Magyar o'clock - can you solve this?

General discussion about learning languages
User avatar
lavengro
Blue Belt
Posts: 728
Joined: Wed May 24, 2017 1:39 am
Location: Hiding in Vancouver. Tell no one.
Languages: English - finally getting a handle on this beast of a language. Also tinkering with a few other languages intermittently.
x 1994

Magyar o'clock - can you solve this?

Postby lavengro » Mon Nov 30, 2020 9:49 pm

From the online version of The Guardian. The solution is posted in today's The Guardian if you are curious to check your work or keen on cheating. I can post the solution (or at least The Guardian's solution) tomorrow.

3. Magyar o’clock.

Below are four time expressions in Hungarian, followed by their expression in numerals.

Három perc múlva háromnegyed három: 2.42

Három perccel múlt háromnegyed három: 2.48

Négy perc múlva negyed három: 2.11

Négy perccel múlt négy: 4.04

How would a Hungarian say 3.03 and 3.19?
7 x
This signature space now on loan to the mysterious and enigmatic Breakmaster Cylinder:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hUGKldkiex4

User avatar
lavengro
Blue Belt
Posts: 728
Joined: Wed May 24, 2017 1:39 am
Location: Hiding in Vancouver. Tell no one.
Languages: English - finally getting a handle on this beast of a language. Also tinkering with a few other languages intermittently.
x 1994

Re: Magyar o'clock - can you solve this?

Postby lavengro » Mon Nov 30, 2020 9:53 pm

Here is a link to a more current version of the column, with some more language-related puzzles.

https://www.theguardian.com/science/2020/nov/02/can-you-solve-it-puzzles-for-language-lovers
1 x
This signature space now on loan to the mysterious and enigmatic Breakmaster Cylinder:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hUGKldkiex4

User avatar
lavengro
Blue Belt
Posts: 728
Joined: Wed May 24, 2017 1:39 am
Location: Hiding in Vancouver. Tell no one.
Languages: English - finally getting a handle on this beast of a language. Also tinkering with a few other languages intermittently.
x 1994

Re: Magyar o'clock - can you solve this?

Postby lavengro » Wed Dec 02, 2020 3:55 am

Solution from The Guardian:

"The solutions are:

3.03 Három perccel múlt három

3.19: Négy perccel múlt negyed négy

Here’s how I worked it out. The final line suggests that négy is 4. Perc(cel) appears in the same position in all of them so is probably hours or minutes, and so múlt is probably ‘past’.

The confusing word in the other lines is három, which appears three times in the first two sentences and once in the third. In fact, the first two sentences differ only in that one has perc múlva and the other has perccel múlt, which we have hypothesised might be ‘minutes past’. So perc múlva might be ‘minutes to.’

How might 2.48 and 2.42 be related if one is the same number of minutes more and the other one is the same number of minutes less? Well, it works counting three minutes backwards or forwards from 2.45. Let’s say, therefore, that három is 3. Then háromnegyed három must be 2.45. How? Well, again we have seen that négy is 4, so this might suggest that negyed is ¼, which means that the Hungarian phrase for 2.45 is ‘three quarters [on the way to] three]. In other words, when mentioning quarter-hours Hungarians refer to the hour that is coming rather than the hour that has just past. Thus négy perc múlva negyed három is ‘four minutes to a quarter [on the way to] three’, or 2.11.

We can now deduce that:

3.03 is három perccel múlt három. (Three minutes past three)

3.19 is négy perccel múlt negyed négy. (Four minutes past a quarter [hour] [on the way to) four.)
"
5 x
This signature space now on loan to the mysterious and enigmatic Breakmaster Cylinder:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hUGKldkiex4

gaborszollosy
Posts: 1
Joined: Wed Nov 23, 2022 8:35 pm
Languages: Hungarian (N), English (N), Swedish (A1)
x 3

Re: Magyar o'clock - can you solve this?

Postby gaborszollosy » Wed Nov 23, 2022 8:41 pm

As a native hungarian speaker I can tell you, that 3:03 would simply be:

Három óra három perc.
(lit. three hour three minute)

3:19 is:

Három óra tizenkilenc perc.
(lit. thre hour nineteen minute)

We usually don't refer to time in relation to being close to a quarter, like in English.
3 x


Return to “General Language Discussion”

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: themethod and 2 guests