Date and time notation in Hungary
Date
In Hungary date is traditionally expressed in big-endian form, like ISO 8601. Numeric date elements are followed by a dot. The format yyyy. month d. is commonly used, the name of the month can be abbreviated (standard are ‘jan.’, ‘febr.’, ‘márc.’, ‘ápr.’, ‘máj.’, ‘jún.’, ‘júl.’, ‘aug.’, ‘szept.’, ‘okt.’, ‘nov.’, ‘dec.’[1]). Months can also be written using Roman or Arabic numerals.[2] Examples:
- 1999. augusztus 1.
- 1999. aug. 1.
- 1999. VIII. 1.
- 1999. 08. 01. or recently 1999-08-01
As year and day elements in Hungarian are ordinal numbers, they are followed by a dot. However, unless a suffix is added, they are said as cardinal numbers. Also note that stacking of symbols when writing in Hungarian is considered a bad practice, therefore when a suffix is attached to the date using a hyphen, the dot is omitted.
- 1999. augusztus 1-jén (on August 1, 1999)
A single year is followed by a dot unless it is
- followed with a suffix ‘1999-ben’ (in 1999)
- the object of the sentence ‘1999 szép év volt.’ (1999 was a nice year.)
- followed with a postposition ‘1999 után’ (after 1999)
- a genitive ‘1999 tele’ (winter of 1999)
- in parentheses ‘születésének éve (1999)…’ (the year of his/her birth (1999)…).
Monday is the first day of the week.
Time
Like in most countries, the 24-hour clock is used in formal and 12-hour clock in informal contexts. The time format is “hh óra mm perc”, but the numeric form hh.mm can also be used.[2] Example:
- 10.35
The following are commonly accepted divisions of the day that can be said before the time:
- hajnal (dawn) – 1–5 a.m.
- reggel (morning) – 6–9 a.m.
- délelőtt (before noon) – 10–11 a.m.
- délután (afternoon) – 1–5 p.m.
- este (evening) – 6–10 p.m.
- éjjel (night) – 11 p.m.-1 a.m.
Additionally, dél (noon) and éjfél (midnight) may be used.
Each hour is divided into four equal periods and are verbally referred to as in the following examples:
- negyed 8 (quarter 8) – 7:15
- fél 8 (half 8) – 7:30
- háromnegyed 8 (three-quarter 8) – 7:45
Combining the above with 5 perc múlva (5 minutes before) or 5 perccel múlt (5 minutes after) is commonly used when asked for the time. Example:
- 5 perc múlva háromnegyed 8 – 7:40
- 3 perccel múlt 7 – 7:03
References
- ↑ Osiris Helyesírás, 2006 (ISBN 963-389-541-3)
- 1 2 A magyar helyesírás szabályai, 2005 (ISBN 963-218-980-9)