Learn Hardcore Hungarian: A múlt héten színházba mentünk a barátokkal. - Last week we went to the theatre with friends.

Hungarian often uses the definite article a/az with time expressions. A múlt héten literally means “the last week,” i.e. “last week.” Omitting a would sound less natural or mean “a week in the past” rather than the specific one just passed.

Why is múlt héten written as two separate words and why does it take the -en ending?

Múlt (“last”) is an adjective modifying the noun hét (“week”), so they stay separate. To express time (“when”), hét takes the case ending -en, yielding héten. The extra e is an epenthetic vowel for pronunciation.

Why is there no article before színházba?

When a noun directly takes a case ending (here the illative -ba “into”), you drop the article. So színház + -ba becomes színházba (“into the theatre”).

How do you decide between -ba and -be for place?

By vowel harmony. Check the last vowel of the stem: színház has the back vowel á, so it takes the back-vowel suffix -ba (not -be).

What does the suffix -ba do in színházba?

It marks the illative case, indicating movement into or to a place.

Why is there no pronoun mi (“we”) in the sentence?

Hungarian verbs encode person and number in their endings. Ment-ünk already means “we went,” so adding mi is redundant and usually dropped.

What does mentünk literally consist of?

It’s the past-tense, first-person plural form of menni (“to go”). Ment- is the irregular past stem, and -ünk means “we.”

Why do we say a barátokkal and not just barátokkal?

Adding the article a makes the noun definite: a barátokkal = “with the friends” (those specific friends). Without a, barátokkal would mean “with friends” in a general sense.

How is barátok + -val formed as barátokkal?

Because barátok ends in k, the comitative/instrumental suffix -val undergoes assimilation and consonant doubling: barátok + val → barátokkal.