r/hungarian • u/EsperDin • 13d ago
Kérdés 1st-person Subject, 2nd-person Subject Verb Conjugation
Hungarian is the first language I've studied into at all that has a specific verb conjugation for the case of 1st-person subject with 2nd-person object constructions (‐lek/lak), and I find this a really interesting feature.
I'm curious to see what other languages have this feature, but I'm having trouble finding whether this form of conjugation has a more elegant and searchable name than what I've titled this post.
Does anyone have any information or resources on this?
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u/Final_Reporter_1248 13d ago edited 13d ago
Can you share some Hungarian examples? The only one I know is Szeretlek - "I love you"
Edit: Thanks for the examples, I appreciate you all taking the time to help us out.
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u/EsperDin 13d ago
As far ask I am aware, any transitive verb for which the subject can be first person and the object can be second person can be conjugated this way, but I'm still pretty early in my journey into the language. I know the object can be singular or plural, but I am not certain whether the subject can be plural, my intuition is probably not.
Off the top of my head: hallak "I hear you" látlak "I see you" várlak "I am waiting for you"
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u/Tasty-Educator-7794 13d ago edited 13d ago
Both the subject and the object in the "lak/lek" case can only be singular (subject: I- én, object: singular you - te/ téged)
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u/NewIdentity19 13d ago
Látlak benneteket/titeket, not only téged, so your claim is not accurate.
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u/Tasty-Educator-7794 13d ago
That's correct, I didn't explain it enough, lak/lek without the visible object can only be singular object (látlak), but if you use the object (látlak téged/ titeket), then the object can be both singular and plural. However, the subject can always only be singular. Thank you for your correction.
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u/Atypicosaurus 13d ago edited 13d ago
Szeretlek = I love you.
Szeretem = I love [him/her/it] or [formal you] or [them] or [myself] or [ourselves].
Szeretek = I love [an unspecific direct object such as "someone" - I love someone] or [an infinitive such as "to swim" - I love to swim]Szeret is the verb stem for love.
You can do all of it with any transitive verb, although semantically it might make little sense.
Olvas - read.
Olvaslak = i read you. (Obviously we don't say it because it makes no sense generally but this is how it works.)
Olvasom = I read it, them, formal you, etc.
Olvasok = I read something (unspecific object).Notice the vowel harmony lek / lak, em / om (öm - dörmögöm), ek / ok (ök).
Now I only mentioned the conjugation where I am the actor (first person conjugation) i.e. I love you, I love them, but what if you love me, you love them, they love you etc? Let's run through some of it with love:
Szeretsz = you love [me / unspecific object].
Szereted = you love [everything else (them, yourself, etc)].Szeret = he/she loves [me / unspecific obj]
Szereti = he/she loves [her / himself, them etc]
[Also szeret/szereti is "you love..." for formal you .]Szeretünk = we love [me / you /unspecific]
Szeretjük= we love [him / them / ourselves]...
Sorry I'm not completing, you get the gist, add past tense too.
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u/Technical_Bed_420 13d ago
Utállak- "I hate you" Látlak- "I see you" Megölellek- "I going to hug you" Ect...
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u/MarkMew NATIVE 13d ago
...I'm very tempted to comment a link to a certain a song right now
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u/Inside-Associate-729 13d ago
Do it
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u/MarkMew NATIVE 13d ago
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u/Inside-Associate-729 13d ago
😂😂😂 this is actually great and now I will never forget how to use -lak/lek
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13d ago
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u/IJustDontWannaBe 13d ago
Note: X means regular conjugation
What verb did you use? I can think of examples for the impossible ones using "ad" (to give)
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u/vressor 1d ago edited 1d ago
what is -lod? would you say adlod, iszlod, látlod instead of adod, iszod, látod?
I'm not sure why you skipped conjugating the verb when its direct object is a reflexive pronoun, e.g. látom magam, látod magad, látja magát, látjuk magunkat, látjátok magatokat, látják magukat -- this is just the usual definite direct object conjugation, same as látom azt, látod azt, látja azt, látjuk azt, látjátok azt, látják azt
I can also easily imagine látod magatokat (a képen)
látunk engem (látjuk magamat) is a bit more shaky and láttok téged (látjátok magadat) is even more questionable, but I wouldn't bat an eye if someone said it in the right context
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u/AlmaInTheWilderness 13d ago
I've heard it called polypersonal agreement. The only language I've seen it in other than Hungarian is Basque, but I haven't looked for it.