Distributive numerals (Hungarian)

Dupl(DN)(N): Reduplication of the stem can only occur within nominal heads.

Suf(DN)(V): Reduplication of the stem can only occur within verbal heads.


(1) berta és rudi két-két csomag-ot hoz-ott.

Berta and Rudi two-two package-acc bring-pst.3sg

‘Berta and Rudi brought two packages each.’


(2) berta és rudi kett-es-é-vel hoz-t-a a csomag-ok-at.

Berta and Rudi two-dist-3sg-ins bring-pst-obj.3sg the package-pl-acc

‘Both Berta and Rudi brought two packages at a time.’


In Hungarian, distributive numerals have different forms depending on the part-of-speech properties of their heads. If the head of the phrase is a noun, the reduplication of the numeral expresses the distributive meaning. In the case of a verbal head, however, the numeral takes a special suffix.

Author: 

Nikolett F. Gulyás