Breakdown of A tanár küld egy e-mailt a diákoknak.
tanár
the teacher
diák
the student
egy
a
küldeni
to send
e-mail
the email
-nak
to
Questions & Answers about A tanár küld egy e-mailt a diákoknak.
What is the function of A in A tanár küld egy e-mailt a diákoknak?
The first A is the definite article “the.” Hungarian uses articles before noun phrases to mark definiteness. So A tanár means “the teacher.”
Why is the verb küld in this form rather than küldi?
Hungarian has two conjugation patterns: definite and indefinite. Because the direct object egy e-mailt is indefinite (“an email”), we use the indefinite third-person singular form küld. If the object were definite (for example az e-mailt, “the email”), you would switch to the definite conjugation: elküldi or küldi (with a prefix as needed).
What role does egy play before e-mailt?
egy is the indefinite article “a/an.” It marks e-mailt as an unspecified email. Thus egy e-mailt = “an email” in the accusative.
Why does e-mail take a -t at the end?
Hungarian marks direct objects with the accusative suffix -t. Even loanwords like e-mail simply take -t to become e-mailt when they are the object of the verb.
Why is it a diákoknak and not just diákoknak?
Hungarian uses the definite article with all nouns, regardless of case. So a diákoknak = “to the students.” Here -nak is the dative case suffix (“to”), and the article a stays in front of the noun phrase.
How do you form the plural and dative of diák?
First add the plural suffix -ok to get diákok (“students”), then add the dative suffix -nak for “to”: diákok + -nak = diákoknak.
Can you change the word order in this sentence?
Yes. Hungarian word order is flexible and signals emphasis/focus. For example:
- A tanár a diákoknak küld egy e-mailt. (emphasizes “to the students”)
- Egy e-mailt küld a tanár a diákoknak. (emphasizes “an email”)
How would the sentence look if the teacher sends a specific email instead of just any email?
You’d make the object definite (az e-mailt) and switch to the definite verb form. For example:
A tanár elküldi az e-mailt a diákoknak. or
A tanár megküldi a diákoknak az e-mailt.
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