Венгр тілінің дыбысталу ерекшеліктері

Sounds and pronunciation of the Hungarian language

The phonology of the Hungarian language is notable for its process of vowel harmony, the frequent occurrence of geminate consonants and the presence of otherwise uncommon palatal stops.

Combination of a "palatalizable" consonant and a following palatal consonant results in a palatal geminate. Palatalizable consonants are palatal ones and their non palatal counterparts: d ~ gy , l ~ ly , n ~ ny , t ~ ty Full palatal assimilation occurs when the ending palatal consonant is j : nagyja 'most of it', adja 's/he gives it'; tolja 's/he pushes it'; unja 's/he is bored with it', hányja 's/he throws it'; látja 's/he sees it', atyja 'his/her father'. The cluster lyj is a simple orthographic variant of jj : folyjon 'let it flow'. Partial assimilation takes place if an alveolar stop (d, t) is followed by a palatal gy , ty : hadgyakorlat 'army exercises', nemzetgyűlés 'national assembly'; vadtyúk 'wild chicken', hat tyúk 'six hens'. Some sources report that alveolar stops change into their palatal counterparts before ny : lúdnyak 'neck of a goose', átnyúlik 'it extends over'. The majority of the sources do not mention this kind of assimilation. When the first consonant is nasal, the partial palatal assimilation is a form of the nasal place assimilation (see above). The full palatal assimilation is an obligatory feature in standard Hungarian: its omission is stigmatized and it is considered as a hypercorrection of an undereducated person. Partial palatal assimilation is optional in articulated speech.

Long consonants become short when preceded or followed by another consonant, e. g. folttal 'by/with (a) patch', varrtam 'I sewed'.

The middle alveolar stops may be omitted in clusters with more than two consonants, depending on speed and articulation of speech: azt hiszem ~ 'I presume/guess', mindnyájan 'one and all', különbség ~ 'difference'. In morpheme onsets like str , middle stops tends to be more stable in educated speech, falanxstratégia ~ ~ 'strategy based on phalanxes'.

assimilates to a following (e. g. balra , 'to the left'). also tends to be omitted between a preceding vowel and an adjacent stop or affricate in rapid speech, causing the lengthening of the vowel or diphthongization (e. g. volt 'was', polgár 'citizen'). This is quite common in dialectal speech, but considered non standard in the official language.

Standard Hungarian prefers hiatus between adjacent vowels. However some optional dissolving features can be observed:
An optional weak glide may be pronounced within a word (or a compound element) between two adjacent vowels if one of them is i , e. g. fiaiéi ~ ('the ones of his/her sons'). This, however, is rarely transcribed. Adjacent identical short vowels other than a and e may be pronounced as the corresponding long vowel, e. g. zoológia ~ ('zoology'). Adjacent double i is always pronounced as single short in the word endings, e. g. Hawaii This reduction is reflected in the current orthography when the adjective forming suffix i is added to a noun ending in i. In this case suffix i is omitted also in writing. e. g. Lenti (a placename) + i → lenti 'of Lenti'.

The stress is on the first syllable of the word. The articles a, az, egy, and the particle is are usually unstressed.