Hungarian grammar

Expressing “to have” and “there is”

Hungarian language – just like Russian, Arabic and Hebrew – lacks the verb to have, so we need other ways to express it. For this reason, we use the verbs van, vannak, which are considered to be the Present tense, Realis Mood, S/3 and P/3 form of lenni (=to be), however these verbs aren’t used for expressing he is/she is/they are, as in those cases the verb has to be left from the sentence, so that the lack of the verb in a sentence indicates that the predicate is nothing else than the Present tense, Realis Mood, S/3 and P/3 of lenni (see: conjugation). So the verbs van, vannak are used only for expressing to have and there is/there are. So let’s see the meaning of these words and their negations:

van: there is

vannak: there are

nincs (or nincsen): there is no

nincsenek: there are no

For example:

Van Isten. = There is a God.

Vannak okos gyerekek. = There are smart children.

Nincs kegyelem. = There is no mercy.

If we want to express to have or not to have, then we have to use these 4 words. And then we take the noun, which would be the object of to have in the English sentence. Then we have to add the Possessive affixes to this noun. Also important to put the owner into Dative (last 2 examples). For example:

Van autóm. = I have a car.

Nincsenek gyerekeim. = I don’t have children.

Van házad? = Do you have house?

Vannak testvéreid? = Do you have siblings?

Eszternek van autója. = Esther has a car.

A gyerekeknek nincsenek autóik. = Children don’t have cars.