Hungarian words that do not exist in English

Although English is a rich and complex language, there are some situations where English speakers cannot express something with one word, while Hungarians do not have that issue. Read our article and have a look at Hungarian words that do not exist in English!

Love = szerelem and szeretet

The Hungarian Language has two separate words for love. – writes catchbudapest.com. One of them is szeretet, which is very general. Hungarians use it to express love towards their friends or for family members. On the other hand, szerelem means something more specific: romantic love. This distinction is important to note, as there is a difference between the two kinds of love. For example, if you talk about your partner, you can describe the feeling as szerelem. However, if you talk about your pet, it is best to use szeretet.

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Siblings: báty, öcs, nővér, húg

When it comes to describing siblings, the Hungarian vocabulary is very rich. In English, you can only say younger or older brother/sister, but in Hungarian, each has his/her own word. The older brother is báty, while the younger one is öcs. Regarding female siblings, the younger sister is húg and the older sister is nővér (note that nővér also means nurse).

Have you ever been happy about someone else’s misfortune?

Interestingly, there is no word for this feeling in English. The Hungarian language, however, can express this with the word káröröm. Káröröm basically means that you feel secretly happy when something bad happened to someone else. – writes ourwanders.com. The literal translation of this word would be “damage-joy”. It is probably not the nicest feeling, nonetheless, Hungarians are able to express it with only one word.

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Ne kertelj!

This unique Hungarian word is quite useful to learn. Although kert means garden, kertelni is something totally different. A person who “kertel” will try to avoid answering a question directly. If you talk your way around something, you are doing exactly what this Hungarian word is used for. In addition, kertel can describe the action where a person constantly changes the topic to avoid a certain issue. Actually, there is one idiom that is very similar to this in English: beat about/around the bush. But the Hungarian language is able to express it with one word only.

Source: ourwanders.com, catchbudapest.com