# Essive-formal and Essive-modal



## 123xyz

Though the essive-modal seems to have some additional functions in adverb formation, I can't see how it is used differently from the essive-formal to denote what something is being used as. 
Both "emberként" and "emberül" seam to mean "as a human/man".
What would be the difference between the two?


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## Zsanna

Hello 123xyz,

I haven't seen yet a linguistic comparison between the two, so I could only give you my hunch about the difference between them at first sight (1) and some examples that may illustrate their use (2).

1. Roughly, I'd say that *emberként* could be "in the shape of a human being", "as a human being", (_en tant qu'homme_ - does French it can help?) i.e. more in a physical sense - meanwhile *emberül* is used more in a figurative sense, having the (good quality of a) human being, i.e. doing something as much/as honestly as a human being is capable of (that means a lot of good in Hungarian).

2. Examples 

a) 
- Zeus öreg emberként jelent meg előtte. (Zeus appeared to him as an old man.) 
- Nem orvosként mondom, hanem barátjaként, hogy tegyen így. (I'm not saying this as a doctor but as your friend that you should do this.) -> here it is less "physical" than in the previous, still, it is not figurative, rather abstract...

b) 
- A csata hőse megállta helyét emberül. (The hero of the battle stood his ground like a man) 
I may have overdone it a bit (the verb already expresses that he did very well) but to illustrate the meaning I think it's OK. 

It was also an example that this suffix can go with/follow some verbs (although they sound a bit old fashioned/literary in this form): felró hibául (= claims as a mistake/error), felhoz ürügyül (= brings up as a pretext), kiválaszt utódjául (= choses as his/her heir - e.g. a king a young man when he gives evidence of great bravery and wisdom...) 

- it can also go with verbs the other way round (another grammatical category) - this is used more, sounds more natural than the examples above: 
rabul ejt (= "takes as a prisoner", i.e. charms somebody with her glance) - Az első pillantásával rabul ejtette a férfit. 
vendégül lát (= "sees somebody as a guest", i.e. to provide him with seat, food, bed - whatever entertaining a guest may require) - Behívták a házba és vendégül látták a koldust.
valami balul üt ki ("something strikes in a lefty way", i.e. it ends up in a bad way) - Minden, amit próbált, balul ütött ki. 
feleségül venni valakit ("take somebody as a wife", to marry somebody -> only a woman) - A királyfi feleségül vette Hófehérkét.


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## Olivier0

A difference I can see is that -ként refers to the subject and -ul/ül to the object:
he appears to him as an old man, he says this as a friend = what follows "as" is the same as the subject of the verb = -ként
he chooses him as his heir, she takes/charms him as a prisoner, he sees/entertains him as a guest, he takes her as a wife = the same as the object = -ul/ül
-- Olivier


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## Zsanna

I don't know whether it helps but, in French, M. Nyéki (in _Grammaire pratique du Hongrois d'aujourd'hui_) explains the first group in  b) as: "Combiné à un certain nombre de verbes,_ -ul/-ül_ fonctionne comme un véritable morphème de rection" and the second: "Le complément en _-ul/-ül_ entre aussi dans des tournures relevant de la phraséologie."

As translating these wouldn't have helped much with our original dilemma, I chose to be lazy... but if 123xyz speaks French, it may be now some extra help, too.


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## 123xyz

Thank you for the elaboration and examples - I don't believe I've understood the difference grammatically but I do think I'm now getting the feel of when it's right to use which. As for the subject/object obeservation, that doesn't seem to agree with the structure of the sentence "A csata hőse megállta helyét emberül." The word in the essive-modal seems to modify the subject, "hős". However, this usage seems to be something different - in Macedonian we also say "as a human/man" to indicate that something is being done properly but usually in the context of scolding or referring to something being done improperly, so I'd say the connotation is different, though I find it helpful to make that link. 
By the way, I have no knowledge of French


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## francisgranada

The following is surely not "exact", but perhaps may help to understand the difference:

*How*?   (In what way/mood...?)
magyarul, emberül, balul ... (in a Hungarian, human, bad ... way, i.e. approximately "in Hungarian, humanly, badly")

*As what/who*?  (In what function/role/identity ...? )
magyarként, emberként, orvosként, barátként ... (as/like a Hungarian, man, doctor, friend ...) 

The suffix -ul/-ül behaves like a "normal" adverb formant, while _-ként _can be often substituted by "_mint_":
Nem orvosként mondom, hanem barátjaként   >   Nem mint orvos mondom, hanem mint a barátja

_Vendégül látni, feleségül venni etc..._ are rather idiomatic phrases, that cannot be translated literally to an other language.


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