Lost in translation..

[Ganymede]

No, nothing to do with the movie, just trying to catch your attention...

Can anyone help me with a silly question, please? I'm trying to find out the meaning of the word 'ezret'. I googled it, and there were a lot of hits, all of them Hungarian, but the internet translators I tried didn't give me any plausible meaning.

I think I know what it means, but I could use some confirmation. As far as I can make out, this is a conjugation of the Hungarian word for thousand. Is that right?

[Dakkus]

My ISP's internet dictionary couldn't find that word, but it found word "ezred", which means:

regiment ,noun, military
thousandth part, noun, common language

"ezredes" is "colonel" and "ezredik" is "thousandth, adjective, common language"
"ezrelék" would be promille (0,1%)

Because Hungarian language is closely related to Finnish, "ezret" could be some conjugation of word "ezred". I got no idea :)
However, we've got a Hungarian speaking participiant in this forum. I can't remember who it is, but he's anyway Finnish. He'll tell (if the word really is Hungarian)

[Ganymede]

That's alright, you've helped me a lot already. At least I can be pretty sure it's not offensive...

See, Ezret is a name I made up for a fictional character. These days it's very easy to check if there's anything wrong with it. I google everything to make sure there's no chance of funny coincidences, strange meanings etc.

I'm still wondering if I should use Aris. I got hits like Agrarian Russian Information System, Aids Resources, Information & Services, FC Aris Thessaloniki, and also several people called Aris.

[BogPoet]

Have you tried www.logos.net?

EDIT - Not in there

[Ganymede]

Thanks anyway, I 'collect' these sites...

I'm pretty sure by now that it's derived from the Hungarian word for thousand, ezer - possibly the plural? In the texts I found it was very often in combinations like: '40 ezret' or '68 ezret'.

[ag_pt]

you should try this english<-->hungarian dictionary:
http://consulting.medios.fi/dictionary

if anyone knows about other good dictionaries for other languages, please reply and report them here! one never knows when it becomes useful!

[Ganymede]

Ow, I've got a few of those... Most are in my favorites, at home, but here's some I've got in a little notebook that I take everywhere.

These are my favorites for a quick look-up. Like with most internet translators, don't expect miracles:

• InterTran, for 28 languages, single words, texts and URLs
• FreeTranslation, English to spanish, French, German, Italian, Dutch, Portuguese, Russian, Norwegian and Chinese (v.v.), single words and texts
• Babel Fish, English to Chinese, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Portuguese and Spanish (v.v.) and German-French, single words, texts and URLs
• SYSTRANBox, for English to Dutch, Japanese, Korean, Chinese, Russian, Spanish, French, German, Italian and Portuguese (v.v) and for French to Dutch, Spanish, German, Portuguese and Italian (v.v), for words, texts and URLs

Which one I pick depends on my mood.

For word-translations in some of the 'smaller' languages, you can try www.langtolang.com, or www.majstro.com/index.html. For Dutch users there's also www.vertaalwoord.nl.

[Poutsi]

In addition to those Ganymede already posted:

WorldLingo, the best Dutch -> English free translator I've found, translates English, Chinese(Traditional/Simplified), Dutch, French, German, Greek, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Portugese, Russian and Spanish.

Google Translate, similar as Babelfish (both use Systran), translates also URLs IMO better than BabelFish.

[Ganymede]

I didn't say my list was complete, sometimes I forget... I've written them down straight away.

You're absolutely right to mention the Google one, especially since I find it also works much better on the URL translations - with some of the others it is very hard, if not impossible to click through to another page (for instance the second page of a topic).

[Aaron]

Thanks anyway, I 'collect' these sites...

I'm pretty sure by now that it's derived from the Hungarian word for thousand, ezer - possibly the plural? In the texts I found it was very often in combinations like: '40 ezret' or '68 ezret'.

As far as I remember correct, ezret is a partitive form for ezer. I can ask my girlfriend who is Hungarian.

[Aaron]

Thanks anyway, I 'collect' these sites...

I'm pretty sure by now that it's derived from the Hungarian word for thousand, ezer - possibly the plural? In the texts I found it was very often in combinations like: '40 ezret' or '68 ezret'.

As far as I remember correct, ezret is a partitive form for ezer. I can ask my girlfriend who is Hungarian.

Remembered to ask finally.

Yes, I was correct. It really is ezer (=thousand) put in partitive case.

But you Indo-Europeans most likely don't have a clue what partitive is.

[Dakkus]

But you Indo-Europeans most likely don't have a clue what partitive is. :roll: :lol:

In fact they probably do. For example French, Italian and Spanish languages have a partitive form, too.
When a Finn says "syödä koiraa", a Frenchman says "manger de chien". Here the word "de" indicates a partitive form.
"Soy de manzana" is something like "I'm made of apple substance". (In Finnish it would be "Olen omenaa", as opposed to "Olen omena"). Though, my Spanish skills are so bad that I can't be 100% sure the Spanish sentence I wrote is completely right. But you get the point anyway and the sentence should be understandable by a Spaniard :)

BTW, It's quite interesting how the Hungarians call their colonels. If "ezer" is "thousand", then "ezredes" must be something like "thousandator". So, a person who commands thousands of others. In Finnish we used to have a word alike. It was "sadanpäämies". "sata" = "hundred", "-n" = "of" or " 's ", "päämies" = (in older Finnish) "chief". So, that would be "chief of hundreds". I don't know what a sadanpäämies actually was, but I'd understand it was somekind of military word anyway :)

[Aaron]

But you Indo-Europeans most likely don't have a clue what partitive is.

In fact they probably do. For example French, Italian and Spanish languages have a partitive form, too.
When a Finn says "syödä koiraa", a Frenchman says "manger de chien". Here the word "de" indicates a partitive form.
"Soy de manzana" is something like "I'm made of apple substance". (In Finnish it would be "Olen omenaa", as opposed to "Olen omena"). Though, my Spanish skills are so bad that I can't be 100% sure the Spanish sentence I wrote is completely right. But you get the point anyway and the sentence should be understandable by a Spaniard

But it is not a partitive form then. They use prepositions instead.

BTW, It's quite interesting how the Hungarians call their colonels. If "ezer" is "thousand", then "ezredes" must be something like "thousandator". So, a person who commands thousands of others. In Finnish we used to have a word alike. It was "sadanpäämies". "sata" = "hundred", "-n" = "of" or " 's ", "päämies" = (in older Finnish) "chief". So, that would be "chief of hundreds". I don't know what a sadanpäämies actually was, but I'd understand it was somekind of military word anyway

This sadanpäämies word comes probably from Latin. I don't think it has ever been used in Finnish military.

Hungarians have their own words for quite many things whereas other languages use words borrowed directly or indirectly from Latin. This is one of the reasons why many Indo-Europeans say Hungarian language is difficult but the real reason is they're used to learn languages of which grammar and a huge part of the vocabulary is close to their own language. That's why I'm not extremely impressed if a Dutch-speaking person boasts he can speak fluently also English, Swedish, Danish, Norwegian and German.

[Ganymede]

Hey, I'm Dutch, we don't have any cases left besides a few antiquated expressions, but I studied Latin (and German) in school. I know my way around nominative, genitive, dative, accusative, ablative and vocative cases, sorry if I haven't mastered the partitive yet! And I díd do some homework - not that it helped much...

(...) the Partitive case, an object case which alternates with Accusative case under various circumstances (which include its use to give a predicate Imperfective meaning), in Finnish.

The partitive is one of the most difficult cases for a foreigner to learn in Finnish. This case is usually used in the same instances when some or a few would be used in English.

• In negative sentences in place of the accusative
• In negative existential sentences in place of the nominative
• With all numbers greater than 1 and with 0 (use the singular partitive when it comes after the number and the plural when it isn't attached to it!)
• With indefinite amounts of things, in particular, things that can't be measured very easily
• When something is still in the process of being done
• With the phrase it is X (please note exceptions to this rule!)
  • NB. Some adjectives can be used in either the nominative or the partitive, but most Finnish teachers will tell you it is easier to just use them in the partitive (except for the following three, which are always in the nominative).
  • NB. If X is a noun, then it is always in the nominative, even if it is in a negative sentence!
  • Exceptions: The adjectives hyvä, paha and parempi are always in the nominative
• In greetings
• In weather reports

It would seem the third point in this list fits the bill of 'my' Hungarian websites...

[Aaron]

• With all numbers greater than 1 and with 0 (use the singular partitive when it comes after the number and the plural when it isn't attached to it!)

It would seem the third point in this list fits the bill of 'my' Hungarian websites...

No, in this case there's a difference between the Finnish and Hungarian grammar. Hungarians don't put words always to partitive after numbers just like we do. For example:

English: house / three houses
Hungarian: ház / három ház
Finnish: talo / kolme taloa

In English they use plural, Hungarians don't use anything and Finns put it to partitive (talo -> taloa).

It consists also on numbers, as ...hundred and ...thousand.

If you say in Hungarian 'two thousand forints' it is kétezer forint. In this case everything, also 'ezer' stays in nominative. As far as I've understood (I'm just a beginner) you have to put the numbers to partitive in such cases as if you say for example 'I'm not ready to pay two thousand for this'. Then the one who says assumes the other one knows they're talking about forints and he doesn't mention it. But in this case you have to put the number to partitive.