A főváros nagy.

In Hungarian, the verb to be is usually left out in the present tense when the subject is third person singular or plural.

So:

• A főváros nagy. = The capital is big.

But in other persons, Hungarian does use the verb:

• Én nagy vagyok. = I am big.
• Te nagy vagy. = You are big.

So this omission is normal and required here, not casual shortening.

A is the Hungarian definite article, meaning the.

So:

• a főváros = the capital

Hungarian has two forms of the definite article:

• a
• az

The choice depends on the sound at the start of the next word:

• a before a consonant: a főváros
• az before a vowel: az iskola

Since főváros begins with f, which is a consonant, Hungarian uses a.

Főváros is a single word meaning capital city.

It is built from:

• fő = main, chief
• város = city

So its literal sense is something like main city or chief city.

Hungarian often forms words by combining parts like this.

Great question. Hungarian does put adjectives before nouns when the adjective is directly describing the noun inside a noun phrase:

• a nagy főváros = the big capital

But in A főváros nagy, nagy is not simply modifying the noun inside the phrase. It is the predicate: it tells you something about the subject.

So the structure is:

• A főváros = the subject, the capital
• nagy = the predicate adjective, big

That is why it comes after the noun here.

A simple pronunciation guide:

• főváros ≈ foe-vaa-rosh
• nagy ≈ roughly nawdj or nody, depending on how you approximate it in English

A few important points:

• ő is a long Hungarian vowel that does not exist exactly in English.
• á is a long vowel, somewhat like the a in father.
• s in Hungarian is pronounced like English sh.
• gy is a special Hungarian sound, somewhat like the dy in duke in some pronunciations, but softer.

Also, Hungarian stress is usually on the first syllable:

• FŐváros
• NAGY

Hungarian does not have grammatical gender like English he/she distinctions in nouns and adjectives, so nagy does not change for masculine, feminine, or neuter.

So nagy can describe many kinds of things:

• a ház nagy = the house is big
• a város nagy = the city is big
• a könyv nagy = the book is big

However, in some situations Hungarian can mark plurality in the predicate:

• A városok nagyok. = The cities are big.

So there is no gender agreement, but there can be number marking.

Yes. Hungarian word order is quite flexible, and changing it often changes the focus or emphasis.

For example:

• A főváros nagy. = neutral statement: The capital is big.
• Nagy a főváros. = more like The capital is big / It’s the capital that is big, with extra emphasis on big

The basic meaning stays similar, but the information structure changes. For a beginner, A főváros nagy is a good neutral pattern to learn first.

It is in the nominative case, which is the basic dictionary form of the noun.

There is no special ending here because főváros is the subject of the sentence:

• A főváros = the capital (subject)
• nagy = big

Hungarian uses many case endings, but this sentence uses the simple base form.

You would say:

• egy nagy főváros = a big capital

This is different from:

• A főváros nagy. = The capital is big.

Compare the structures:

• egy nagy főváros → adjective + noun inside one noun phrase
• A főváros nagy. → subject + predicate adjective

This is an important distinction in Hungarian.

In speech, Hungarian often makes yes/no questions mainly with intonation.

So you can say:

• A főváros nagy? = Is the capital big?

You may also hear different word orders depending on focus, such as:

• Nagy a főváros?

Both are possible, but for a learner, the simplest idea is that intonation can make it a question even without adding a separate word for is.

Because in Hungarian, the sentence is still a completely normal full sentence even without an explicit present-tense is.

So:

• A főváros nagy.

is not incomplete at all. Hungarian grammar simply allows the present-tense copula to be omitted here. The punctuation works just like in English: a statement gets a period, a question gets a question mark.