Page:Simplified grammar of the Hungarian language.djvu/26

14 Nouns follow in the accusative singular the same rules as to orthographical changes as in the plural.

A substantive is declined in the plural in the same way as in the singular, the affixes being joined to the plural endings—e.g., házak houses; házaknak, házaké, &c.

We have seen that the object governed by the attributive case is always inflected, Péternek aty-ja.

A substantive which is governed by another substantive, that is, a noun which is claimed as property or possession by a preceding (attributive) noun or pronoun, is called birtok (property), which we will render in English with the "object possessed."

The object possessed is inflected to express its relation to the foregoing substantive or pronoun, and as the possessor is the speaker himself, the person spoken to, or the person or thing spoken of, the object will express by means of suffixes whether it belongs to the first, second, or third person, wherefore these suffixes are called personal suffixes.

The first and second persons can of course only represent rational beings; the third person comprises persons or things alike.

The possessor can be one or more things or persons, as:—

A gyermek könyve, the book of the boy. Here the possessor gyermek is in the singular.