# Tótok & szlovakok



## Witiza

Hello everyone,

what's the difference between a tót and a szlovak in Hungarian?

Kössz!


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## francisgranada

As to the meaning - nothing. _Tót _in Hungarian was used to call the Slavs inside the Hungarian kingdom, later the Slovenes and the Slovaks, from about the 17th-18th century only the Slovaks.

It's an exonym, etymologically connexed to _Deutsch_, _Dutch_, _Teuton_, _Tedesco_, etc. The original meaning of the corresponding Indo Eupean stem was "people","folk".  From the foundation of Czechoslovakia (1918) the term Szlovák (autoetnonym of Slovaks) is used instead, as the term _tót_ is/was  considered derogatory by some Slovaks.


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## ilocas2

A propos, a question, what is more used among ordinary Hungarians, Tót or Szlovák?


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## francisgranada

ilocas2 said:


> A propos, a question, what is more used among ordinary Hungarians, Tót or Szlovák?


Szlovák, nowadays practically exclusively (as far as I know).


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## Witiza

Therefore, the Hungarian family name "Tóth"   means "slav" (as Horvath, Német mean Croatian and German)?


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## francisgranada

Witiza said:


> Therefore, the Hungarian family name "Tóth"   means "slav" (as Horvath, Német mean Croatian and German)?


Yes, but I think rather _Slovene/Slovak_ (later only Slovak) than _Slav _in general, as for other Slavic people/nations (that already represented a "political nation" or something like this ...) specific ethnonyms were in use (_horvát,  lengyel, orosz, cseh, rác ..._).

In other words, the common usage of family names in Hungary begins in the 13th-14th  century and it became officially compulsory only in 1787, so I think that the family name _Tót(h) _does not go back to the times when it could have meant _whatever Slav_.

For curiosity, something similar happened with the word _olasz _(also family name), which today means exclusively _Italian_, but in the past it meant "Romance speaking people/person", not only from Italy. See e.g. the place name Olasz .


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## Witiza

Rendben, köszönöm szépen!


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## franknagy

"Tót" is an old Hungarian word denoting the Slavic inhabitants of the Uplands, used until 1920. Since Trianon, you must use "Szlovák" t*he word how this people names himself, if you want to remain politically correc*t and you do not want to hurt our Northern neighbors.
The word "tót" however must not be replaced in proverbs like:

"Fogadd be a tótot, kiver a házadból!" 

"Úgy kellett nekem, mint üveges tótnak a hanyattesés."
"Szétcsapott köztük, mint tót az oláh juhai között."
The usage of "oláh" and "román" is the same.


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