A cső nedves.

The pipe is wet.

Breakdown of A cső nedves.

• az: the
• nedves: wet
• cső: a pipe or tube

Questions & Answers about A cső nedves.

Why does the sentence start with a? Is that the word for the?

Yes. A is the Hungarian definite article, so it corresponds to the in English.

Hungarian has two forms of the definite article:

• a before a consonant sound
• az before a vowel sound

So:

• a cső = the pipe / the tube
• az alma = the apple

In this sentence, cső begins with a consonant sound, so a is the correct form.

Why is there no word for is in A cső nedves?

In Hungarian, the verb to be is often omitted in the present tense, third person when the predicate is a noun or an adjective.

So English The pipe is wet becomes simply:

• A cső nedves.

This is completely normal Hungarian.

Compare:

• A cső nedves. = The pipe is wet.
• A cső hosszú. = The pipe is long.

But in the past or future, Hungarian does use the verb:

• A cső nedves volt. = The pipe was wet.

And in some other sentence types, especially location/existence, van does appear:

• A cső itt van. = The pipe is here.