e.g. "viszontlátásra" (goodbye) pronounced /ˈvisontˌlaːtaːʃrɒ/.

Front-back vowel harmony is an important feature of Hungarian phonology. See the details about Hungarian language in the linked article.

[edit] Grammar

Main article: Hungarian grammar

Hungarian is an agglutinative language. Word order is extremely flexible, quite often changing word order has no effect on the sentence or just puts slightly more emphasis on one part or the other. Pronoun subjects are generally absorbed into the verb (when they occur explicitly it is generally to give special emphasis to the subject: te vagy az utolsó ("you are the last one").

[edit] Suffixes

Most grammatical information is given through suffixes. For example: at the table = az asztalnál (space relation), at 5 o'clock = öt órakor (time relation). There are more than twenty-five case endings (some authors cite more than forty); these are conjugated only according to the root word's back- or front-vowel group, however.

Some suffixes (with vowel harmony versions shown) are as follows:

Suffix	Case or Function	Example
-(o)t / -(e)t / -(ö)t	accusative (the case of object nouns)	Megnézte a házat. – He had a look at the house.
-ban / -ben	inessive ('in', existing in an enclosed place)	A szoba a házban van. – The room is in the house.
-ba / -be	illative ('into', moving into an enclosed place)	Bement a házba. – He went into the house.
-ból / -ből	elative ('out of', moving from an enclosed place)	Kijött a házból. – He came out of the house.
-nak / -nek	dative ('to, for')	Tetszett Ádámnak a ház. – The house appealed to Adam.
-val / -vel	instrumental ('with, using'), comitative	Kocsival jött. – He came by car. (literally with car)
-t(a)lan / -t(e)len	'oppositeness' (like the English prefixes -un, -in /-im, etc.) or without (lacking) some quality	Oktalan. – Unreasoning.
-va / -ve	deverbal adverb (similar to English suffix -ly)	Állva énekelt. – She sang while she was standing.
-(cs)ka / -(cs)ke	diminutive	Halacska. – Tiny fish.
-ó / -ő	active participle (similar to English gerund suffix -ing)	Vásárló. – Purchaser.
-ászik / -észik	'to catch, collect something'	Halászik. – He(she) is fishing. Vadászik. – He(she) is hunting.
-i	'of, from or belonging somewhere'	Péter budapesti. – Peter is from Budapest.

[edit] Prefixes

There are two adjectival prefixes (leg- for superlatives, legesleg- for exaggerated superlatives), as well as many verbal prefixes, used to derive new terms or to specify the more accurate meaning.

The following 4 are of the most common ones:

Verbal prefix	Function	Example
be-	Expressing movement directon: "in".	behozni - to bring in
ki-	Expressing movement directon: "out".	kivinni - to take out
le-	Expressing movement directon: "down".	lemegy - go down
meg-	Meg is a verbal prefix used to define the finite character of the action. It has no real English equivalent.	Compare Megírja a levelet. – He is writing the letter (and he is going to finish it now as well.) with Írja a levelet. – He is writing the letter (but we don't know if he will finish it or not.)

See more at Hungarian grammar (verbs).

[edit] Definite and indefinite conjugations

An unusual feature of Hungarian are the 2 verb conjugations. The "definite" conjugation is used for a transitive verb with a definite object. The "indefinite" conjugation is used for an intransitive verb or for a transitive verb with an indefinite object. See also Definite and indefinite conjugations.

[edit] Lexicon

Example with ad

Hungarian	English
Derived terms
ad	he is giving sth
adó	tax
adózik	he pays tax
adózó	taxpayer
adós	debtor
adalék	aggregate n
adomány	donation
adat	data
With verbal prefixes
megad	he is giving sth (e.g, debit etc.) back
hozzáad	he is adding sth to sth
As part of compounds
adóhivatal	revenue office
rádióadó	transmitter

Giving an exact estimate for the total word count is difficult, since it is hard to define what to call "a word" in agglutinating languages, due to the existence of compound words. To have a meaningful definition of compound words, we have to exclude such compounds whose meaning is the mere sum of its elements. The largest dictionaries from Hungarian to another language contain 120,000 words and phrases^[1] (but this may include redundant phrases as well, because of translation issues). The new desk lexicon of Hungarian language contains 75,000 words^[1] and the Comprehensive Dictionary of Hungarian Language (to be published in 18 volumes in the next twenty years) will contain 110,000 words. ^[2] The default Hungarian lexicon is usually estimated to comprise 60,000 to 100,000 words.^[3] (Independently of specific languages, speakers actively use at most 10,000 to 20,000 words^[4], with an average intellectual using 25-30 thousand words.^[3]) However, all the Hungarian lexemes collected from technical texts, dialects etc. would all together add up to 1,000,000 words.^[5]

Hungarian words are built around so-called word-bushes. (See an example on the right.) Thus, words with similar meaning often arise from the same root.

The basic vocabulary shares a couple of hundred word roots with other Uralic languages like Finnish, Estonian, Mansi and Khanty. Examples of such include the numbers kettő 'two', három 'three', négy 'four' (cf. Finnish kaksi, kolme, neljä, Estonian kaks, kolm, neli, Mansi китыг kitig, хурум khurum, нила nila), as well as víz 'water', kéz 'hand, arm', vér 'blood', fej 'head' (cf. Finnish and Estonian vesi, käsi, veri, Finnish pää, Estonian pea or 'pää).

The proportion of the word roots in Hungarian lexicon is as follows: Finno-Ugric 21 %, Slavic 20 %, German 11 %, Turkic 9.5 %, Latin and Greek 6 %, Romance 2.5 %, Other of known origin 1 %, Other of uncertain origin 30%.^[6] Except for a few Latin and Greek loan-words, these differences are unnoticed even by native speakers; the words have been entirely adopted into the Hungarian lexicon. There are an increasing number of English loan-words, especially in technical fields.

[edit] Word formation

Words can be compound (as in German) and derived (with suffixes).

[edit] Compounds

Compounds are present since the Proto-Uralic era in the language. Numerous ancient compounds transformed to base words during the centuries. Today, compounds play an important role in vocabulary.

Compounds are made up of two base words: the first is the prefix, the latter is the suffix. A compound can be subordinative: the prefix is in logical connection with the suffix. If the prefix is the subject of the suffix, the compound is generally classified as a subjective one. There are objective, determinative, and adjunctive compounds as well. Some examples are given below:

Subjective:

menny (heaven) + dörög (roar) → mennydörgés (the sound of thunder)

nap (Sun) + sütötte (baked) → napsütötte (sunlit)

Objective:

fa (tree) + vágó (cutter) → favágó (lumberjack)

Determinative:

új (new) + já (modification of -vá, -vé a suffix meaning "making it to something") + építés (construction) → újjáépítés (reconstruction)

Adjunctive:

sárga (yellow) + réz (copper) → sárgaréz (brass)

According to current orthographic rules, a subordinative compound word has to be written as a single word, without spaces; however, if the length of a compound is over six syllables, a hyphen may be inserted at the appropriate boundary to avoid ambiguity.

Other compound words are coordinatives: there is no concrete relation between the prefix and the suffix. Subcategories include word duplications (to stress out the meaning; olykor-olykor 'really occasionally'), twin words (where a base word and a distorted form of it makes up a compound: gizgaz, where the suffix 'gaz' means 'weed' and the prefix giz is the distorted form; the compound itself means 'inconsiderable weed'), and such compounds which have meanings, but neither their prefixes, nor their suffixes make sense (for example, hercehurca 'long-lasting, frusteredly done deed').

A compound also can be made up by multiple (i.e., more than two) base words: in this case, at least one word element, or even both the prefix and the suffix is a compound. Some examples:

elme [mind; standalone base] + (gyógy [medical] + intézet [institute]) → elmegyógyintézet (asylum)

(hadi [militarian] + fogoly [prisoner]) + (munka [work] + tábor [camp]) → hadifogoly-munkatábor (work camp of prisoners of war)

[edit] Noteworthy lexical items

[edit] Two words for "red"

There are two basic words for "red" in Hungarian, piros and vörös (variant: veres; compare with Estonian 'verev' or Finnish 'verevä'). (They are basic in the sense that one is not a sub-type of the other, like e.g. scarlet is a kind of red.) The word vörös is related to vér "blood". When they refer to an actual difference in colour (as on a colour chart), vörös usually refers to the deeper hue of red. According to Berlin, B and Kay, P (1969) Basic Color Terms, Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, Hungarian is unique in having two basic colour words for red.

However, the two words are also used independently of the above in collocations. Piros is first taught to children, as it is generally used to describe inanimate, artificial things, or things seen as cheerful or neutral, while vörös typically refers to animate or nature-related things (biological, geological, physical and astronomical objects), as well as serious or emotionally charged subjects.

When the rules outlined above are in contradiction, typical collocations usually prevail. In some cases where a typical collocation doesn't exist, the use of either of the two words may be equally adequate.

Examples:

• Expressions where "red" typically translates to piros: a red road sign, the red line of the Budapest Metro, a holiday shown in red in the calendar, ruddy complexion, the red nose of a clown, some red flowers (those with a "cold" property, e.g. tulip), red peppers and paprika, red cards (hearts and diamonds), red traffic lights, red light district, red stripes on a flag, etc.
• Expressions where "red" typically translates to vörös: red army, red wine, red carpet (for receiving important guests), red hair / beard, red lion (as a mythical animal), the Red Cross, The Red and the Black, the Red Sea, redshift, red giant, red blood cells, red oak, some red flowers (those with a "passionate" property, e.g. rose), red fox, names of ferric and other red minerals, red copper, rust, red phosphorus, the colour of blushing with anger or shame, etc.

[edit] Kinship terms

In Hungarian there exist separate words for brothers and sisters depending on relative age:

	younger	elder	unspecified relative age	unspecified gender
brother	öcs	báty	fivér or fiútestvér	testvér
sister	húg	nővér	nővér or lánytestvér

(There existed a separate word for "elder sister", néne, but it has become obsolete [except to mean "aunt" in some dialects] and has been replaced by the generic word for "sister".)

Besides, separate prefixes exist for up to the 5th ancestors and descendants:

parent	grandparent	great- grandparent	great-great- grandparent	great-great-great- grandparent
szülő	nagyszülő	dédszülő	ükszülő	szépszülő (OR ük-ükszülő)
child	grandchild	great- grandchild	great-great- grandchild	great-great-great- grandchild
gyer(m)ek	unoka	dédunoka	ükunoka	szépunoka (OR ük-ükunoka)

On the other hand, no lexical items exist for "son" and "daughter", but the words for "boy" and "girl" are applied with possessive suffixes. Nevertheless, the terms are differentiated with different declension or lexemes:

	boy/girl	(his/her) son/daughter	(his/her) boy/girl (-friend)
male	fiú	fia	barátja
female	lány	lánya	barátnője

Fia is only used in this, irregular possessive form; it has no nominative on its own. However, the word fiú can also take the regular suffix, in which case the resulting word (fiúja) will be synonymous with barátja ("his/her boyfriend").

[edit] Extremely long words

• Megszentségteleníthetetlenségeskedéseitekért

Partition to prefix, root, and suffixes: meg-szent-ség-telen-ít-hetetlen-ség-es-kedés-e-i-tek-ért

Translation of the elements

meg- modifies the meaning of a verb; means repeated, extended or completed

szent - saint

-ség - English -ness suffix

-telen - negation, English un- prefix

-ít - constitutes a verb from a noun

-hetetlen - negation, approximately translates to "the impossibility of [place of the verb]"

-ség - constitutes a noun from a verb

-es - constitutes an adjective from a noun

-kedés - refers to a constant (and sometimes annoying) habit; English: repeated

-e - expresses possession by a single person (simple example: hegye - his mountain)

-i - constitutes plurality; only directly after -e (simple example: hegyei - his mountains)

-tek - suffix of plural your (simple example: hegyetek - your mountain)

-ért - approximately translates to because of (simple example: a tettért - because of the deed)

Translation: "for your [plural] repeated pretending to be undesacratable"

• Legeslegmegszentségteleníttethetetlenebbeiteknek

"to those of you whom it is the very least possible to have desecrated"

• Töredezettségmentesítőtleníttethetetlenségtelenítőtlenkedhetnétek

"you [plural] could constantly mention the lack [of a thing] that makes it impossible to make someone make something defragmenter-free"

These words are not used in practice (and hard to understand even for native speakers), but only invented to show, in a somewhat facetious way, the ability of the language to form long words. They are not compound words--they are formed by adding a series of one and two-syllable suffixes (and a few prefixes) to a simple root ("szent" in the first two and "tör" in the third).

See also: Hungarian tongue-twisters.

[edit] Writing system

Main article: Hungarian alphabet

Before AD 1000, Hungarians had a different writing system. When Stephen I of Hungary established the Kingdom of Hungary, the old system gradually became unused. However, although it is not used at all in everyday life, it is still known and practiced by some ethusiasts. For more information about this writing system, see Old Hungarian script.

Hungarian is written using a variant of the Latin alphabet, and has a phonemic orthography, i.e. pronunciation can generally be predicted from the written language. In addition to the standard letters of the Latin alphabet, Hungarian uses several additional letters. These include letters with acute accents (á,é,í,ó,ú) which represent long vowels, with umlauts (ö and ü) and their long counterparts ő and ű. Sometimes (usually as a result of a technical glitch) ô or õ is used for ő and û for ű, due to the limitations of the Latin-1 / ISO-8859-1 code page, though these are not part of the Hungarian language, and are considered misprints. Hungarian can be properly represented with the Latin-2 / ISO-8859-2 code page, but this code page is not always available. (Hungarian is the only language using both ő and ű.) Of course, Unicode includes them, and they therefore can be used on the Internet.

For a complete table of the pronunciation of the Hungarian alphabet, see the X-SAMPA description in the Hungarian Wikipedia (in Hungarian, but the table is obvious), which transliterates Hungarian letters into IPA and X-SAMPA characters.

Additionally, the letter pairs <ny>, <ty>, and <gy> represent the palatal consonants /ɲ/, /c/, and /ɟ/ (a little like the "d+y" sounds in British "duke" or American "would you"). Also like saying d with your tongue pointing to your upper palate. Hungarian uses <s> for /ʃ/ and <sz> for /s/, which is the reverse of Polish. <zs> is /ʒ/ and <cs> is /ʧ/. All these digraphs are considered single letters. <ly> is also a "single letter digraph", but is pronounced like /j/ (English <y>), and mostly appears in old words. More exotic letters are <dz> and <dzs> /ʤ/. They are hard to find even in a longer text. Examples are madzag ("string"), edzeni ("to train (athletically)") and dzsungel ("jungle").

Single R's are tapped, like the Spanish "pero"; Double R's and initial R's are trilled, like the Spanish "perro".

Hungarian distinguishes between long and short vowels, where the long vowels are written with acutes, and between long consonants and short consonants, where the long consonants are written double. The digraphs, when doubled, become trigraphs: <sz>+<sz>=<ssz>, but when the digraph occurs at the end of a line, all letters are written out:

... busz-

szal...

When a prefix ends in a digraph and the suffix starts with the same digraph, both digraphs are written out: lány + nyak = lánynyak.

Usually a trigraph is a double digraph, but there are a few exceptions: tizennyolc "eighteen" is tizen + nyolc. There are doubling minimal pairs: tol (push) vs. toll (feather or pen).

While it seems unusual to English speakers at first, once one learns the new orthography and pronunciations, written Hungarian is nearly totally phonemic.

[edit] Name order

Main article: Hungarian name

The Hungarian language uses the so-called eastern name order, in which the family name comes first and the given name comes last. However, as a rule, names are represented in the western name order when used in foreign languages. Thus for example Edward Teller, the Hungarian-born physicist, is known in Hungary as Teller Ede. Prior to the mid-20^th century, given names were usually translated along with the name order; this is no longer as common. For example, the pianist uses András Schiff when abroad, not Andrew Schiff.

In modern usage, foreign names retain their order when used in Hungarian. Therefore:

• Kiss János, amikor Los Angelesben járt, látta John Travoltát.

translates to

• When János Kiss went to Los Angeles, he saw John Travolta.

Pre-20^th-century foreign personalities have often had their names Hungarianized even in recent times: Verne Gyula (rather than Jules Verne), Marx Károly (rather than Karl Marx) and Engels Frigyes (rather than Friedrich Engels). Other exceptional forms include Kolumbusz Kristóf (Christopher Columbus), Luther Márton (Martin Luther), Husz János (Jan Hus) and Kálvin János (John Calvin).

[edit] Vocabulary examples

Note: The stress is always placed on the first syllable of each word. The remaining syllables all receive an equal, lesser stress. All syllables are pronounced clearly and evenly, even at the end of a sentence, unlike in English.

• Hungarian (person, language): magyar [mɑɟɑr]
• Hello!:
  • Formal, when addressing a stranger: "Good day!": Jó napot (kívánok)! [joːnɑpot ki:vaːnok]
  • Informal, when addressing someone you know very well: Szia! [siɑ] (it sounds almost exactly like American colloquialism "See ya!")
• Good-bye!: Viszontlátásra! (formal) (see above), Viszlát! [vislaːt] (semi-informal), Szia (informal: same stylistic remark as for "Hello!" )
• Excuse me: Elnézést! [ɛlneːzeːʃt]
• Please:
  • Kérem (szépen) [keːrɛm seːpɛn] (This literally means "I'm asking (it/you) beautifully", as in German Danke schön, "I thank (you) beautifully". See next for a more common form of the polite request.)
  • Legyen szíves! [lɛɟɛn sivɛʃ] (literally: "Be (so) kind!")
• I would like ____, please: Szeretnék ____ [sɛrɛtneːk] (this example illustrates the use of the conditional tense, as a common form of a polite request)
• Sorry!: Bocsánat! [botʃaːnɑt]
• Thank you: Köszönöm [køsønøm]
• that/this: az [ɑz], ez [ɛz]
• How much?: Mennyi? [mɛɲɲi]
• How much does it cost?: Mennyibe kerül? [mɛɲɲibe kɛryl]
• Yes: Igen [iɡɛn]
• No: Nem [nɛm]
• I don't understand: Nem értem [nɛm eːrtɛm]
• I don't know: Nem tudom [nɛm tudom]
• Where's the toilet?:
  • Hol van a vécé? [hol vɑn ɑ veːtseː] (vécé/veːtseː is the Hungarian pronouncation of the English abbreviation of "Water Closet")
  • Hol van a mosdó? [hol vɑn ɑ moʒdoː] – more polite (and word-for-word) version
• generic toast: Egészségünkre! [ɛɡeːʃʃeːgynkrɛ] (literally: "To our health!")
• juice: gyümölcslé [ɟymøltʃleː]
• water: víz [viːz]
• wine: bor [bor]
• beer: sör [ʃør]
• tea: tea [tɛɑ]
• milk: tej [tɛj]
• Do you speak English?: Beszél(sz) angolul? [bɛseːl(s) ɑngolul] Note that the fact of asking is only shown by the proper intonation: continually rising until the penultimate syllable, then falling for the last one.
• I love you: Szeretlek [sɛrɛtlɛk]
• Help!: Segítség! [ʃɛgiːtʃeːg]

[edit] Controversy over origins

Mainstream linguistics holds that Hungarian is part of the Uralic family of languages, related ultimately to languages such as Finnish and Nenets.

• For many years (from 1869), it was a matter of dispute whether Hungarian was a Finno-Ugric/Uralic language, or was more closely related to the Turkic languages, a controversy known as the "Ugric-Turkish war". Hungarians did absorb some Turkic influences during several centuries of co-habitation. For example, it appears that the Hungarians learned animal breeding techniques from the Turkic Chuvash, as a high proportion of words specific to agriculture and livestock are of Chuvash origin. There was also a strong Chuvash influence in burial customs. Furthermore, all Ugric languages, not just Hungarian, have Turkic loanwords related to horse riding. Nonetheless, the science of linguistics shows that the basic wordstock and morphological patterns of the Hungarian language are solidly based on a Uralic heritage.
• There have been historical attempts to link Hungarian with e.g. Etruscan, Japanese, Turkic, and Sumerian. Such alternative theories are only advocated by non-specialists today. See Pseudoscientific language comparison.
• Hungarian has often been claimed to be related to Hunnish, since Hungarian legends and histories show close ties between the two peoples (although the name Hunor, preserved in legends and still used as a given name in Hungary, can also show a link with Khanty). Some people believe that the Székelys, a Hungarian ethnic group living in Romania, are descended from the Huns. However, the link with Hunnish is uncertain, and it is not even known which languages the Huns spoke.

There have been attempts, dismissed by mainstream linguists, to show that Hungarian is related to other languages including Hebrew, Egyptian, Basque, Persian, Pelasgian, Greek, Chinese, Sanskrit, English, Tibetan, Magar, Kechua, Armenian and at least 42 other Asian, European and even American languages.^[7]

[edit] See also

• Hungarian grammar
• Hungarian alphabet
• Hungarian phonology
• Hungarian literature
• List of English words of Hungarian origin
• Hungary
• History of Hungarian
• Hungarian people
• Old Hungarian 'Lamentations of Mary' - The first Hungarian written poem from the 14^th century

[edit] Bibliography

[edit] Books for learning Hungarian

• Colloquial Hungarian - The complete course for beginners. Rounds, Carol H.; Sólyom, Erika (2002). London; New York: Routledge. ISBN 0-415-242584.

This book gives an introduction to the Hungarian language in 15 chapters. The dialogues are available on cassette or CDs.

• Teach Yourself Hungarian - A complete course for beginners. Pontifex, Zsuzsa (1993). London: Hodder & Stoughton. Chicago: NTC/Contemporary Publishing. ISBN 0-340-56286-2.

This is a complete course in spoken and written Hungarian. The course consists of 21 chapters with dialogues, culture notes, grammar and exercises. The dialogues are available on cassette.

• Hungarolingua 1 - Magyar nyelvkönyv. Hoffmann, István; et al. (1996). Debreceni Nyári Egyetem. ISBN 963-472-083-8
• Hungarolingua 2 - Magyar nyelvkönyv. Hlavacska, Edit; et al. (2001). Debreceni Nyári Egyetem. ISBN 963-036-698-3
• Hungarolingua 3 - Magyar nyelvkönyv. Hlavacska, Edit; et al. (1999). Debreceni Nyári Egyetem. ISBN 963-472-083-8

These course books were developed by the University of Debrecen Summer School program for teaching Hungarian to foreigners. The books are written completely in Hungarian. There is an accompanying 'dictionary' for each book with translations of the Hungarian vocabulary in English, German, and French.

[edit] Hungarian grammar books

• A practical Hungarian grammar (3rd, rev. ed.). Keresztes, László (1999). Debrecen: Debreceni Nyári Egyetem. ISBN 963-472-300-4.
• Practical Hungarian grammar: [a compact guide to the basics of Hungarian grammar]. Törkenczy, Miklós (2002). Budapest: Corvina. ISBN 963-13-5131-9.
• Hungarian verbs and essentials of grammar: a practical guide to the mastery of Hungarian (2nd ed.). Törkenczy, Miklós (1999). Budapest: Corvina; Lincolnwood, [Ill.]: Passport Books. ISBN 963-13-4778-8.
• Hungarian: an essential grammar. Rounds, Carol (2001). London; New York: Routledge. ISBN 0-415-22612-0.
• Hungarian Language Learning References (including the short reviews of three of the above books)
• Noun Declension Tables - HUNGARIAN. Budapest: Pons. Klett. ISBN 9789639641044
• Verb Conjugation Tables - HUNGARIAN. Budapest: Pons. Klett. ISBN 9789639641037

[edit] References

[edit] External links

• Hungarian - A Strange Cake on the Menu - article by Nádasdy Ádám
• HungarianBookstore.com Online dictionary, Hungarian-English, English-Hungarian language books, links, related tools
• Ethnologue report for Hungarian
• Numerals of some Uralic languages
• Uralic page
• Introduction to Hungarian
• Hungarian Profile
• "The Hungarian Language: A Short Descriptive Grammar" by Beáta Megyesi (PDF document)
• The old site of the Indiana University Institute of Hungarian Studies (various resources)
• Let's try to learn Hungarian (Magyar) and Turkish! - with Japanese translation
• Grammar, phonology and syntax plus some history of the language
• Hungarian Language Learning References on the Hungarian Language Page (short reviews of useful books)
• Debrecen Summer School with Hungarian Language and Culture Courses offered in Budapest, Debrecen and Sopron all year round. The Language School is part of the University of Debrecen and has been teaching Hungarian as a foreign language since 1927.
• Balassi Bálint Institute (Hungarian language teaching)
• Hungarian Language School (available with Internet Explorer and Netscape)
• Hungarian Language Review at How-to-learn-any-language.com
• One of the oldest Hungarian texts - A Halotti Beszéd (The Funeral Oration)
• Hungarian runic writing
• Rokonszenv - A very good and precise study about the Uralic languages, in Hungarian only

[edit] Linguistic chapters from the Encyclopaedia Humana Hungarica (1–5)

• Introduction to the History of the Language; The Pre-Hungarian Period; The Early Hungarian Period; The Old Hungarian Period
• The Linguistic Records of the Early Old Hungarian Period; The Linguistic System of the Age
• The Old Hungarian Period; The System of the Language of the Old Hungarian Period
• The Late Old Hungarian Period; The System of the Language
• The First Half of the Middle Hungarian Period; Turkish Loan Words
• (The English translations of volumes 6 to 9 are in preparation.)

[edit] Dictionaries

• Hungarian Dictionary: from Webster's Dictionary
• Hungarian<->English created by the Hungarian Academy of Sciences - Computer and Automation Research Institute MTA SZTAKI
  Also includes dictionaries for the following languages to and from Hungarian : German, French, Italian, Dutch, and Polish.
• English-Hungarian-Finnish - three language freely editable online dictionary
• Dictionary with Hungarian - English Translations from Webster's Online Dictionary - the Rosetta Edition
• Hungarian-English False friends (False friend)
• Hungarian slang
• Hungarian-Japanese-Hungarian online dictionary

[edit] Online Language Courses

• A Hungarian Language Course by Aaron Rubin
• STELLA HUNGARIAN – free online course Hungarian for beginners
• Online course hungarotips.com
• Study Hungarian! (AFS.com)
• Hungarian Phrase Guides
• Magyaróra: New paths to the Hungarian language
• Hungarian Language Lessons - Puzzles, Quizzes, Sound Files

[edit] More links for learners

• Course, Vocabularies, Phrases, Literature...

	Official languages of the European Union
Bulgarian | Czech | Danish | Dutch | English | Estonian | Finnish | French German | Greek | Hungarian | Irish | Italian | Latvian | Lithuanian | Maltese Polish | Portuguese | Romanian | Slovak | Slovenian | Spanish | Swedish
Source: European Union website

Finno-Ugric languages
Ugric	Hungarian | Khanty | Mansi
Permic	Komi | Komi-Permyak | Udmurt
Finno-Volgaic	Mari | Erzya | Moksha | Merya† | Meshcherian† | Muromian†
Sami	Akkala Sami† | Inari Sami | Kemi Sami† | Kildin Sami | Lule Sami | Northern Sami | Pite Sami | Skolt Sami | Southern Sami | Ter Sami | Ume Sami
Baltic-Finnic	Estonian | Finnish | Ingrian | Karelian | Kven | Livonian | Ludic | Meänkieli | South Estonian | Veps | Votic | Võro † denotes extinct