A nyugati város szép.

In Hungarian, the verb to be is usually left out in the present tense when the sentence is in the third person and works like X is Y.

So:

• A város szép. = The city is beautiful.
• literally: The city beautiful.

This is completely normal in Hungarian.

But van/vannak can appear in other situations, for example:

• for existence: Van egy város itt. = There is a city here.
• in other persons: Én szép vagyok. = I am beautiful.

So in A nyugati város szép., the missing is is not missing at all by Hungarian rules.

A is the definite article, meaning the.

So:

• a város = the city

Hungarian has two forms of the definite article:

• a before consonant sounds
• az before vowel sounds

For example:

• a város = the city
• az ember = the person

So in this sentence, a is used because nyugati begins with a consonant sound.

Because nyugati is an adjective modifying the noun város.

In Hungarian, attributive adjectives usually come before the noun, just like in English:

• szép város = beautiful city
• nyugati város = western city

So:

• a nyugati város = the western city

That part is a noun phrase, and then szép is the predicate adjective: is beautiful.

Nyugati means western or of the west.

It is related to nyugat, which means west.

So:

• nyugat = west
• nyugati = western

This -i ending is very common in Hungarian for making an adjective from a place, region, direction, or institution.

Examples:

• kelet = east → keleti = eastern
• Magyarország = Hungary → magyarországi = from/in Hungary, Hungarian-based

So nyugati város means western city.

Because here szép is not directly describing the noun inside the noun phrase. It is the predicate adjective: it tells us what the subject is like.

Compare:

• A szép város = the beautiful city

  • here szép comes before város and directly modifies it

• A város szép. = The city is beautiful.

  • here szép is the thing being said about the city

So in A nyugati város szép.:

• A nyugati város = the subject, the western city
• szép = what is said about it, beautiful

This is a very important distinction in Hungarian word order.

Usually, no. Hungarian adjectives do not agree with nouns in gender, and Hungarian does not even have grammatical gender like he/she nouns in many Indo-European languages.

So:

• szép város = beautiful city
• szép ház = beautiful house
• szép emberek = beautiful people

The adjective szép stays the same.

This is often easier for English speakers than languages where adjectives change for masculine/feminine or singular/plural.

In this sentence, the subject is A nyugati város.

A good way to see it is:

• A nyugati város = the thing being talked about
• szép = what is said about it

So the structure is:

• Subject: A nyugati város
• Predicate adjective: szép

This is like:

• The western city / is beautiful

Hungarian word order can be flexible, but in a neutral sentence like this one, the subject often comes first.

Yes, Hungarian word order is flexible, but changing it usually changes the focus or emphasis.

The neutral version is:

• A nyugati város szép. = The western city is beautiful.

You might also hear:

• Szép a nyugati város.

This still means roughly the same thing, but it can sound more like:

• The western city is beautiful
• with extra emphasis on beautiful

Hungarian word order is strongly connected to information structure: what is new, what is emphasized, what is contrasted.

So the sentence you were given is a normal, neutral way to say it.

Szép is pronounced approximately like sape in English, but with a purer vowel and no strong glide at the end.

A few useful points:

• sz in Hungarian sounds like English s
• s by itself sounds like English sh
• é is a long vowel, roughly like the vowel in say, but cleaner and more stable

So:

• szép sounds something like sayp or sape, depending on how you approximate it

The accent mark in Hungarian usually shows vowel length and sometimes vowel quality too. It is a real part of the spelling, not optional.

A rough English-friendly pronunciation is:

nyoo-gaw-tee

A bit more carefully:

• ny is like the ny in canyon
• u is a short u
• a is like o in British-style lot or a short open a
• stress is on the first syllable, as in almost all Hungarian words

So:

• NYU-ga-ti

Hungarian always stresses the first syllable, which is a very useful pronunciation rule.

Grammatically, egy is the indefinite article and means a/an, so:

• egy nyugati város = a western city

However, Egy nyugati város szép. by itself can sound a bit unusual or context-dependent, because in English too, A western city is beautiful often feels incomplete unless you mean a specific one in context.

Still, the article system works like this:

• a/az = the
• egy = a/an

So the sentence you were given uses the definite article because it means the western city.

No, not in normal Hungarian.

The usual adjective + noun order is:

• nyugati város = western city

If you say város nyugati, that is not the normal way to build a simple noun phrase. Hungarian generally puts adjectives before the noun when they directly describe it.

So:

• correct normal form: nyugati város
• not normal in this use: város nyugati

This is one of the places where Hungarian is similar to English.

Yes. Depending on context, nyugati can mean:

• geographically western
• culturally or politically Western

For example:

• nyugati országok = Western countries
• nyugati kultúra = Western culture

So in A nyugati város szép., the exact nuance depends on context:

• a city in the western part of a country
• a city belonging to the West in a broader sense

Without context, western city is the safest understanding.