Breakdown of Mennyibe kerül ez a szendvics?
Questions & Answers about Mennyibe kerül ez a szendvics?
Mennyi means how much or how many, depending on context.
Mennyibe is built from mennyi + -be, where -be normally means into, but in this expression it helps form the idiomatic pattern for asking a price:
- Mennyibe kerül? = How much does it cost?
So you should think of mennyibe here as part of a fixed price-question structure, not as a word you translate literally piece by piece every time.
A useful comparison:
- Mennyi ez? = How much is this?
- Mennyibe kerül ez? = How much does this cost?
Both are natural, but mennyibe kerül is especially common for asking the price of something.
Great question, because this often feels strange to English speakers.
The ending -be usually means into, as in movement into something. But in mennyibe kerül, the whole phrase is idiomatic and historically connected to the idea of something amounting to or coming into a certain sum.
So although -be often has a clear spatial meaning elsewhere, in this phrase you should simply learn:
- mennyibe kerül = how much does it cost
You do not need to actively interpret -be as into when using this expression.